Hive

See that's funny, I could personally never see 4842 as a home to elves. But that's the beauty of it, how we all think differently.

I was thinking that since we lost Kingdoms (a loss I am still personally grieving over ), and won't get any Castle sets for a while... how about a discussion on which non-Castle sets that can, without too many modifications, be used in a Castle setup (not taking the minifigs into consideration)? I'll start with the ones I either already have, for use with Castle, or plan on buying: Harry Potter 4738 Hagrid's Hut I can't recall the name of the guy who did it, but I saw a Castle village setup by someone here on Eurobricks in which he used it as a witch hut. I found that to be an absolutely great idea, and think it fits perfectly as a such. Also, it turned out to be a really interesting build! Pirates of The Caribbean 4183 The Mill I reckon this could pretty much be used as is, maybe just removing the green sea weed thingies. Though I'm not really sure that combining a mill with a clock tower is perfectly historical... 4193 The London Escape This one is pretty much good to go as well after removing/replacing the lamps with torches. Only drawback is that the building is not properly enclosed, and thus will not fit perfectly with MMV and MVR. 4194 Whitecap Bay Some more work is required here, as the light and the cannon are both a bit too futuristic. But a great assortment of bricks, and I could definately see it as a nice coastal Castle outpost. ...and of course, the LOTR sets coming this summer will all (more or less) be great for Castle builds - and I especially look forward to building Helm's Deep together with a castle. Any other thoughts on sets we can use to extend our Castle collection?

I love that I'm apparantly not the only one who sees sets from other themes and immediatly thinks "hmm I wonder how this could be changed to fit Castle..."

I really like it. I too have for a while toyed with the idea of making a series of mocs (though for Castle) that would mimick the LEGO style and could be actual sets, as I for some strange reason find doing so to be more fascinating than doing "real" mocs. You should put them on Cuscoo, maybe LEGO can use some of your designs.

Absolutely amazing, I wish I could build something like that. Hell, I'd even settle for having the necessary bricks to build such a thing.

Nice picture. Helm's Deep looks much better than I originally anticipated, and the castle wall seems fairly useful. You can always use castle walls, after all. I look forward to even better pictures.

Beautiful. Extraordinary. Amazing.

I don't like fleshie minifigs, but I must say that those minifigs are pretty kick megablocks. Probably the best series of minifigs I have ever seen LEGO do for a single theme. I might have to get most of them, and try to switch flesh with yellow where applicable. Thankfully, the bad guys are fine as is.

I find pretty much everything but the sails, masts and the weirdly placed cannon is better on BB. Especially the colours stands out. It was a tough decision though, close call for me.

This ship pretty much represents everything I hate about the Ninjago theme. Silly beyond reason. But at the same time, I can definately understand why kids would find it very exciting. And it seems to have its fair share of AFOL followers as well, so good for LEGO. And good review.

Yes, I left out a great deal of very interesting sets from Fantasy Castle - but that's because they had no logical counterparts in Kingdoms to put them up against. The two Chess sets being good examples of that dilemma. What I did was take parts of the Fantasy line that I felt had fairly compareable counterparts in Kingdoms, and made that basis for an obviously not exactly scientifically discussion that was aimed as lighthearted fun.

Yeah well it was hard to select the lineup for Fantasy in this battle, with there being a lot more sets than for Kingdoms. I couldn't use the Dwarve's Mine or Troll Mountain Fortress since there were no sets in Kingdoms that are directly compareable (due to only the main "good" faction getting a base there). I did consider using Troll Warship in the wildcard battle, but opted for Skeleton Ship Attack due to loving it a bit more than Troll Warship personally - but I do love both of them. They had to be in the wildcard battle though, since there are no ships in Kingdoms. The Final Joust, I really wanted to include as well - and nearly did. But had to make some tough cut-off choices. Funny that you got the same result as me, though took a different road getting there. Good analysis, I agree. About the Drawbridge Defense, I was actually very much in love with that set and craved it dearly. I managed to get it early last year, when it was pretty much the only Fantasy Castle set I could still find in any retail shop, and had to have it so much that I made my ex gf bring it back from England to me. ...however, after building it my love kinda vanished a bit. It was a bit wacky structure-wise, and doesn't really fit with anything else. Though I love the colours and the drawbridge itself, and the golden knight is... well, golden. I'm still looking for something fitting to build it into. I'd say that since it's a tie for you, the fact that your favourite Fantasy sets were not include gives it a tie breaker victory for Fantasy.

He true, but thankfully we'll have another 2-3 friday the 13th this year. I did choose to open a saved lego box yesterday though: The King's Castle. Not quite as sweet as MVV, but still pretty sweet.

Sounds good that the minotaur will be easy to spot, I want at least one of those.

I finally built this set tonight, and I'm pretty impressed. Took a couple of hours to build it together with a friend, and it was enjoyable in spite of being slightly repetitive at times. It's my first ever real castle, and buying and building it fulfilled a childhood dream of mine. I regard this as one of the best LEGO Castles ever, so I'm very pleased to have it as my first. And while it's true that it's not as big as the 2007 Castle, it seems to be as big or bigger as the classic castles. So no complaints here. And best of all, it gave me all the bricks needed for some own creations I've been wanting to do for a while.

This is absolutely stunning, great job.

Here's what I think: 1. 7955 Wizard - Due to being an exclusive not found anywhere else. It's only useful to buy one of them though, much unlike it's Fantasy counterpart. 2. 7090 Crossbow Attack - Simple choice really, due to having an additional minifig as well as a skeleton horse. 3. 7037 Tower Raid - This one was pretty tough for me to call, and if it was possible I'd call it a draw. But since this is a fight to the death, I choose 7037 Tower Raid. Outpost Attack has better colours and minifigs, and I like the design of the catapult more than I like the design of the siege ram thing... but Tower Raid has a better tower and, in spite of not my favourite design, a more impressive attacking weapon. It also has more minifigs. Very close call here. 4. 7188 King's Carriage Ambush - Win by a landslide here, and I'll honestly be surprised to see anyone choose the chariot. Pretty much everything except the colorscheme on the carriage itself is simply better here. 5. 7947 Prison Tower Rescue - While not perfect, Prison Tower Rescue wins by having better colours and a more interesting and "realistic" structure than its' counterpart. I do like the evil wizard and dark red in the Skeleton Tower a lot, though. 6. 7946 King's Castle - King's Castle Siege has better colors and a greater size, but is inferior to King's Castle in every other way. 7. 10193 Medieval Market Village - Pretty much my favourite LEGO set ever, so not much of a battle here. Though I would gladly swap the minifigures of the two sets. 8. 7979 Castle Advent Calendar - Another tough battle here. I enjoyed both, but found 7979 to be the more diverse of the two. But it's another close call. 9. 7189 Mill Village Raid - I really really wish I could choose both here, as I love both (but sadly don't own Skeleton Ship Attack). MVR wins due to being a rare civilian set with tons of new pieces, though I find the SSA to be a very fresh and different idea with many things going for it as well. And I've always been a sucker for the (unfortunately) rare ship sets in Castle. So... for me, Kingdoms edges it out 5 to 4. But a very close battle! And it leads me to the conclusion that the last two Castle subthemes have both been excellent, and while I'm still sad about Kingdoms ending, I simply can't wait to see what kind of goodness LEGO brings us next time they revive Castle. What say you all?

A minor debate in the Kingdoms 2012 thread made me compare these two Castle subthemes some more, and I thought it could be fun to decide once and for all (in fun and good spirits) which one was the superior theme. I have therefore lined up a series of "battles" between two compareable sets from each line, with the aim to have people vote on each one. Some may not agree with my choices, and indeed many things could have been done differently, but please bear in mind that this is only meant as a light topic in good fun. Without further ado, I present you the battle lineup: 1. 5615 The Knight vs. 7955 Wizard - Battle of the impulses 2. 7090 Crossbow Attack vs. 7950 Knight's Showdown - Battle of the army builders 3. 7037 Tower Raid vs. 7948 Outpost Attack - Battle of the besieged towers 4. 7078 King's Battle Chariot vs. 7188 King's Carriage Ambush - Battle of the royal carriages 5. 7093 Skeleton Tower vs. 7947 Prison Tower Rescue - Battle of the evil towers 6. 7094 King's Castle Siege vs. 7946 King's Castle - Battle of the castles 7. 10193 Medieval Market Village vs. 10223 Joust - Battle of the exclusives 8. 7979 Castle Advent Calendar vs. 7952 Kingdoms Advent Calendar - Battle of the holidays 9. 7029 Skeleton Ship Attack vs. 7189 Mill Village Raid - Battle of the wildcards Let's get reeeeaaaaady to ruuuuuuuuumble!

I have it MISB standing right next to me right now, just waiting for a special occation to finally open it and build this magical gem for the first time ever... even in the box, it's my favourite Castle set ever (and thus also my favourite LEGO set ever).

Design-wise, I think only the newest Imperial Flagship is better than the BSB - though I think several ships generally have a better color scheme, as I'm not too fond of the yellow and, especially, old grey in it. I prefer the colors of both the BB and the QAR to the BSB by far.

The first 10 orders through Bricklink will receive one of my series 4 collectable minifigures as a bonus, free of charge!

I made myself a Bricklink store now, check it out if interested: http://www.bricklink.com/store.asp?p=Hive If my shipping conditions (or anything else, for that matter) are unclear, please let me know.

Wow, I really love your setup. Amazing work! I'd love to see some more pictures of it, as I'm sure many others would as well. It looks absolutely stunning, and your Lion ship looks great. I've been considering doing such a ship for a few weeks now myself (though I could never do it this well, I'll admit).

The MMV is the greatest Castle set ever made, in my opinion. Hell, maybe even the greatest LEGO set of all time. And yes, the smaller sets - the impulse sets in particular - were much better in the Fantasy line, as they were useable for army builders. But who wants more than one (if even that) of the jester and green wizard (I love the green wizard, but only one)? And yes, the fantasy line had more factions... but as you say yourself, it also had a longer life. Kingdoms would probably have gotten a couple more factions itself this year, had it not been discontinued (Forestmen and Black Falcons perhaps?). And the Fantasy boats, while not perfect, were indeed welcome rareities and are on top of my Castle wanted list. Hmm you know what? Come to think of it, I'll agree that Fantasy was more diverse, in spite of lacking civilian sets apart from the exclusive (and awesome) MMV. I still like Kingdoms better as a whole though, and would have liked 1-2 more years worth of sets.