Brick Miner

what i am seeing is that the shelves ARE stocked, they are stocked VERY WELL... just not with LEGO... i am seeing MEGABLOCKS and other non-buidling toys. if LEGO toys were selling fast, too fast to keep on the shelves, we would be seeing empty shelves... which is not the case. LEGO is doing terrible, that is a fact... i got this off a information news site somewhere. - brick miner

egyptian theme was so great... when lego canceled the western and pirates in 1998, this was the only theme saving me that year. it did a wonderful job of letting me down easy !!! but then i was let down again, because the adventures moved to the amazon jungle... and achu just wasn't that cool. just a weak version of the great islanders. dinos sucked, and disgraced the adventures theme... all of the orient was good, but i had stopped buying legos during the time of their release, so i am not as familiar with them... i voted egyptian desert !!! bm

yup, that is the head i was refering to... i can't believe its officially a SPACE head !!! it works so well with pirates, western, and adventurers !!!

awesome, well, i'll have to get that camera, it looks like there is some hearty conversations going on here !!! what i meant was, it is the best image, not the best MOC !!! your presentation was really spectacular. on a scale of presentation i would give a 4 of 5. i gave it a two of five because of the lack of creativly putting bricks together... like i said, this set is more a tribute to LEGOs great minifigure designs rather than the MOC itself. i would give 6247 bounty boat, 6706 frontier patrol, or any minifigure pack the same type of score. now on the contrast, let me give some examples of small sets that would score high (4 or 5). western set 6712, something as simple as that frying pan adds so much to that small (otherwise minifigure based) set. the frying pan couldn't have been thrown into any other set and had the same impack it did on 6712. pirate set 1872 has the same feel with the soldiers camp. 6237 is a great small set because it has a lot of playablity, right out of the box. you can have a treasure hunt, and a pirate/imperial face off !!! also, making a treasure hunt a larger set seems pointless. a treasure hunt was the prefect concept for LEGO to release as a small set. to make a treasure hunt set as large as 6270 would be ridiculous !!! this is probably why LEGO released a small treasure hunt set twice (6235 and 6237) !!! now that i mention it, 6712 is great for the same reason, there is a lot of conflict to play out for such a little set, and again, the frying pan along with the prickely bush and accsesories are a prefect touch to the gun-shootout setting. - brick miner

why does your signature include a dog-chewed cutlass ??? ;-) oh, and the mini-fig head is good... the reason it might look a little fruity is that the expression is so happy with a open mouth grin, when all the other armada figures are not, and have tightened eyebrows. however, the lips do look a little red on my screen. i always like the SPYRUS CHEIFs head for a pirates minifig MOC... it seams to blend seamlessly. - brick miner

first of all great job on the photoshopping... looks spectacular !!! i also have respect for announcing such a simple set as your first MOC. what a great idea. it shows that MOCs don't have to be multiple thousands of pieces (as seen on classic-castle) to be great. i look at this set as if LEGO had officially released it. i used all the same criteria when rating this MOC as i do when i rate LEGOs sets. as i said before small sets are great, but they have to present something new, that the larger sets just cant do. for example, the "cargo train" has great road cars. but they get lost behind the shadow of the overpowering train its self. within little sets, the focus is not driven from the smaller objects... all-in-all i think the smaller MOCs are harder to produce and to make look great. all the smaller details are revealed, and their construction has to be just right, with exactly the right pieces. for example you can't use two 1x2 bricks in place of single 1x4 brick. in a larger MOC you can get away with it !!! this set is simply men, and as with the "frontier patrol" of the western series i would give it a low score due to its lack of creatively of putting bricks together, and for not bringing anything new to the table that a larger set hasn't done. notably, the cannon cart does have handles, and that separates it from the cannon cart in imperial trading post. this MOC is a more of a tribute to LEGOs great craftsmanship of designing mini-figs, and not to the actual design of the set. it is interesting to note that you decided to add a horse... it could be argued that you strayed to far from the "pirate" theme, if you are trying to produce a set in the style of LEGO releases. LEGO used boats as modes of transportation for the pirate sets. this possibly could be attributed to the fact that they need to keep some distance from the castle theme. although i am not objected to adding a horse to LEGOs pirate theme, personally, i would never add one when trying to keep to LEGOs consistency with the theme. i am also interested in this idea of creating rules and limitations with my MOCs. this also helps when mixing MOCs with LEGO releases.... and as you said its fun to explore the ideas the LEGO missed. as soon as i get a digital camera i'll try to post some of my MOCs which explore this concept. i gave your MOC a 2 of 5, and don't take that hard, i think this is a beautiful group of images. you did a wonderful job and i would love to see more !!! i would even venture to say that these are the best MOC images i have seen yet !!! again, great job in photohop. i am thankful that there is another LEGO fan that holds ideologies similar to mine. and even though i frequented this board several times, it took this post before i signed on and started contributing - brick miner