deraven

There are many differing opinions on this, but if you're just starting out I wouldn't pick LDD to invest time in with it being dead (no longer supported or updated) and would instead go for something in active development with a broad user base, like Bricklink's Studio (www.stud.io). There are several other good programs out there, but unless there's a specific feature of LDD you really love or need that Studio doesn't have, that's a good way to go.

Ah, yes, that's a good way to go.

Yes, if you can properly identify the set you could sell that as "new" since the internal bags were never opened. Of course, it depends on the set as some won't have more value than the parts themselves, but doesn't hurt to check. I won't go into detail here because there are literally hundreds of sorting & storage discussions in the appropriate forums, but my solution for this is to take a retail approach and have a (relatively) fixed number of storage containers of a few sizes, and then whatever doesn't fit in those goes into "overstock" storage. That way I can have a nice, orderly, and not constantly-changing main storage setup that is also space-friendly since the overstock can be higher density bulk storage wherever I have the room. What that looks like for me is Akro Mils drawers with each cabinet having its own large tub or box filled with ziploc bags of the same corresponding parts. If I'm getting low on a particular element or need more in a specific color (though like you if I have a large number of a particular color I sort that out), etc., I just go to the overstock bin and re-fill the drawer or grab what I need from there. The need for more surface area for building/display/sorting, however, never seems to be resolved.

I'm just now discovering this version, and it does look great. Thanks for bringing it up, and for the link to instructions as well.

Welcome to EB, Steven! Plenty of Technic inspiration here for you, and also a whole world of part sorting theory and strategy that you may want to look into with hundreds of kg of bulk pieces to deal with now. Happy building!

The best so far! I really can't find anything to critique here... except maybe the cost on the couple of rare-colored parts on the nose for those of us who might want to build it.

Nice Razor Maria there.

Ha ha. Nice! For the water, if you just orient the tans blue tiles in the other direction (so the water is rolling towards the beach instead of perpendicular to it) it might work better with the parts you've used for the breaking waves on the beach. That is some gnarly jungle there- I like it.

Awesome! You've captured the overall shaping very well, and all the key elements are there. Great build.

Yes, very nice! The use of texture and patterns keeps it interesting despite being fairly monochromatic, and nice job with the droid.

For what it's worth on this bit specifically, my rule is to do a quick check of the Lego Bricks & Pieces price for anything that I'm buying a larger quantity of unless it's dirt-cheap already on Bricklink (or obviously older stuff that Lego isn't likely to stock). I've found plenty of things that were surprisingly cheaper from Lego (mostly tiles, recently). Usually the difference per piece isn't much and if I only need a few of them the convenience of Bricklink and faster turn-around time means I don't care about saving the 50 cents, but when I'm buying a few hundred parts of a few types and brand-new from Lego they're a few cents cheaper per part, plus it qualifies for free shipping, that's worth it to me.

Welcome to EB (and back to Lego), NerdYoda! Happy to have you here, and plenty of Star Wars fun and inspiration to keep you busy around the board. Happy building!

Wonderful! Now this is a version I'd have bought from Lego in a heartbeat! First and foremost, getting all of that packing into an exterior shell that still looks great is much easier said than done, and you've done a fantastic job. The idea for the shooters for the machine guns is fun, and a simple and elegant solution with the string to fire them as they come up. Plenty of power and speed with those buggy motors too which is good to see. Fantastic build!

Awesome! The whole thing is great, but what really caught my eye was the pelt and chain mail, and that shield. The sword also looks great, and the technique for the bellybutton works very well, too. Well done!

Brilliant! Very clean with everything so well-integrated. Really a beautiful build - looking forward to seeing more from a more successful shoot soon!

Welcome to EB, Cam! Please feel free to ramble on about whatever Lego-ish topics you'd like. See you around the board, and happy building!

Neat! Fun concept, and some good Space Police vibes there.

What a nice little city. Those simple, adorable cars really add some life to it.

I think I'm pretty neutral overall. The IKEA collab kind of makes sense to me and I can see the appeal there, and Lego has made basic storage products themselves for a long time now. But when it comes to the shoes and Levis clothing items... that has basically zero appeal to me even with as much of a Lego fan as I am so I think what bothers me is the concern about whether anyone will want them in numbers large enough to make it worthwhile and not be seen essentially as hubris and diluting the Lego brand. But I am not representative of all people, so what do I know? From another angle, if these (at least the clothing) are more of an artful statement (more akin to the Lego Originals products, but on a larger scale) and maybe tied into the Rebuild the World campaign, then I can understand that. Looking at it as art or an outreach campaign I'm still not interested in buying any myself, but it seems like a more reasonable thing to do vs these things having an expectation to sell in the kinds of number of other TLG products which I just can't see happening. If that's the case and several more collabs are announced all with artful, niche, low-volume expectations then it's just a bit of inspiring fun. If they continue at this rate and promote them as regular products, I'm going to be concerned.

This is my take on it as well - I think it's a balance. For instance, I really like the look of fleshies in neo-Classic Space builds since you have the quaint, cartoonish super-simple suits and helmets they're wearing, but then the realistic skin tones. It's an interesting juxtaposition. Conversely, the pirate-type outfits are a lot more realistic to begin with, so the yellow faces keep it feeling more light and fun... but either way it's personal preference and depends on the look and feel you're trying to convey.

Well Star Trek is clearly better, so we don't need to debate that bit. I'd love to see it, and I think this is key. Star Trek has few compelling ships that work at minifig scale while SW has all kinds of fighters, planetary vehicles, etc.. For Star Trek they'd need to do things that were more like the SSD or Death Star play sets, or a line of Start Trek UCS ships. I think that along with a robust line of minifigs (either CMF style or battle-packs maybe with a bunch of characters and small builds from the different series) would be wonderful, would manage fan expectations, and would sell quite well!

Sure, but the fact that they haven't yet probably means they've run the numbers and it doesn't make business sense. I think the minifigs are a big reason people buy some of the sets in the first place, and with licensing and such a Star Wars CMF line might be in the $6/fig range which could be too far outside the curve for that marketing model. Not to mention folks would be irritated with the "average" characters that they'd be paying way too much for, and Lego would probably do some Mr. Gold-style special figs to try to keep interest up which would then cause all kinds of angst with a certain segment of the market... yeah... I dunno if I'd want them to or not. You know, what I think would be more interesting is if they sold more "battle pack" style sets but bent a little more towards the CMF character selection. For instance, if they were going to do a CMF line, instead do 4 packs of 4 or 3 packs of 5-6 minifigs that all had a similar theme (Bespin pack, Sith pack, Rebels pack, or whatever) along with a few accessories and then price it appropriately. If folks know what they're getting they'll still pay the higher per-minfig equivalent price but would get rid of some of the negative aspects of doing it as a CMF line. Not to mention that they'd sell a ton of those on top of the CMFs and not have to use one of their CMF production & marketing "slots" for a SW line.

That's great! I hope that's a sign of things to come in the US as well, because my last couple orders from them also ran in the 6-8 weeks timeframe. my most recent one said it shipped after a little more than 3 weeks, but then it sat in the warehouse in pre-ship status for another 2 weeks, and then took over a week to actually arrive. Not complaining due to the circumstances and since Lego is up-front with the long lead time, but it sure would be nice to have things moving a bit more quickly again!

Ha ha - that's the spirit! I think you'll get more votes in the first place if you add some images that better show the scale. Maybe for 5K or 10K you can do an epic shape-shifting battle with Aku in some of his different forms.

Might I suggest that for your Ideas submission you include an image of Jack confronting/fighting Aku which would both give people a better idea of the scale of the build and also show the dynamic play element. Even something simple like this: