MetroiD

Happy birthday guys!!! Hincks, I really think it's time you stopped playing with toys already, you're getting too old for that! You really should consider a career in whacking, now that's a proper job with huge possibilities...

Great idea! That shotgun sure must have come in handy while fighting off the pirates

Ah, the railing! Loving it! Besides, it's good to know you're not a minifig racist :) I've only got a small suggestion and don't worry, it doesn't involve you building anything additional to this top-notch entry - I'd just love it if the door to the pub were cracked open a bit, so that viewers could get a glance inside... In addition, that way it would also look as if the fleshie redcoat and the yellow bluecoat have just "taken it outside". Sense of action, you know

Subtle improvements always go a long way :) Glad to see you added that backpack and the broom, the story makes even more sense this way. The path is also a winner and the idea with those vines is also nice, although I think the way this one is placed makes it stand out a bit too much - it almost looks as if it were glued to the house. I'd suggest adding a few more wine pieces to give it a more natural look... You could check out the way I garnished the sidewalls of our Flower Shop with vines if you're unsure as to how that would look.

"Last", as in how long you're gonna enjoy it, I guess? I don't think that's a question which anyone can answer for you. If you've got second thoughts about it, I guess it pretty much tells you all you need to know - although these sets are really stunning in person, pics can never do them enough justice. That aside, I think you don't have too much time to make up your mind tho. It'll be a month tops before the Cafe Corner is completely off the shelves and prices will skyrocket then... P.S.: Oh, as to the build - it shouldn't take THAT long. No matter how long you haven't been playing with LEGO, the instructions are extremely thorough, so I'd give 10 hours TOPS - that is, if you take your time - a lot of it...

Erm, this goes out to the admins - guys, excuse me if this sounds stupid, but I was wondering whether I was the only one who's bothered by the fact that there seems to have been a bit of a misunderstanding here... I think Briggs wanted his MOC (and the entry itself) to still be called "Harbour Master's Office" and the description of the topic to contain "PTV II - Large: Traders, Traitors and Jail-Breakers" as a clarification that he's submitted it a PTV entry. What he got instead is... a weird designation for his MOC, to say the least

Been there, done that (in my first car, on the highway). Believe me, it's anything but a thrill. Having that experience is what kept me off buying a scooter when I was 18. On a sidenote - I did upgrade that ol' car a bit, but I still made a point never to take it out on the highway again. Now, the ZXR 400 is not a flyer per se, but it's still a zappy bike and should be able to hit a nice top speed which won't make me feel too ashamed!

The way brown & dark red works with classic white walls is undeniably marvellous, that's one of the reasons I like this creation so much! Welcome out of the Dark Ages. Once LEGO was a toy, now it's hard-earned joy Just kidding -- I wish you the best of success in getting all those pieces cleaned and sorted. If you have a girlfriend, that's the perfect way to get her into LEGO (and I'm not joking here!) Making your comeback with an entry in such a contest is a wonderful thing, I can only congratulate you once again :)

That's true, but I don't feel it reflects how people feel about the blog. In any case, a suggestion I have regarding that would be to remove the whole moderation process - any one of the bloggers should be able to remove stupid / offensive comments if there are such, which in my point of view is a better alternative than waiting half a day until your comment actually gets posted - by then that MOC you've commented on is already old news. Should be a tough call, I know you're really enjoying it... And so are C-T's readers! But whatever you decide, it's good to know you'll still be around slipping people the Johnson Rod

Good to hear this is the final version, you seem to have had enough of modding it by the sound of things... I do hope _you_'re happy with the final result, because that's the only thing that matters at the of the day. As a viewer/ voter, I have to say once again that this is one of my favourites - with or without Photoshop :D

Adding this to the PTV II Contest is definitely a wonderful idea, I was hoping you'd do that. That way we get even more diversity in the Large category - besides, another cool MOC can't go amiss there! And it does fit the theme of this year's contest perfectly - at least in my point of view. I was actually checking this one out over at Flickr a few days ago and I wasn't aware you'd posted it here as well. Congratulations, it's a great MOC and your attention to detail makes it a joy to behold. There's just one small thing which spoils that joy - and that's the amount of dust which some of your pieces have gathered throught the years . Believe me, I know just how you feel about that, I've got a pretty sizeable chunk of my collection ruined by sun & dust - and while the latter can be cleaned, the effects of sunlight on white and grey bricks can be detrimental... However, back to the dust issue - seeing as you've entered this wonderful MOC into the contest, I thought I'd just give you a friendly advice to dust it off so that you get more votes in. EB members are pretty spoilt as far as Pirate MOCs go (due to being given the chance to check out tons of awesome MOCs :P), so they'll definitely nit-pick something as high up on the "nay-nay" list as obvious dust layers... Since I'm guessing you wouldn't want to take that to pieces just yet, I'd recommend using a soft toothbrush and some warm water to rinse your bricks. That shouldn't take too much time or effort, but the outcome should be a noticable imrpovement. Even though, I must admit, having dust on top of the treasure chests looks sooo right! That aside, I was also wondering why you'd wanted to build the entire thing out of white bricks. It's perfect as it is, I don't think a full-white approach would have been a good idea, least of all because it would have looked way too monchromatic Perhaps the gold-coloured 2 x 1 slope bricks would indeed have looked nice in white, but then again those pieces don't come in white all too often, unfortunately. Otherwise though, the entire construction & design is wonderful, and the same goes to the little stories unfolding all over the place :) If there's just one thing I would have really liked to see more of, that has to be docks & wharves... I really enjoy seeing good builders come up with unique wharf designs and thought that a larger and more intricate dock would have been the perfect thing to place in a Harbourmaster MOC - for example, something along the lines of the Imperial Trading Post - because your MOC does kinda remind of that awesome set. That said though, I like this one as it is just fine - I was just imagining what you could have come up with if you'd decided to extend that. Good luck in the competition! This is definitely an entry to look out for!!

NPU all over! I particularly enjoyed seeing yet another use for the extra wide barrels and the lettuce exo-force hair pieces. Brilliant concept too! I wouldn't want to be in the shoes of those guys "downstairs" when the mighty yew finally cracks though. Just a question - how did that knight get up there anyway!?

Awwwwww, now that's just mean of you, animal cruelty man!!! I can take mischievous, and as for impatient, yeah that's pretty much me, but small!!! I'm officially offended

Ooops, my bad. For some weird reason I was almost sure that the baseplates were tan... well, doesn't really matter all that much anyway, since dark bley baseplates can't be combined with old classic town street baseplates either. I hadn't voted in the old poll and I'm still holding off my vote until I receive the Cafe Corner (courtesy of EB member emile who kindly agreed to ship it to me from the UK!). Then, I'd own 3 out of 4 which should give me enough choice, right?

Whoa! Absocarbinglutely fantastic! You're a master of 30s designs (nothing new, but I just had to say that)... The techniques you've utilised there are very clever, you're quite a bit out of the box ;) Can't wait to see the green convertible in actual bricks! Btw... can I please your typewriter design when furnishing our CC? It's just plain awesome!

That is precisely what I'm planning to do to our Toy Store set once it arrives! catbricks, it really is a wonderful mod and brings so much life to the whole structure! I particularly love the combination of windows you've used on the second floor - simple, yet absolutely delightful! Is it time to start playing all the Christmas songs yet? I'm holding back a few more weeks, but I really can't wait for Christmas and New Year to finally come this year... Guess I just want 2009 to finally end. Oh but anyway, enough of my moaning - catbricks, I love this one and actually seeing it alongside the GG and CC has given me quite a few thoughts about where I'd fit it in our city! Yay!

Milan, sounds like that must have been a terrible experience... That's the only reason why I don't like scooters - they're extremely practical, but can sometimes turn a good thing into a downright nightmare. I would have told you to consider getting a new bike on a lease after selling off the Elyseo. The new Suzuki Gladius 650 is supposed to be an affordable alternative, and so is the Ninja 250R - however, it is not sold in every country and I'm not sure how things are in neighbourly Serbia. For what it's worth though, I must say that I believe your ZZR beats both of those hands down ;) Btw, I know that our Greek friend Zorbas is also a huge bike fan, perhaps we could organize small Balkan LEGO scavenging bike tours at some point later on

Ouch! On second thought... should I point you in the direction of Scruffy's cold body? You need to ask TheBrickster for that, but I can still make arrengements

Calm down, will ya. You are really making a fuss out of something which is supposed to be fun. If you feel you're being treated unfairly, try resolving your issues privately. YOUR poll included Town Plan, which is nowhere NEAR being a Modular Set, and this was never about Market Street being included or excluded from the list. That poll was never "taken over", whatever you mean by that. It was simply an attempt to compare sets, some of which had absolutely nothing in common. For your information and for future reference - the Cafe Corner, Green Grocer and Fire Brigade are all LEGO Exclusives. The Market Street is a LEGO Factory Set. There is a substantial difference between those and it's like comparing a Creator set to a regular City set - even though they might sometimes look alike. And even though, in this case, the Market Street does define the "modular concept" in its 16x16 implementation. I too am a huge fan of the Market Street and would love it if LEGO continued producing similar sets, but the bottom line is - comparing it to the other three is simply not fair. That said, the fact that the Town Plan is also a LEGO exclusive does not in any way justify it being called a "Modular Set" - because it's quite clearly not one. Which is perfectly fine and doesn't mean the set is worse in any way... Edit: Link included

Hush up, you mischievous small-animal-dragging Santa. We know it was you! By the way, your time of the year is approaching fast... What animal are you going to pick for slaughter this time around Btw - just so that I'm not off-topic: Impatient Mutt was _most_ probably given to me by that whacker Hinckley - for a) being impatient as I am (at least I admit it!) and b) being a good-yet-freakishly-large-strong-and-talkative dog on the Murder Express. Poor Scruffy got shot for most of the above reasons... :cry_sad:

From the looks of it, LEGO are definitely not planning on pulling the plug on the Modular Sets line (but still, let's hope that's not wishful thinking / interpretation on our side...). As Jamie Berard has shared in his interview with Captain Zuloo (a huge THANK YOU goes out to Z for providing us with that!), LEGO are obviously paying attention to what fans want - and especially to what AFOLs have requested in terms of exclusive sets. Actually, if that weren't true, I don't think that sets such as the Imperial Flagship, the Carousel or most of the Modulars would have ever seen the light of day! I myself would like to see the Modular Sets being expanded at the rate they've been going so far - one set per year feel just about right (on my wallet, mostly ), especially bearing in mind that there are also other wonderful exclusives such as the Emerald Night, the VW Beetle or the Imperial Flagship that most of us would never be caught missing out on. So for the summer of 2010 (when I hope the next Modular would be announced - if there is one), I would be very happy if we could get something along the lines of.... the Market Street. Yes, you're not mistaken, I'm really talking about set 10190 which was a bit neglected and remained in the shadows of its two (now three) "bigger brothers". To me however, that set was a wonderful foundation which any AFOL could improve as they saw fitting, all the while keeping the original idea intact. In other words, it is a wonderfully-designed set which wouldn't get dismantled immediately after it is built (as, for example, is the fate of all Creative House sets that I buy) and it leaves more than enough room for your imagination to fill in the gaps (furniture, decoration, etc.). Most of all, it provides realism to LEGO Modular City streets - because let's face it, not every building in town can or should be a 32x32 behemoth (which in some cases even gets boosted by unlimited extra floors... right, Svelte? ). That said, I'd be chuffed if LEGO were to release a library using the same approach as the Market Street - a bit less bricks, a bit less furniture / decorations, but the same originality in architecture and colour variety and that very same level of sheer awesomeness. What's more important, I feel that now that the Modular Set line has been more or less consolidated, a cheaper alternative for next year would be a smart marketing move (Market Street did cost a mere 90 EUR which was more than affordable compared to the price of the three "official" Modulars). That way, sales of the Fire Brigade would continue unabated by the introduction of a new set, which in turn would also bring in quite a lot of cash for TLG. At the end of the day, both sides need to happy, right?

In light of Jamie Berard's recent interview in Captain Zuloo's Behind The Helm, Ep. 12, I really do believe that discussing potential new exclusive sets and possible additions to the Modular Sets line would be much more rewarding, seeing as those are precisely the products which are aimed at AFOLs and as such are most influenced by our wishes and desires. So I believe it would be very useful if you guys added your suggestions as to what Modular Sets you would like to see released in the future.

Lorentzen mate, I don't really think you need a big solid swivel armchair there. Even a small round chair would suffice - just to add some kind of seating for extra comfort in front of that lovely fireplace. Knowing the trickeries you're capable of, I'm sure you can come up with something like that! I personally would suggest using a 2x2 round plate(possibly with a matching tile on top) as the top of the chair. I'll leave the base to your imagination - that plate does provide for quite a few options, and if I were you I'd probably consider using a T-piece for the connection beneath the 2x2 plate. As to your photoshopping - the embers, the burnt-up end of the stick and the pieces of eight stashed downstairs do look lovely, especially in the first pic. I'm not 100% sure about the glow which you've given to the treasure chest and the candles, but it may just be me - in any case, I don't feel the lighting effects are overdone.

Indeed, it is so much bettah! I must say I enjoyed the addition of the mastermind who's rather busy pouring wine down his throat. That would most definitely have to be me if I were ever to be caught in such a situation The cavern holding the treasure chest is concealed in a very clever way and adding more depth to the actual pithole has worked wonders here. I really feel that the whole MOC looks complete now - great work ;)

Now THIS is a point I absolutely agree with. On the one hand, I must admit that smooth pavement does look very nice and is definitely an eye-catching concept which allows for tons of creativity... But on the other hand, street pavement in LEGO world is not supposed to be studless, it's the exact opposite of that - otherwise you get poorly-balanced minifigs slipping all over the place Seriously though, same as the entire city-building concept, the Modular sets did turn around the whole simple concept of pavement as well. I personally am still considering whether to keep the tiles in our city (when it's built). They sure look lovely, but can be a costly alternative to the simple yet rather effective solution of using the actual baseplates. That, however, poses another big problem - modular sets are not built on grey baseplates per se - the Green Grocer utilizes a green 32x32 baseplate and the Market Street is built on a couple of tan 16x32 baseplates. Displaying that as it is would look downright ugly alongside any street baseplate, so there goes an additional expense for purchasing enough replacement grey baseplates. In light of that fact, I think we will stick with tiles after all. Of course, putting in a 1x1 plate or a jumper every now and then, so that minifigs can actually feel comfortable walking their own city streets. Besides, the real advantage which comes along with tiling sidewalks is the fact that the extra height does not only look more realistic (Pavement! It's not at street level), but it also provides for a wonderful way of hiding tram/train rails that run alongside the streets (as discussed a few weeks ago). I'm sorry for the off-topic rant... Just thought that was also an interesting topic to discuss alongside the theme of Modular Sets which has indeed been discussed at length on multiple occasions.