jodawill

This new The Office set perfectly summarizes everything that's gone wrong with the Lego community over the past several years. The build is uninspired. It's just a bunch of minifigures and, "Haha, I understand that reference!" I like the show, but I don't need to have my own Lego stapler in Jello. These TV show sets are a new low for Lego, to be honest. There's nothing creative here whatsoever. Even Star Wars has the building aspect. This is just nothing but, "Yes, I know that reference."

I was just telling @Norro the other day that I'd like to have enough of those original gold coins to take a bath in. If those ever showed up on the PAB wall, I'd clean out every store within a 10 hour drive from me. You're right though. I would need more cups of the new coins.

I like this too. I miss the old golden chrome coins, but these are also nice in a different way, and it's nice to have some consistency just as we did with the old coins. I hope this becomes a reoccurring part. I also hope it shows up in Pick a Brick. I'd like to buy enough to make a proper treasure mound with them. Imagine if they showed up on the PAB wall at the Lego store! I would buy an entire large cup full of them because.. why not?

Bricklink has been around since 2000.

Neither of them do.

Don't forget to smash that like button and subscribe! Look at all the cool Patron supporters scrolling across the screen! No, we just have, "Support my Ideas project!" Forums lend themselves to more nuanced and intelligent discussions. It's hard to have a meaningful conversation when you're limited to a small number of characters with no newlines and you're forced to type the message on your phone. Reddit's commenting format is a lot better, but I think the voting system, the more general audience, and the fact most people are anonymous makes it a really toxic platform.

Did anyone notice that these stairs are actually built with angles, but they match up to form straight stairs?

I don't think that buying things you use is consumerism. To me, consumerism is constantly buying more stuff not because of the use or enjoyment you get from the items, but because of a compulsion to buy more because of your exposure to marketing (and a flaw in your character). You can fall prey to consumerism by buying sets, but I've also met a lot of people who are obsessed with buying individual parts they don't use. It's a bit of a running joke that some AFOLs simply collect parts and don't actually build anything because they're too busy to use them or buy more than they could ever possibly use. There's nothing inherently wrong with something like the new Bowser set, but sets like that lend themselves to unhealthy, consumerist behavior, versus a set that includes much more general parts that encourage people to use their imaginations.

There was some speculation either in this thread, or maybe the castle one (I can't remember) that the GWP is the only place the forestmen's shield is available. It actually is in the castle. It's just hidden away and we can't see it in the photos.

I don't know what you've posted in the past, but I imagine a post asking a question would generate a lot more discussion than a post that's simply photos of your latest MOC. Even great MOCs don't generate a lot of discussion usually. If you posted a photo of your MOC and asked a specific question on how to improve it, you might get a lot of insightful comments. We're having a great discussion right here, after all. They've promoted the idea of "collecting them all" for a long time. In the Mania Magazines, they used to print posters of collections of sets with boxes for you to write "Date I Built." I think the two biggest contributors you mentioned are the licensed sets (which draw in a broader audience of collectors) and, most importantly, I think, "display only objects." Take that new Bowser set for example. It's an absolutely PHENOMENAL creation. I'm absolutely in love with it. But am I going to buy it? No. Not because of the price, but there aren't a lot of parts that appeal to me. If I bought it, I'd build it and set it on a shelf and just take it out to play with it occasionally. That's not why I buy Lego. But that's the kind of consumerism they're promoting with sets like that. That's the kind of thing where I would be really excited to see it as a MOC from a Eurobricks member, but I don't need to go out and copy someone else's MOC.

Yes, the amount of skill required to gain anyone's attention is a very high bar. Not only do you have to know how to build, but you have to know how to take good pictures of it also, which I'm terrible at. But you know, we don't need to build in order to get approval from other people. It's all about having fun. Whether you're a MOC builder or just a collector, we shouldn't be doing it for anyone else. We should be doing all of it for our own enjoyment, and when we share our work with others, it should be to have a discussion, not to feel approval from random strangers on the internet. Of course, the irony is that for all I know, people who do it only for enjoyment could be the vast majority of people, but we don't see them on the internet. They're off living in the real world. Don't feel discouraged if you don't get a lot of feedback on your MOCs. If you're having fun and exercising your mind, that's all that matters.

These are fantastic. Do you sell them?

I hadn't looked at that book in a long time. I completely forgot about the forestmen stuff in it. That's really a wonderful book. There's a lot of great ideas for both the forestmen and the castle stuff there. I think that hollow tree you mentioned is a great example of why the forestmen theme is so much fun to do MOCs with. This theme really gets my imagination reeling when I look at the photos. I think, though, that this theme is a rich topic for MOCs, but that doesn't necessarily mean we need dozens of sets, or even large sets. I'm very content having just a few sets that give us the parts we need to create our own stuff. I hope we get more torso prints soon, as well as brown hats. Black feathers would be amazing too. And imagine how fantastic it would be to have those plumes in black again!

This is an interesting discussion. This is something I've been noticing over the past decade also, and I have a lot of thoughts on it. I've been in the AFOL community for quite a few years. I never had a dark age in the sense that I stopped building, except a couple years as a teenager. But I stopped following new sets around 2001 because I didn't like the stuff they were producing. In hindsight, I really regret missing out on the rereleases in 2002. But I completely stopped paying attention to new Lego sets from about 2001 until 2009 when I saw new pirates sets in the stores, and that's around the time I found the AFOL community. Other people may have different perspectives, but I think there's been a marked change in the AFOL community since I found it. MOCs used to be the primary focus. The Lego subreddit used to be filled with cool creations. When I joined our local LUG, the meetings had a positive atmosphere. Everyone got together to discuss their latest creations and spend time with nice people. At some point, there was a shift. I think it was when the Lego movie came out. The Lego subreddit became turned into a stream of pictures of Lego boxes and people bragging about their "hauls." On social media in general, the discussions became dumbed down. Instead of people discussing building techniques and so forth, it turned into a bunch of consumerism. Our LUG saw a large influx of new members, largely people who are just collectors. A few bad apples (selfish, loud mouthed people) ruined the experience for me. Our meetings turned into a group of 40-50 people sitting around watching a small minority argue bitterly over how to distribute stupid freebies from Lego. One of the last times I went to one of the meetings, they spent most of the meeting arguing over how to distribute some dogs. I was so disgusted by it, I didn't come back for 6 months. Then when I returned, they were having the same argument again. I had a few other really sour experiences with people, so I eventually just left completely. (I'm thinking about going back now, several years later, because I miss the good people. I shouldn't let a few bad apples ruin it for me.) I don't know if this marks a change in society in general. I remember when I was a kid, my parents didn't have money to buy me Legos, and I'd go to other kids's houses and see their extravagant collections just sitting on the shelves. It always made me upset because I would have spent so many hours building with those things, and they didn't appreciate what they had. It's the same way I feel now about the "collector" community. I have a great appreciation for Lego sets as they're presented to us. There's nothing wrong with buying a set simply because you love the design. It's no different from buying a painting because it's beautiful, or listening to music that someone else wrote. The problem I have with this shift in the AFOL community is that, from my perspective, it doesn't seem like most people are really appreciating what they have. People buy things simply because they need to add to their collection. People build their sets once, then let them collect dust, or they set them on a shelf next to hundreds of other sets. Fewer people are buying sets merely for the parts and to enjoy the creative process. It's just consumerism. A company releases a product, they convince us we can't live without it, then once the newness wears off, we rinse and repeat. I think there's something different here from merely being someone who enjoys Legos and appreciates the official sets. This is an unhealthy relationship with our stuff, and I think it reveals the brokenness within us. I think there's room for people who both love creating MOCs and for people who are simply passive fans who appreciate the sets. The question I have for you, if you're reading this, is do you really take the time to appreciate what you have? Do you stop buying things long enough to smell the roses? Or are you just obsessed with accumulating more stuff? And if you're a builder, are you building because you enjoy it, or are you building because you're waiting for the next notification that someone "liked" your photos?

Those are some good ideas. I like the "bridge troll" idea. I think a lot of these things could fit in as a small bonus to a larger castle set though. For example, a bridge set (like the ones they had in the '90s) could come with a couple forestmen hiding under the bridge.

What kind of sets do you imagine they could have done? To me, there's only so many variations on "hideout in the woods" you can do. They're a small minority of the public by definition, and a large fort doesn't really make sense (although they did make one). Including some new minifigures in other castle sets would be a great way to keep the theme alive. (If we could keep the castle theme alive!) I really want some new b I'm not at all saying I don't like the theme. It's one of my favorite Lego themes. But I don't think we would appreciate it the same way if we hadn't gone so many years without new sets. Perhaps, and that could be really cool. But it doesn't really fit into the idea of outlaws living in Sherwood forest. It wouldn't take the foresters long to catch onto that. That's why the River Fortress never made sense to me. The idea of putting shields and flags on their secret hideouts doesn't make sense either, but it's Lego after all, and you have to take some liberties to make it look cool. So maybe an Ewok village style set could work too. I'm going to make a big castle display after the Lion Knights Castle comes out, and I hope to build a forest of black trees with the forestmen hiding in the middle of it. I love the idea of them being just a small portion of the display, almost an easter egg.

I think the real irony of the forestmen is how quickly the theme would have gotten old if they had given us as many sets as we thought we wanted. The entire idea only lends itself to a handful of small sets. I wish we didn't have to wait over 30 years between waves, but I think what they've done here is the most tasteful way to represent the faction - this GWP and a little hideout in the castle. I would love to get a new version of Forestmen's Crossing though.

I haven't seen anyone creating MOCs from this set yet. I just spent some time trying to come up with my own forestmen set from two copies of the GWP, and I'm pretty pleased with the results. I'm afraid I'm not much of a photographer, unfortunately. This MOC is somewhat inspired by Camouflaged Outpost, but re-imagined as a waterfall. Here's the full album. You can't tell from the photos, but the secret hideout under the waterfall is quite deep, extending more than half of the baseplate (which is the only part that isn't included in two copies of the GWP).

Well, the only thing you can do now is order two more of them in August.

You might want to wait until the Forest Hideout GWP is available again in August.

I can see the benefits of just simply showcasing the product so you can easily see what you're getting, but this old artwork really got my imagination going. It still does when I look at it. When I was a kid, I'd carry my magazines and catalogs with me everywhere I went, and I'd spend countless hours looking at these pictures, imagining all sorts of adventures. I couldn't afford the sets back then, so I really appreciated the free magazines. I think kids today would also get a lot more excited about the products if they were able to see them through the same lens we did with this terrific artwork. I've actually been thinking recently that it would be great if they'd release new issues of Mania Magazine to go alongside sets like Pirates of the Barracuda Bay and The Lion Knights Castle. I would love to see official artwork similar to this old stuff with the new sets, as well as the return of the Lego Maniac. (Imagine how cool it would be to have a new fan submissions page!)

Thanks! That's definitely what I was going for, and that's why I love those two Lego Movie 2 sets so much. I'll have to buy some more at some point for myself because I've basically given all of my copies to my son. Honestly, there's a lot of things I don't like about this new set. I'm not a fan of the use of barrels and buckets. It's too much like a Creator set, or even the Lego Movie. And, as I mentioned before, the use of tiles instead of slopes and that weird windshield are very unfortunate. Those parts should have been the highlight of the set other than the minifigures. This set just doesn't include a lot of classic space parts, even ones that showed up in the Lego Movie 2 sets. I'll still buy multiple copies though. The gray slopes and wings will be useful, and I want to get a lot of the red space minifigures. But honestly, the more I look at the details of this set, the less I like it. I would much prefer something that's just a straight up classic space set. Edit: With all this criticism I'm giving the set, that's not to say I don't like the way it looks. The set looks great for what it is (for the most part). But it definitely doesn't include the parts I wanted it to. Edit 2: I also wish they had gone with the smaller wheels on the vehicle. It makes sense because this set is 150% scale of the original, but those big fat tires don't look like classic space to me.

I love this. You did a fantastic job! It's amazing how recognizable every detail is.

Honestly, even though it was half that price a couple years ago, I still think that set is worth $15-$20. The other one is great also, and still sells for less than retail price. It's not a lot of pieces, but it includes four minifigures and some really terrific pieces. You could probably buy the minifigures and parts in bulk for much cheaper though. I think the yellow space guy is only $3. I haven't posted any MOCs in a long time, and I actually deleted my Flickr a while back. I used to have a Wild West display at Brickworld. I mainly just build with my son for fun these days. He's six years old. When he saw pictures of the new Galaxy Explorer, he asked me to make him one. This is what I came up up with (album). Except for the trans yellow plate and the baseplates, these parts are all from his modern sets. Here's some more space stuff we made together, some non-space stuff we built (castle, pirates, etc.), some Duplo stuff, and some Playmobil/Brio too. I liked these too a lot:

Right. Pirates can look sinister even with a smile on their faces. She doesn't look angry or mean. You're exactly right. She looks like a moody teenager. It's more like a sour disposition than an actual emotion. I can't imagine being a six year old kid, excited to be at Legoland for the first time, and then be greeted by this minifigure. It doesn't set the mood I'd want to have at Legoland. This has been a general problem with minifigures recently. In the new roller coaster set, one of the women has a scowl on her face, and the other looks like she has self esteem issues. Why can't they just smile?