Aanchir

I'm sorry, but do you realize that many folks like me have pretty much made a habit of keeping silent about our concerns and discomfort with the Harry Potter theme specifically because of the inevitable backlash to mentioning that discomfort, even in the context of reacting to news about the sets and theme? Please understand that as frustrating as it is for you to be reminded again and again of the author's commitment to promoting this particular brand of prejudice, it's all the more frustrating for those of us at the receiving end of that prejudice. And we have to deal with those reminders far more often than the rare occasions that somebody mentions them in relation to a new wave of LEGO sets. I wish I could still feel the same, to be honest. I used to love Harry Potter, and still have a lot of nostalgia for those things I loved about it as a child. But Rowling's betrayal cut a little too deep for me — especially I had only just come out as transgender shortly before Rowling began to openly align herself with other, even more flagrantly transphobic figures in British media and politics. Since then, I'm no longer able to enjoy the series or brand the way I once did. I can't bring myself to weigh in about what LEGO (or their fans) should or shouldn't do regarding the HP brand at this juncture. But having to engage with these sorts of discussions is tiring in and of itself. In a best case scenario, I would have preferred if the creator of this series had just been more supportive and accepting in the first place so I didn't have to associate such hurtful perspectives with such a beloved childhood interest in the first place. But since we're well past that point, and she has shown no signs of changing her views about transgender people… well, I have to admit, I'd be happier as a LEGO fan if LEGO didn't keep that theme around for too much longer. I don't have the stomach to speak any further on this topic right now.

I would honestly not mind if the set included duplicates of some of the current horse colors/coat patterns. As much as I love it when sets treat animals as characters in their own right rather than as accessories, it's not like it'd be strange for a castle to have two horses that look alike. For that matter, the set could always do like 6080 or 6085 and use different saddles or caparisons to differentiate between horses with the same coat pattern. Frankly, new recolors of the saddle, chanfron, and caparison may be even MORE useful for Castle builders than new recolors for the horses themselves, since there have been so few horse barding options since the updated horse mold came out in 2012! And while LEGO can introduce new horse colors or patterns even in more modern-day sets from themes like City or Creator Expert, I feel LEGO would be unlikely to introduce new horse barding in a non-Castle set. Similarly, I'm not too interested in seeing a whole bunch of livestock animals like cows in this set, mainly because even if LEGO is capable of including them, many of those sorts of animals can just as easily show up various other types of sets and themes. I suppose small single-piece like chickens or piglets would not eat up too much of the budget, especially if LEGO already has them in production for the City Farm sets, but I'm hardly expecting it to include as many farm animals as you'd find in a Duplo farm set! There are a few non-livestock animals that I would not mind LEGO including to liven up the actual castle interiors in interesting ways, though, such as a mouse or rat to steal food from the kitchen/larder or add a touch of gloom and squalor to the castle dungeon. Interesting choices! For my part, I'm not too picky about the number of figures that are included as long as there are enough to adequately populate the scene. But I am definitely hoping that those figures are varied enough to play a variety of different roles that you'd expect to find in a LEGO castle. My expectations are similar to some of those from your list: I'd love to see a king, queen, princess, squire, cook, chambermaid, stablemaster, smith/farrier, and perhaps a bard, jester, and/or wizard. Of course, some of the peasant/laborer characters could be designed so they can perform more than one of those tasks — for example, a chambermaid minifigure with a sufficiently generic design could also serve as a cook or part of the kitchen staff, and a smith/farrier could also serve as the stablemaster. Naturally there'd also need to be a few knights, guards/footsoldiers, and archers, but for my part I've never been too much of an army builder, so I would probably be content with two to four figures in each of those three categories. I realize, of course, that many people would prefer far more, in order to comprehensively defend what's sure to be a very large castle! But I've also found that having TOO many figures of that sort would create some complications with the amount of seating you'd need for banquets or other gatherings in the great hall, even if a few of those figures remain on guard duty during those gatherings. That's not helped by the proportions of the LEGO minifigure, or the amount of space they'd need for even the most basic of table settings (i.e. a 1x1 goblet and 2x2 plate for each figure). I also agree that I'd prefer to see a number of different female minifigures. And for my part, I don't even mind if some of them were in traditionally male roles like knights, soldiers, and archers. After all, those sorts of figures would probably still have gender-neutral torso designs, so people who are bothered by that could easily just switch the heads for more masculine-looking ones (and I'm sure most of us have plenty of those to choose from). Another thing I'd love to see that's perhaps slightly controversial would be a "characters page" in the instruction manual, similar to the ones from sets like Pirates of Barracuda Bay or Ninjago City! I know a lot of historic themes builders prefer the figures as nameless archetypes that each builder can project identities onto at their individual discretion. But over the past year I've gotten really into reading old LEGO publications like De LEGO Krant from the Netherlands,Bricks & Pieces magazine from the UK, or various comic strip style ads that ran in various kids' magazines/comics throughout Europe. And one thing that I've found fascinating about publications from that era (even including catalogs) is that some of them DID have characters with more clearly-defined names and roles! For instance, the ruler of the Lion Knights from set 6080 (most likely the mounted knight differentiated by a two-colored banner and a black cape and yellow shield instead of a blue cape and shield) was named "Ridder Pieter van Blankevoort" (Sir Peter Whiteford) in the Netherlands, and "Sir Richard" in the UK (quite possibly the same character later named "King Richard Lionheart" in the 1995 Royal Knights sets. A 1984 issue of De LEGO Krant also gave him a daughter, "Jonkvrouw Machteld Eleonora" (Lady Matilda Eleanor), and subsequent issues identified her specifically as the damsel/maiden from set 6023 and introduced new adventures that featured her. The blacksmith from set 6040 also appears as a Lion Knight supporting character in stories from both Bricks & Pieces magazine and De LEGO Krant, the latter of which named him Adrianus. The ruler of the Black Falcon/Eagle Knight faction from set 6073 (again, differentiated from the other mounted knights in that set by a two-colored banner and a differently colored shield) was named "Ridder Jan Swartegeest" (Sir John Blackghost) in the Netherlands, and "The Black Knight" in the UK. In this case, UK publications explicitly acknowledged him as the same character who subsequently ruled over the Black Falcons in set 6074 and over the Black Knights in set 6085 . "The Black Knight" from sets 6034, 6009, and 6086 (with facial hair and updated armor, but otherwise the same torso and legs) was probably also meant to be a later depiction of this same character. For that matter, magazine stories and set names in the UK also identified the two minifigures from 6021 as Sir Richard and the Black Knight in alternate tournament armor. A lesser known Black Falcons/Eagle Knights character was an evil wizard named "The Wizard of Avalon" in Bricks & Pieces magazine and "De lelijk tovenaar Swartegeest" (The Wicked Wizard Blackghost) in De LEGO Krant. At first I thought that these were just two media-only characters with no physical minifigure counterpart. However, I since realized that the wizard's unusual portrayal with a bare chest and cape in the Captain Indigo comics appears to have been based on a minifigure from an alternate model of set 6040 (essentially just the Lion Knights' blacksmith with his apron flipped around and worn as a cape). A fun detail about his appearance in De LEGO Krant is that he's portrayed as a shapeshifter who can take the form of either a raven or a handsome Anyway, even if the storylines of these early Castle themes were both less well-known and globally consistent than the ones for the Pirates theme, I would love if the set and manual had callbacks to these characters. They don't necessarily even need to share the names of their classic counterparts, or be named at all — it could be enough to give them designs loosely inspired by their classic counterparts, titles like "The Blacksmith" or "The Young Princess", and short bios that vaguely allude to the roles they played in previous stories, like the ones in the Barracuda Bay manual. I'm just a sucker for these sorts of callbacks. Ninjago City Gardens also had lots and lots of tiny detail elements for stuff like roofs, signage, shop and museum interiors, etc — even a highly detailed castle build wouldn't necessarily have the same emphasis on tiny brick-built details and wildly non-traditional part use as that set did, since it's a very different sort of architecture and setting. I definitely don't think it's outrageous to expect 5000 pieces, but the types of pieces used can have a big impact on a set's price per piece. After all, Pirates of Barracuda Bay had far fewer pieces than the Treehouse for the very same price. But the Treehouse contained an abundance of identical, lightweight parts like tiles, plates, and leaves. Whereas Barracuda Bay had numerous bulky pieces like boat hull segments, 10x10 quarter-circle bricks, 8x16 plates, 16x16 plates, and 10x10 wedge plates — not to mention a lot more animals and minifigures! As such, I wouldn't deem a hypothetical 4800-piece version of this set a bad value as long as the end result is just as substantial as I'd have expected a hypothetical 5500-piece version to be. At the moment, regardless of piece count, I'm envisioning something somewhat larger than Barracuda Bay or the Treehouse, but somewhat smaller than the Creator Expert Roller Coaster (although it'd require fewer engineering-intensive new molds than that set did, so… who knows?)

To be honest, I'm expecting more of a traditional motte-and-bailey style castle with a courtyard surrounded by a curtain wall (with the usual LEGO castle features like towers and a gatehouse) and a clearly-defined keep, rather than a single towering structure like in that MOC.

I have to admit, I am mildly disappointed in those new conical roofs, mainly 'cuz the shape of the shingles doesn't match the ones from the 2x4x3 conical roof. Admittedly, I prefer the rectangular shingles on the new roof cone to the rounded shingles on that one, but it really frustrates me when roof pieces have a texture that doesn't match any other parts. Hopefully if LEGO makes any other textured roof slopes/cones like this in the future, they'll try and make them match these new ones instead of throwing even more mismatched textures at us.

Agreed. If it had been selected, there are a number of different approaches LEGO could have taken for an 18+ tribute set, such as 2x or 3x scaled System models of the original Toa, or a set of brick-built Kanohi masks at a similar scale to the Star Wars Helmet Collection. I should also note back when the polls were up, even some LEGO set designer were rooting for Bionicle on Twitter, including designers who have made their own System-based Bionicle tribute MOCs (like Nick Vás and Niek van Slagmaat). So it certainly seems that it was regarded as a genuine possibility like any other. Notably, there were already various 80s and 90s themes/subthemes omitted from the poll which I suspect LEGO had ruled out in advance for various reasons. For instance, Islanders and Western featured insensitive portrayals of indigenous people that LEGO probably didn't want to remind people about in an anniversary set. Roboforce, Unitron, and Dark Forest were likely considered too minor to base an anniversary set on, since they were extremely small subthemes that never got a full global release. And although Fabuland was a long-running theme which has become a beloved "cult classic" in its own right, it was likely omitted on account of its preschool target age range. If LEGO truly didn't believe that Bionicle would be a viable option for this anniversary set, they could have omitted it as well on any number of objective grounds. For example, they could have limited the poll to 20th-century themes and omitted themes of the 2000s like Bionicle or Alpha Team. Or they could have strictly limited the poll to System themes, since Bionicle was already the only non-System theme present. Some Bionicle fans might've been bitter (what else is new?), but a poll like this was never going to please EVERYONE no matter which choices were included in the poll or which of them was ultimately selected for the anniversary set. So I don't believe for a minute that LEGO only included Bionicle in the poll to spare Bionicle fans' feelings. From every indication, it was a genuine option for the anniversary set, just not the one that they ultimately ended up choosing.

While the previous rubbery vine pieces can sometimes be a little more fun for jungle settings and the like since they could wrap around or hang between different sorts of structures, I suspect this newer part could be a little more practical for smaller plants like sunflowers. There's also a cool new inverted curve piece used for the parapets of Peach's castle, and for the white castle towers in some of the other sets.

It looks like the new one is made of individual rigid segments like the candle piece, rather than one long rubber hose like previous vine-type pieces! It's certainly an interesting choice, and one that might make this new component useful even for smaller plants like sunflowers. In fact, I can't help but wonder if it might show up in this year's LEGO City Farm sets as well!

Baseplates aren't entirely out of production by any means — they're still available individually in the Classic theme, and still used in Modular Buildings sets and ones comparable to them. For my part, I prefer standard plates to baseplates in most situations, mainly for compatibility reasons. In the Castle theme in particular, I can't help but think back to how sets like 6080 and 6085 used baseplates, but all the "expansion sets" for them used standard plates — meaning that if you combined sets to create a larger castle, you'd be stuck with an awkward half-plate offset between them. Standard plates can also be a lot more convenient for allowing designs to go "off-grid" (such as with wedge plates and hinges), which makes a lot of sense in the context of a theme like Castle — after all, castle walls were rarely built at perfect right angles. I get your point about not wanting the ground to cut off abruptly just a few studs from either side of the castle walls, though. And that's an area where I think today's LEGO parts palette and design philosophies could offer quite a few advantages. Prior to the 2010s, standard plates simply didn't exist in sizes like 8x16 or larger, and far fewer sets were built on large, sturdy brick-built foundations made using multiple large plates, bricks, and Technic connectors like in Barracuda Bay, Apocalypseburg, Story of Nian, or the Lunar New Year Ice Festival. Needless to say, as I mentioned in the topic for this specific set, I've got pretty high hopes based on what we've seen designers accomplish in other "premium" sets from recent years.

Sounds promising! A $350 price point is leaps and bounds above any other Castle-themed set from years gone by, and could very well make this "the ultimate castle" as far as minifig-scale sets are concerned. I can't help but feel hopeful that it'll include some of the features I've long wanted to see in a Castle set such as a royal bedchamber, banquet hall, kitchen, and perhaps even a stable for horses! The rumored set name suggests Lion Knight branding, and given that this is tailored to AFOLs (and it's been years since the 2013-style Lion Knights appeared in sets), I suspect LEGO will take this opportunity to introduce 80s-inspired Lion Knight minifigs in line with the Black Falcon/Eagle Knight minifigs from the Medieval Blacksmith and 3-in-1 Medieval Castle. Ideally, I'd love for this set to be designed in modular segments of some kind that can be re-arranged or added to. After all, even if fewer people will buy multiples of a $350 castle like this one than of a typical $100 castle, modular connections are a great source of inspiration for MOCs that add features absent from the original set. Plus, if this sells well enough, it could hypothetically even get follow-up "expansion sets" like Ninjago City did! I would also love if it ends up having nice curvy towers instead of angular ones like we're used to seeing in more kid-targeted castles. Make no mistake, angular tower designs can be gorgeous in their own right, and they're just as historically accurate as round ones, but personally I'm a sucker for builds with curved shapes, and a build at this level could potentially even make use of more complex SNOTted curves like we saw from Löwenstein Castle. Anyway, I'm gonna try and curtail any further speculative ramblings for right now, but I'm very eager to see how this set turns out, and considering the amazing designs of sets like Barracuda Bay or the Medieval Blacksmith, I have lots of confidence that the LEGO design team will deliver something truly awe-inspiring!

I'd LOVE to see a modern set along the lines of Rocky River Retreat — especially since I feel like LEGO could make the build a lot more impressive these days! For instance, it could have a custom plate-based foundation with brick-built rapids instead of a specialized printed baseplate, and brick-built conifer trees instead of just molded trees on top of a stack of brown bricks. That said, I'm not sure if river-related sets would really better off as their own subtheme/category, or if it'd be more effective to spread rivers out across several different subthemes, like how current sets feature roads across several different subthemes.

True, but even then, a number of Elves sets include both "daily life" AND combat elements. Ragana's Magic Shadow Castle has a bedroom, bathroom, and a luxurious-looking foyer, but also more typical LEGO Castle features like traps, a dungeon, a throne, and a rolling catapult. The Elvenstar Tree Bat Attack has a dining table, bedroom, and a waterfall for bathing, but also a giant evil bat, a training dummy, a forge, and various weapons like a greatsword, crossbow, war hammer, and magic staff. And Breakout from the Goblin King's Fortress contains a fireplace, writing desk, bookshelves, and beds for both the Goblin King and his guard — but also a throne, catapult, drawbridge, secret entrance, hanging prisoner cage, and three vicious carnivorous plants. For that matter, even some combat-driven "action themes" have managed to include "daily life" features in some of their sets, especially those at higher price points. Consider that for all its battle vehicles, armaments, traps, monsters, and other perils, Jestro's Volcano Lair also managed to include a bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen! For that matter, Knighton Castle had a dining table and SEVEN beds, despite also containing numerous battle vehicles and brick-built mech/monster characters which surely must have eaten up quite a bit of its budget. Even Journey to the Skull Dungeons managed to include for a cot for its orc-like prison guard, and that was just a $30 set! As such, I don't at all think "daily life" features have to come at the expense of more combat-focused ones — particularly if the maximum price point for Castle and Pirates models is raised above $100. After all, I'm not expecting these sorts of amenities to always be depicted at a LEGO Elves standard of detail, let alone at an AFOL-level standard of detail like they were in the Ideas Blacksmith Shop!

Fair, fair. Truth be told, it's been my opinion for a while that Castle and Pirates sets in general have been held back by the usual $100 cap on price points for non-exclusive sets. After all, a lot of large and imposing LEGO Castle and Pirates sets of past decades (such as Black Seas Barracuda, Imperial Trading Post, Skull's Eye Schooner, Black Knight's Castle, Flying Ninja Fortress, and Vladek's Dark Fortress) would cost considerably more than $100 in today's money when you adjust their prices for inflation. In fact, some of those pirate ships even had price points of over $100 when they were brand new! And for over a decade, other play themes like Ninjago, Nexo Knights, Hidden Side, and Monkie Kid have shown us plenty of outstanding examples of the size and level of detail that even kid-targeted playsets can achieve at a $120 to $150 price point. Yet the sticker price for a typical full-size castle or pirate ship (whether in the Castle/Pirates theme or the Creator 3-in-1 theme) has remained frozen in place for over a decade and a half! Is it any wonder that the contents of those sets often ended up disappointing long-time fans? None of this is to say that a $100 set can't be outstanding in its own right — the Elves theme never exceeded a $100 price point, and yet many of its castles and other medieval fantasy builds like 41179, 41180, 41185, 41188, and 41196 remain favorites of mine to this day! I'm sure that with the right designers at the helm, LEGO could likewise come up with some more traditional Castle and Pirates builds that far surpass the 2013 or 2015 ones while still maintaining similar sticker prices. But it's frustrating that even as LEGO prices in general continue to rise steadily over time, Castle and Pirates sets — which could benefit greatly from being designed for higher price points — have NOT seen any increase of that sort.

They actually did list most Space subthemes individually! You can see the full list of poll options on the first page. Classic Space, Blacktron, Space Police, M:Tron, Ice Planet, Spyrius, and Exploriens were all listed separately. There were some 90s Space subthemes omitted (Unitron, Roboforce, U.F.O, and Insectoids), but in the case of Unitron and Roboforce in particular, that was probably because they were small wacves that had an extremely limited release — same as with the Dark Forest wave of LEGO Castle, the Aquaraiders wave of LEGO Aquazone, or the final 1997 wave of LEGO Pirates. Also, the choice to list Paradisa, Divers, Extreme Team, and Arctic separately was probably because those subthemes WERE in fact listed as separate categories in a lot of catalogs and marketing materials, rather than sharing space with other Town subthemes from those years. A lot of these choices may not be intuitive to us from a fan standpoint, but I strongly doubt that any of the poll options were subthemes that LEGO was determined to reject regardless of how they did in the poll. After all, I suspect that Western and Islanders were omitted from the poll options specifically because they WERE ruled out in advance due to all the insensitive cultural stereotypes in those themes.

We can't necessarily assume that the one adult-targeted set they're making based on the fan vote is the only 90th anniversary product they have planned. After all, just look at how many different types of products they had in 2018 to celebrate 60 years of the LEGO brick and 40 years of the LEGO minifigure! As such, I'm not sure they're actually under any pressure to ensure this ONE set/theme decided by the fan vote will represent the brand's entire 90-year history. If that HAD been a meaningful concern of theirs, they could have just as easily limited the poll options to 20th century themes, leaving early 2000s themes like Bionicle, Arctic, and Alpha Team out of the running altogether. And even then, there were many flash-in-the-pan System themes included in the poll (Wolfpack, Ice Planet, Divers, Xtreme Team, Rock Raiders, etc) that wouldn't reflect the fullness of the company's history any better than Bionicle! I don't think Bionicle is necessarily any more likely to be chosen than Castle, Pirates, or Space. But I see no reason to think that it wouldn't even be considered, particularly given how many LEGO designers remain extremely fond of and nostalgic for Bionicle to this day, and how instrumental a role it played in keeping the company out of bankruptcy long enough to reach this milestone in the first place. I'm curious, is there some specific historical milestone you're referring to when you say "Castles are what put LEGO on the map"? Because to me it seems like the Town and Space themes played just as big a role for LEGO in the 70s, 80s, and 90s as Castle did. Particularly since they had a much larger presence at the time of the minifigure's debut in the late 70s, whereas Castle took a few years longer to truly catch up with them. I thought the Creator one had pretty good interior detailing, to be honest! I mean, the A-model alone included a well, a market stall, a smithy, a cabinet/apartment with fireplace and armchair, a dungeon, a gatehouse, and even a garderobe-style toilet. Most big $90/$100 Castle sets over the years haven't had nearly as many clearly-defined interior spaces. And the B- and C-models can be used to add even more interior features. Mind you, I agree that there's room for improvement still! I'd love to see a big castle with features like a royal bedchamber, kitchen, great hall, library, and stable. And the 3-in-1 Medieval Castle did lack a treasury and throne room, which tend to be a staple of comparably-sized Castle sets. But unlike the minifigure selection (which I agree is usually rather weak), I don't think the interiors of Creator 3-in-1 sets suffer from their theme assignment at all. After all, just look at how well-furnished Creator 3-in-1 houses, cabin cruisers, and RVs (e.g. 31052, 31083, and 31118) tend to be compared to their Town/City equivalents! I haven't heard anything yet, but some of your hopes sound pretty plausible! I imagine that the Midgard Serpent in the main build may include a lot of green parts, which could then be repurposed for landscaping elements like grass and trees in an alternate Viking fort or dwelling. Assuming the non-sea serpent parts are mostly in some shade of brown, I could also imagine other mythology inspired alternate builds. Perhaps a battle between a more traditional dragon like Fafnir versus a siege engine of some kind (like in some of the 2005 Vikings sets). Or even a model of the world tree Yggdrasil with the dragon Nidhogg at its base, the squirrel Ratatosk in its branches, and the unnamed eagle atop its canopy. Honestly, one of the strengths of Creator 3-in-1's reliance on fairly basic parts is that there are any number of alternate build options, regardless of what the main build is like. Whereas "play themes" like City, Castle, Pirates, Ninjago, etc. are often more likely to include boat parts that are tricky to use for non-boat builds, creature parts that are tricky to use for non-creature builds, plant parts that are tricky to use for non-plant builds, etc.

Why is it an either/or? I mean, LEGO probably only started making train sets in the first place because they felt it would get more train fans interested in LEGO. And even a lot of today's AFOLs only discovered or rediscovered their passion for LEGO building after having a positive experience with a licensed theme that happened to overlap with their non-LEGO interests. The same applies to a lot of the newer and more experimental sets that LEGO is making — in marketing-speak, they're a great way to "recruit" new fans who might not have previously had any interest in LEGO, and hopefully get them hooked on LEGO building in general. I mean, I'm sure train fans of all people know quite well how alienating it can be when LEGO doesn't make sets that are relevant to your interests. Now think of how many potential builders there are who might have never had sets or themes tailored to their own tastes or interests. There's no reason for LEGO to write them off just because their interests differ from a typical KFOL or AFOL.

Why do you think that young children are "not the target castle group"? After all, even if you didn't care for the aesthetics of the 2013 Castle sets, they still had around the same target age and level of complexity as comparable sets from the Fantasy Era and Kingdoms launch waves in 2007 and 2010. By comparison, many brightly-colored and "cartoonish" themes like Ninjago, Nexo Knights, Elves, and Monkie Kid DID target older kids (as evidenced by their higher recommended age ranges and more complex builds), yet still managed to last quite a bit longer than the 2013 incarnation of LEGO Castle. So whether or not a castle theme aimed at older kids would have had a better chance of success than the 2013 wave, it wouldn't necessarily have had any more of the sort of "maturity" you felt the 2013 sets lacked.

Since the original poll was said to be for "a single new product for the 2022 LEGO Adult Portfolio", I don't think LEGO would be too worried about it conflicting with their kid-targeted "play themes". So I'm not sure we have any grounds to "rule out" any of the four themes in contention at this point. Plus, when you we get right down to it, I don't think we even know exactly what sort of set the resulting product is going to be! A lot of folks here are expecting it to be an "advanced playset" of sorts, like the Modular Buildings Collection, Pirates of Barracuda Bay, etc. But it could turn out to be end up being something else entirely, like a large-scale character sculpture or a mosaic kit. I realize that sort of thing might be disappointing for a lot of people, but it would help explain how LEGO could have the confidence to offer so many different themes and subthemes as poll options without needing to worry about any of them being too heavily reliant on out-of-production parts or set-specific recolors. And truth be told, would any of us really say no to a set like 76393 that focused on classic LEGO Pirates, Castle, or Space characters instead of licensed ones? I certainly wouldn't mind that sort of thing at all!

From what I can see online, it's currently rumored to be a City polybag, not a Creator one, which if true boosts its chances of being minifig scale… of course, it could still end up being a minifig-scale model of a miniature railway train or something along those lines.

Adorable! LEGO did a very good job with the new foal. Compared to the old Paradisa one, this one is a much closer match to the modern horse mold's beveled contours, and the printed eyes also bring it more in line with the design standards of larger LEGO animals. It was also a nice touch to use a second plastic color for the tail and mane, and to include a stud on the back. Compared to the recessed stud of the current LEGO Friends pony/foal mold, this one will make it less suited for "pony rides", but I imagine it WILL work with the harness from the service dog in last year's Town Center set, which could be useful for behavior training, for keeping them from running off during outings to a farmer's market or agricultural fair, and potentially even for use as a service/therapy/emotional support animal.

Regarding stickers, keep in mind that a lot of the time stickers appear in addition to, rather than in place of, printed elements. Often a lot of the unique printed elements that LEGO produces are put towards minifigures, animals, and accessories, which is part of why sets without minifigures like the Super Mario sets, Saturn V Rocket, Typewriter can have so many printed bricks. But there's never been a time when LEGO would have been able to print all those parts that they currently print AND all the ones that they currently use stickers for. The reason they were able to print all the decorated elements in, say, the M:TRON sets is that only 12 new-for-1990 printed elements appeared across that entire subtheme (one minifigure torso and 11 other parts)! By comparison, there are 12 new-for-2022 printed elements in this year's City Hospital, and stickers for an additional 12 elements! Needless to say, printing every decorated element in every set from every theme set would be a quick way to drive the number of individual LEGO elements in production back up to the wildly unsustainable levels they were at back in the early 2000s, when LEGO was losing money on nearly all their sets and very nearly had to declare bankruptcy because of those sorts of out-of-control costs. And in any case, LEGO train sets in particular often made extensive use of stickers even in the 70s and 80s. So bringing up stickers as a reason you think LEGO sets today are overpriced doesn't seem very applicable to this particular thread.

Don't worry, the Creator 3-in-1 Viking ship is a separate set (set number 31132 according to the leaks/rumors I've seen).

Don't worry, the Creator 3-in-1 Viking ship is a separate set (set number 31132 according to the leaks/rumors I've seen).

I think there's a number of reasons! For one, when a set based on a theme or category with a lot of fans (e.g. Castle, Pirates, NASA, etc) gets produced, it helps boost interest in the Ideas platform among fans of that category. After all, even fans who had more or less given up on their preferred theme getting produced through LEGO Ideas are happy to be "proven wrong". And fans who hadn't been paying close attention to LEGO Ideas in the first place might become curious enough to see what other projects along those same lines builders have submitted. Additionally, it goes without saying that satisfied owners of "playsets" like the Medieval Blacksmith, Barracuda Bay, or even the Old Fishing Store are usually eager for the possibility of getting more high-detail sets like that to accompany them! And LEGO Ideas can be ordinary fans' best option for contributing to that outcome. Even if there's no guarantee of that their support will end up getting future sets like that approved for production, it still feels more "proactive" than just hoping and speculating. In short, any time new sets come out, it gets fans of those sorts of sets pretty hyped. And especially when it's a LEGO Ideas set, a lot of that hype is channeled into revisiting the LEGO Ideas website to support other projects that appeal to those same interests and passions! I certainly haven't forgotten it. I got it for Christmas, and after a greatly enjoyable building experience it's now sitting on one of my bookshelves. As I see it, LEGO did a beautiful job making refinements to a lot of the building techniques from the original fan-created model while maintaining the all the core structural details and a lot of the key cosmetic details and furnishings that made it such a great project in the first place. Saying it doesn't look anything like the original project is like saying that these two Eldorado Fortress MOCs don't look anything like the original Eldorado Fortress: In reality, there's no mistaking that the MOC linked above is based closely on the original Eldorado Fortress set, despite using a lot of different colors and building techniques than the set did. Likewise, there's no mistaking that the Medieval Blacksmith set was based closely on the original Medieval Blacksmith project, even if the designer made some architectural and cosmetic changes (e.g. removing gaps in the timbers, adding curved braces between vertical and horizontal timbers, adding quoins, keystones, and voussoirs to the stones on the lower level, and using slightly brighter colors for the doors, timbers, and some of the shingles). Frankly, if LEGO does as beautiful a job with the A-frame house as they did on previous Ideas buildings like the Medieval Blacksmith or Old Fishing Store, I would probably be thrilled to add it to my collection! After all, even the most gorgeous MOCs often still have room for improvement, particularly since LEGO set designers often have access to parts and colors that weren't available to the original MOCists! Honestly, I think the brighter colors were a big improvement for both the Medieval Blacksmith and the Tree House, for the simple reason that most LEGO fans don't display their sets under constant, direct, photo-studio-quality lighting. Right now I'm glancing over at the Medieval Blacksmith set atop my bookshelf (lit only by the natural light coming in through the windows on the other side of the room). The bright colors do a LOT to boost the contrast and ensure that all the intricate details stand out, even from a distance. And they also help the set as a whole to remain interesting and eye-catching even when it has to share a shelf with other stuff like picture frames, figurines, plushies, and other LEGO sets. It's just one of several considerations that set designers are under a lot more pressure to consider than MOCists. For the most part, we can set up our lighting exactly how we want it and single out all our MOCs' best angles when we photograph or screenshot them to present to other people (at least within the limits of our photographic or CG rendering know-how). Whereas set designers have to ensure they look good even in "everyday" lighting conditions — whether the light source is natural or artificial, whether it's close to the set or far away, and whether the set is sitting on a low coffee table or perched upon a high shelf. And yeah, the sorts of colors that LEGO used for the Tree House and Medieval Blacksmith are every bit as "Creator-Expert-ish" as they are "City-ish", especially since they're still dominated by "earth tones" like browns, greens, and greys! I mean, 10247 Ferris Wheel and 10260 Downtown Diner are just as much "for grown-ups" as 10194 Emerald Night or 21310 Old Fishing Store (note that in that case, LEGO actually reduced the brightness of the railings and some of the roof beams compared to the original project). The idea that simply brightening up certain parts of a model (especially when simultaneously INCREASING the complexity of the build) flips a switch from "for adults" to "for kids" is utterly baffling, and frankly it suggests a very juvenile idea of what maturity or sophistication actually means. In any case, I do imagine the set designer may increase the A-Frame Cabin's contrast in the final set. Whether that means adding brighter colors, darker colors, or both is pretty up in the air. But for those who were bothered by the Tree House's colors, it's worth noting that the A-Frame Cabin is already primarily Medium Nougat and Reddish Brown — close to the final colors of the Tree House set, and far brighter than the colors of the original Treehouse project. One change I would certainly expect in the final set would be variegated leaf colors on the trees (rather than just one leaf color per tree) and variegated stone colors on the foundation. Also, I expect LEGO's design lab would probably veto having the roof tiles not fully pressed down on both ends unless parts such as SNOT brackets are used to help them retain that "not-quite-flush" angle. As it is, it'd be tricky to communicate those slight imperfections in the building instructions or to ensure the parts don't get pressed down fully by accident while handling the model. It might also make sense to use a lighter color for the interior floors than for the roof so that it's not drowning in darkness when the roof is closed. Similarly, I wouldn't be surprised to see Dark Brown beams added to the exterior, since that's the portion that would get the most light under normal circumstances, and it would help the individual beams stand out from one another even if LEGO's Design Lab does end up vetoing the slightly askew angles. If LEGO did decide to add a vivid exterior "accent color" that wasn't in the original model, the most obvious place to add it would be in place of the door or white window frames, which already contrast with the surrounding walls. Sand Green or Olive Green could also definitely be added to the stone foundation to represent moss or lichen, just as LEGO did with the Old Fishing Store's foundation. The unevenly-placed tiles that make up the porch could also be changed into a "cobblestone" texture using quarter-circle or half-circle tiles to create gaps instead of the same technique that's currently used for the pulled-up boards, or use SNOT techniques to create half-plate offsets between some of the stones. While looking at the pictures of the set, I'm noticing that some of the exterior pics feature textile curtains which aren't present in the interior pics. I feel like the curtains are a detail the designers might like to include in the final model to add some color, although they could potentially opt for brick-built ones instead of textile ones. Another discrepancy is that there is a chimney in the back of the exterior photos which is absent in the interior photos. Again, I think the designers would opt to keep the chimney since it adds some nice detail to the model's silhouette and breaks up the geometric simplicity. But they may add a hinged or removable back wall for it to connect to, or at least extend the chimney itself to the foundation so that it can connect properly to the wood stove. So yeah — while it's a beautiful MOC with lots of gorgeous details, I can see plenty of opportunities for refinements or improvements, some of which I'm sure the builder was aware of when proposing it. I'm excited to see what the set designer turns it into, and I'm sure the original builder will be more than open to collaborating on that and contributing feedback to ensure that any changes remain in line with their creative vision.

Probably about a millimeter left on the edges, since that tends to be the norm with LEGO stickers compared to the surfaces they're designed for. Basically, they'll fit the dwarf shields just as well as they would have fit the original tiles. Of course, if you don't have a lot of spare dwarf shields, you could also always just use the stickers on the tiles from the Goat Boat set, and attach a piece like 25893 to function as a handle.

The Fantasy Era dwarf shields are actually exactly the same size as a 2x2 round tile, so the stickers from the Goat Boat would fit them perfectly. And that's probably a better choice for Vikings anyhow, since Viking shields tend to be flat aside from the metal boss in the center, unlike convex metal shields like Captain America's.