fred67

^^ Every single review (as I write this) is five stars with the caveat "I received this for [free or with a discount] in exchange for my 'unbiased' review." For $20 it might be worth testing them out, but if they needed to bribe people for reviews then what can you expect?

Color names are annoyingly confusing and, what's worse, is color variations over time. I've gone into the LEGO store and stacked brown plates in a PAB cup, and the color variations were terrible, making it even harder to identify certain colors (lavenders, pinks, purples... reddish brown is, itself, possibly the worst). I do reference this chart occasionally; it helps when you're deciding to order some from S@H instead of BL.

Definitely buying the complete set is worth it, in this case. Bricklinking can be fun. Also, in my case, I generally have a large number of parts available in my collection - when I decide to go ahead and do it, I'll at least have a quarter of the pieces, usually closer to half. So it's not like I haven't paid for it, but collecting (and often collecting extra, padding bricklink orders and so forth over the years) helps when you don't think about a whole price, but only what's missing.

Shipping from S@H PAB can take a while, a couple of weeks for me, usually. With BL it's hit and miss - some stores ship right away, some stores are notoriously slow. To answer the cost question, I agree that it's often more economical to buy from S@H when your BL order would be from many different shops, but there might be some parts you can get for a lot cheaper. If you're getting 100 of something for $0.20 on BL, but they cost $0.65 on S@H, and you can get it all at one place on BL, then I'd definitely get that part on BL... a $0.45 difference on 100 parts is HUGE. And then, if you're going to do that anyway, from that particular BL store you should get as many parts you need as possible since you're already ordering there. If you really want the absolute cheapest price, you'll have to keep going back and forth and figuring it out - it's not always a simple question to answer where you're talking about over a 100 different parts or colors.

The CMF butcher came with a cleaver... AND a steak. The problem is if you want a display case with steaks, good luck finding any quantity of them at a reasonable price. Back to trains, I would like a system that works in the city without screwing up regular traffic... like an elevated train or subway. Subway would be too hard for most people to make (well... too many bricks, anyway, to elevate your entire city to build a subway); certainly not a viable set. A cable car would be interesting, but the modern version of one that appears in city square set is not really meant to be motorized. An interesting idea (at least to me) would be to make 32x32 road plates with track for a tram/cable car built in. There are always work arounds for things like that if you have the money/parts to build up every single baseplate, but it's not really practical for most people.

It may not be bringing genders together, but TLG has been at this for a long time and had a lot of failures trying to attract girls with "regular" sets. With friends they may get minidolls, but the sets are still just plain old LEGO that can be combined and used with anything. A lot of adults (including men) buy Friends sets for the parts because they are ultimately pretty good sets. What people want is for TLG to lose money (or lose potential revenue, rather) for the sake of their own social agenda - TLG doesn't set social agendas, it follows them. It's a capitalist company, it exists to make money. Whatever other nice things we may think about TLG, we can't expect them to lose customers just so their fit our ideals. For the record, I would love to see more female figures in "regular" sets - and I think minidolls are terrible (and I'd buy some Friends sets if it weren't for the minidolls - not only don't you get female minifigures, you get useless figures - in my opinion, of course, which makes the premium prices not worth it at all). For the record, again, I never told my daughter what she could or couldn't get - we're in the LEGO store and she asks if she can fill a PAB cup, and I say "sure!" She gets pinks and purples. Then she picks out a set.... this one: Would she have gotten it if it had a regular minifigure? Yes, I actually think she would... I wish they would not deviate from standard minifigures. But they did their testing and research, and most girls preferred minidolls over minifigures. I don't personally like it, but then TLG does a lot of things I don't like (Nexo Knights instead of a regular castle theme?), but it's their product, and they do what they think will make the most profit. Period.

Well, then, let me clarify: each figure in it's own small baggie, the small baggies in a large sterilite drawer. Two reasons to separate them into their own baggies: they stay with their accessories, and they don't scratch each other. I even group them into larger baggies by type so that the ones I want are easier to find.

Yeah... I bought hundreds of small baggies from amazon (not too expensive) and generally keep them individually packed (along with their accessories).

^^ It can be both, as a lot of products are packaged that way, where you need to tear it open, but there is also locking.

Aujourd'hui, je suis français.

The years I was invited I spent at least (at least) three times that at the LEGO Store and online (and, of course, they know because of my VIP account). I think the first year it was more like $6k. I had an addiction. It was a heinous amount for me to spending on LEGO, and now I probably spend about $500/year or less on LEGO at the LEGO Store or S@H.

This is another case of mysterious cracking in parts.... except one bionicle part that I got used and came already cracked, I've simply not had the problem a lot of you seem to have with figures. My Ghostbusters have been assembled and on display for over a year, including holding their accessories, and there are NO cracks in them. I build little modular castle sections (as seen in my signature) that have been assembled for years - hundreds of the white cheese slopes that everyone complains about, and not a SINGLE crack. 256 CMFs on display, some since 2010, on their stands, holding accessories, and not a single crack. I have hundreds of sets, hundreds of thousands of bricks, and maybe have seen one or two cracks on 1x1 or 1x2 plates; I simply don't understand how this is such a problem. The only time I ever had a minifigure problem was a castle battle pack where the figures were packed poorly and holding their weapons badly - not firmly in place, so pushing the hand apart so that they wouldn't hold the weapons securely when put in their hands the right way. But all I did was remove the accessories and let the figures sit on display for a while without them, and their hands eventually got back into good enough shape that you'd never notice. There HAS to be more to this than "cheap Chinese" plastic or bad batches - I have enough sets that if there were really that many bad batches, I'd surely have gotten something by now. The claim is it's not environmental, then there has to be something to how forcefully people are putting their sets together (or taking them apart) or something... even that seems wrong, because I made sections of the brick-built monorail that capitalize on the flexibility of parts to make curves, and none of them cracked, either. I really don't get it, and I can't say it's not a quality control problem, but year after year I see these complaints, and year after year I continue to buy LEGO problem free.

Yes... Kreon heads/hair seems to be interchangeable with LEGO minifgures.

Yeah... the prevailing theme I'm seeing here is that, while people use brickset, they aren't obsessive enough to make sure it's 100% accurate. Still a good rough estimate, though. To the OP, there was a posting a while back on setting the world record. The original posting from bricklink is long gone, though. Several people with over 1000 unique sets.

I actually think that's hugely offensive not only to Melissa McCarthy but to fat people in general. I'm... horizontally challenged... but I don't get how that's an insult to fat people. Am I missing some slang the kids are using nowadays? Is there some "Chinese headquarters" reference that I don't get? Anyway, I'm with the crowd that thinks a reboot is a bad idea, and I don't understand why we can't just have a Ghostbusters:TNG, where these women are daughters or something of the original Ghostbusters, or, I don't know... why does it have to be a "reboot." Reboot is usually reserved for something you thought was good, but could have been done better. They simply are not going to top the original Ghostbusters. However, I'm looking forward to seeing it and hoping they do a good job with it, and if it gets us some good LEGO sets, then it's all good... after all, none of us have any stake, financially or otherwise, in how well the movie does, so who cares? So if there's already only going to be one other set (besides HQ), then I don't see what difference it makes.

You own 391 sets, 318 different. We have piece counts for 311 of them. You own 132650 pieces. You own 1396 minifigs. Some of those are CMFs, but I only say I have a complete set of 16, I don't do them individually.

It's not necessarily the store you shop at, but by whatever calculations they come up with it's the store they think you should be shopping at.... or they may be balancing out the buyers in your area - not the top 25 at a particular store, but the top 50 in your general area, split between the stores. Also, from what I understand, the managers got leeway in the past on who to invite, so it might be more-or-less the top 25, but some "regulars" might get chosen instead of hit-and-run shoppers that just dropped a lot of money at one time. I got invited to the first two, but not since - and I'm glad. I've cut way back on LEGO, and I don't think you get much more than Black Friday.

Last spring woot.com had a Kre-O Enterprise on sale, so I got one. I built it and put it on display at my office - a decent conversation piece. Here's someone's .When built, it looks OK, but there's a few things I didn't like about it. First, there's a big chunk of a piece in the middle where batteries go for the lights. I didn't even bother with the batteries since it will just sit on my shelf for display, but the way they did it to hold the saucer section and engines on felt like cheating. I also am not a fan of the Kreons; perhaps LEGO is too cute, but don't like Kreons at all. One thing you can look out for is someone here on EB makes Star Trek uniforms. They don't come with arms or legs, so I had to buy black arms and legs on bricklink. Here's the quick thing I made (warning: crappy phone pic ahead): Lego star trek by Fred Haab, on Flickr Lego star trek by Fred Haab, on Flickr Sorry, I cannot find the post that lead me to the site where I bought these. I did also find these online.

Yes... I see the eyes are a more modern style C-3PO - all of mine are older ones without highlights on the eyes - it makes quite a difference. I'm glad I was able get one.

Honestly, I'd try to go the "nice" route and talk to ME first, but I'm guessing they're probably too preoccupied with fulfilling their orders and getting product to sell through their website to think about changing what they've come up with for something new. But I think you should throw it out there, first. Second, if they're not game, go ahead and do a kickstarter... what can it hurt? The worst that happens is not enough people pledge, and so you don't do it... and you're in the same boat you're in now, nothing lost, really. If you do it, learn from them - a huge portion of backers reneged on paying, which is one of their problems - the campaign succeeded, yet they didn't get the money they needed, had to do a backerkit project, blah blah blah, yada yada yada, here we are, a year later, with no metal rail (and a lot of plastic buyers complaining they didn't get theirs). Not to sound to negative - I fully expect the metal rail, and if I could smack somebody it would be the people who backed out. I know ME is doing what they can to make everybody happy. EDIT: BTW, I've ordered a few things from altBricks, and you've got a lot of interesting things... in case readers didn't know, they should check it out. It's like brickforge or brickarms for people that want to build trees and bridges instead of armies.

Interesting; good to know... but even new they're way more expensive that solutions that give you a lot more flexibility and/or better use of space. Here's one good thread on the subject.

Limited availability, not in production anymore - relatively expensive when new, very expensive in the aftermarket - especially if you decide in the future to house more figures and want your displays to match. There's several threads on displaying minfigures, just search for them - some great ideas, some LEGO built, some inexpensive (and some expensive) solutions.

You don't see the issue? Did those 10k voters commit to buying? I've had this argument before and been summarily shot down by a lot of people - I don't vote for sets I wouldn't actually buy and, I think, for example, The Golden Girls set would not have gotten 10k votes if voters were obligated to buy it. Neither would a lot of these huge sets whose cost would be several hundreds of dollars. Based on average prices, a 10k piece set would be in the neighborhood of $1000. How many people would vote for it if they were required to put 10% down on the estimated cost of the set? You could get it back if the set fails to reach 10k and be accepted, but you'd lose it if you didn't buy the set if it was made. Now how many 10k sets are viable? How do you think TLG looks at it? Small sets, small runs, not really worth while. Huge sets, even in small runs, potential loss. Medium sets, small runs, potentially worthwhile, smaller risk of loss. Medium sets win.

Agreed - there were some pieces that just weren't available when Market Street was designed. Of the many problems I had with the design of MS, not only didn't I like the look of white for what I would expect to be wrought iron anyway, so while I like how yours turned out, I took a different tact and stuck with black. I also felt the railings should match all around, including the railings on the "penthouse" patio. I made a number of other substitutions - some because of expense, some because I just didn't like the original design. It does look better - the original looks unfinished. I never liked it, which is why I didn't buy it when it came out. Only after so many modulars did I regret not getting one of the first (although, while it works as a modular, is really technically not). The arches over the front top windows can now be found in medium blue, as can the headlight bricks. daniel9x was right about the masonry bricks - good call. I also thought the technique was overused in the original. I also put in a couple of real windows in the back, instead of having just those tan blocks. I don't have all of them, but replaced two of them, and it looks a lot better. Anyway, the link in my signature goes to my take on MS.

Phenomenal. Absolutely.