Robianco

Just got back from the Lego store in Liverpool and the R3-M2 promo doesn't include keyrings. Anything Star Wars other than a keyring gets you the polybag.

Hoth Bricks have hi res of pretty much everything over on their Flickr page here

There's been a couple of supermarkets in the UK that has price matched or price dropped things in various promotions. Tesco had a price drop better than the 40% that Lego did during the May promo and they ran it for a while. I think my Battle of Scarif was £31.

Just in case anybody was interested... I see Han's new hairpiece is available from B&P.

Check his splash page to see if there's any info on how frequently he ships stuff. Your profile also doesn't show what country you're in so that would have an effect on the shipping also. Quickest BL order I've had was around 18 hours from making the order to receiving item. I don't think it'll be that quick.

That seems to clear it up if that image is indeed genuine. I think the keyrings or fridge magnets will be flying off the shelves.

I think I saw a screengrab of a European offer that stated a minimum spend to qualify but I must admit having two minimum spend offers running one after the other on the same theme seems like a new (and cheeky) thing to do.

All the more reason for them to update the normal figure with those dark brown legs with holster.

If that is indeed the version of Han that we'll be getting in the MF then it would fit with the recent trend of updating existing Han figures with the new hairpiece and updating the reddish brown legs with dark brown. The jacket on the existing design is pretty good as it is. The Skiff Han technically has the same pants and shirt on as Hoth/Bespin Han. The dark brown holster legs are the only variant we don't have.

When they're leaving Hoth Han has a blue jacket... it's not the arctic hooded coat that has the blue/brown colouring he was wearing on patrol.

I've been able to pick up the Rogue One Battlepack for around £7 or so making each Stormtrooper just under £2 per figure. Considering the only place to get them at one point was the UCS Slave 1 they're now available in calendars and inexpensive battle packs. I'd say Lego was doing just fine at letting people army build them.

Ordered Battle on Scarif, Clayface Attack and another Stotmtrooper/Deathtrooper battlepack all for roughly the regular price of the Scarif set. I love Tesco's discounts.

Someone posted this over at a Lego Buy/Trade/Sale UK Group on Facebook today and I remembered about the April 1st thing so assumed it a joke. If Stash is saying this is legit... and lets face it... old stoney face doesn't seem like the kind of mod to pull anyones pud when it comes to stuff like this, then it looks like the most solid piece of evidence we could have hoped for. I've seen people make jokes about Lego's wording on set descriptions previously such as 'comes with two blasters' as selling points. The text on here does actually sound like internal marketing speak. People in marketing don't speak as normal people. Add in the possible translation factor from Danish and it's not too hard to imagine that as the kind of language people would use to circulate information about the Falcon. Now this might all be the practical joke it was originally considered to be but for someone who has worked at Lego and is familiar with their internal documents to say, with a straight face, that this is genuine then I'm prepared to give it a go. The bottom text that's close to the image of the actual build looks like it says something along the lines of 'Final model will be similar but not exactly this'. Let's see about that October 1st release date then shall we?

I've bought several things from Arealight and their printing and moulding are very good quality. I've not ordered from CAC but I've heard good things about them. Whether things are more accurate is up to you. Arealight's Fett jetpack is far more accurate than Lego's, at least to me. Add a BrickArms, BrickForge or Arealight EE-3 Carbine for your Fett and it's taken up a notch again. Arealight had done a Sabine Wren helmet and torso before Lego released one and I'd probably say their helmet for Sabine was more accurate at least in terms of colour.

What brand were they?

Did you just upload that pic to Eurobricks or post a link through Flickr or similar hosting site? Eurobricks doesn't allow images to be uploaded really and the image size allowance is mainly for profile pics etc.

Here's my twopenneth. 1. Lego Ideas hasn't really changed my opinion of them as a company. They have an excellent brand identity built on the quality of their product so they don't need to offer something like this to improve their image in my eyes. 2. I think you'd have to be looking for something to have a Lego Ideas release alienate you. It's a Lego set... why would any set alienate anyone? The platform is very open so unless Lego specifically chose to stop me participating then I don't see how alienation can occur. Rather than 'do no wrong' I think it would be really hard for Lego to alienate it's fanbase though a set release. 3. I wouldn't say it's made me more or less loyal. My loyalty is down to Lego's build quality and design ethic. They work hard to get things right and they pick up the right partnerships and licenses to release great product. 4. I have no idea what the Test Lab is.

The prices on these seem to be dropping thankfully. I just picked one up closer to £20 which is a lot less than they were selling for. I think it's a really nice little package and even when displaying the Tiger Suit with the rest of the Bat line up I'll probably put a regular Batman into the pod as I think that would work as a nice little display piece too.

There's a full one with less than 4 hours to go for around £34 currently. I'd keep an eye on that one. I think I've actually got a second set unbuilt as I bought it cheap for a second set of Biths and another Dewback. Actually I think I sold the Speeder and other spare figures so probably not useful to you.

The only problem with selling those items is there's now an updated Speeder with hose same digs available in a cheap set. picking up a set with just he cantina may be a better option. They were relatively cheap not so long ago.

I had the email this morning from Lego for the UK discounts and it lists the X-Wing as the first one same as the German site. That means Scarif will be purchased on it's discount day for me.

I'm thinking not, unfortunately. Ultimately each of these discussions seems to head off in the same direction which closely resembles an infinite loop.

When I saw someone bring up that Lego has made a lot of money so it doesn't matter I think a point was missed. So what if Lego makes a lot of money?.. It's a business. But to be successful in that business it works to build a portfolio of products and licenses to help it create shelves full of toys that people want, at a quality that people trust. Lego has worked with Lucasfilm and Disney to acquire the rights to produce brick based merchandise for their properties. In the case of the Imperial Shuttle. A designer was paid to come up with that design, whether that be McQuarrie or not. Lucasfilm then owned the rights to that design. Lucasfilm then licensed Lego to build Star Wars sets and in doing so allowed the shuttle's likeness to be used. This is a mutually beneficial relationship. Lego as the world's biggest toy manufacturer, trusted for it's quality of design and product and Lucasfilm, now Disney, for being the largest creator of Child orientated media in the world with HUGELY popular properties. The designer of the shuttle for Lucasfilm was paid... and did his job... the designer of the Lego shuttle was paid... and did his job. There is nothing in the world that says a designer working for a company gets to have his name credited on something. I've designed corporate identities for companies and even a currently circulating £2 coin produced by the Royal Mint. My name isn't on it. That's fine. I know that's not how things work. That's just what being a designer for a company is like. Yeah, people know it was you at that company... and your name might even get circulated a bit in the related press but most of the time it doesn't. It doesn't mean I don't take pride in what I created and it also doesn't mean that I feel the need for my name to be on it to be validated in some way. The designer of 10212 doesn't need to be credited... nice if he is in some way but he was paid for his work and that's that. It doesn't make a copy of that work by Lepin any more valid if he isn't credited. Lepin doesn't have a license agreement to recreate those designs either by Lego or Disney so they can't. That's regardless of how cheap it is and what market it's aimed at. Yes, AliExpress has made the western world able to buy these things and maybe, just maybe if these were just contained to the Asian market they were intended for as a very low price alternative to genuine Lego we wouldn't be having this discussion because we wouldn't really know about them and Lepin wouldn't have got so much attention, but that's a different conversation. I just don't think we can take the argument that company A makes a lot of money so therefore it's OK for company B to copy it to make it cheaper for some people because A are already rich. If Lepin's brick quality is actually that good... and I've seen Youtube reviews of things such as the Porsche GT set claiming they can be, why not just pay for some designs and release your own sets. Release modulars that are compatible with Lego if you want... just pay for them... pay a MOCer to make some for them and go form there. Make a product that even Lego builders might want as a compliment to their existing modular set up. You just can't make Star Wars, DC, or Marvel sets to name but a few.

The Arctic Explorer CMF actually has red and dark blue dual moulding.

For me, minifigures and accessories are different to bricks and building elements when it comes to specialist or custom parts. I can't see myself looking for third party building elements but when it comes to customising minifigures I'm more than happy to use them. I love my SAS 80s Squad with custom moulded gas masks, tactical vests, grenades and H&K machine guns with pad printed balaclava head. Lego can't give me that but if third party customisers can then I'm more than happy. I also like that my Han Solo minifigures have accurate DL-44 blasters and my Stormtroopers have accurate E-11s.