Subject:
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Re: A fan no more
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.general
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Date:
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Mon, 12 Jul 2004 23:27:03 GMT
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Viewed:
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6771 times
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In lugnet.general, Jindrich Kubec wrote:
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I’m biased basic brick user. You’re biased Bionicle user.
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Not true. I’ve been collecting since the days of the maxifigs and
non-articulated minifigs. Yes, I’ve found a new degree of freedom in the
BIONICLE series that wasn’t present before, but I do still build with basic
bricks. I’ve just never done been a big fan of building old-style TECHNIC
models, which is why my earliest TECHNIC set got mixed in with my Yellow Castle
parts.
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Stud free Technic liftarm is almost useless when you want to use other
(non-Technic) studded parts.
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The newer TECHNIC sets get around that problem by not using non-TECHNIC parts.
If there aren’t any basic bricks in the set, there’s no reason to include
TECHNIC bricks to interface with them for that set. And while a few sets are
released with the specific intent of directly interacting with one or more other
assembled sets (the three Jabba sets, the various Hogwarts sets, and the
Exo-Toa/Tahu), they’re still designed as stand-alone sets. If a specific part
isn’t included in the set, the set isn’t designed with that specific piece in
mind. In general the TECHNIC system is compatible with the basic System bricks,
just like in general the basic bricks are compatible with the DUPLO system.
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Technic bricks with plates make better frames for stuff like cars.
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They make great square frames, but very few cars these days are made in such a
box-like style. There’s the Hummer (which was designed as a very utilitarian
military vehicle), the Landrover, and a few other SUV-wannabes, but even pickup
trucks and police cars are getting more curvy.
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Usage of Technic bricks has almost flat learning curve. You just use
them as another brick, and learn few tricks like inserting 2 plates and
cross-strenghtening with other beam (even studless, you know).
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So, to turn your argument on its ear, you’re complaining that the modern TECHNIC
system is too advanced compared to the old-style TECHNIC/System meld, in spite
of the fact that kids have made BIONICLE the top selling theme, and the Racers
theme is another one of the biggest sellers with the younger crowd, while the
Inventor series hasn’t seen any new sets in 2004.
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Usage of studless beams in studless-only creation is anything but
intuitive. You’ve got to use complete different way of building
(instead of bottom-to-top you must use inside-to-outside) and master
tens of funny new elements just to achieve something what would take you
1 minute of playing with plates and bricks.
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As someone who often builds in weird patterns like both-ends-to-middle (which I
did with my
SpeeToa Bike), I find the stud-free design to be less restrictive, as I can
change orientations many times in a very small space. I also find myself
wanting certain parts only to see them released later on (specifically, I
desperately wanted 1x2 flat liftarms two months before they first shipped, and
the new +oo perpendicular axle joiner offers functionality that I’ve been
wanting for a very long time). To me, the sheer variety of parts is what makes
it worth using. The biggest limitation of stud-free TECHNIC is that they’re
still in the middle of building up the basic part catalog, but the more they use
those parts, the more quickly they’ll end up seeing a need to fill it out.
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Simply put, I really don’t know what would make me build something like
the new Tow Truck (using studless bricks) when I can easily build
something like 8479 (using studded bricks).
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I’m noticing quite a few stud-free liftarms and such in that 8479, especially
for the moving parts. Are you sure you want to use that as your example?
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Tell me why do you think that the studless bricks in the Tow Truck are
more effective then the studded bricks in the 8479. For me they clearly
aren’t.
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The blue tow truck? Have you actually tried it out, or are you just going by
visual impression? I got to play around with it at Toy Fair, and I didn’t
notice any wobbliness. It’s also 1/4 of the price, and slips under the $50
hurdle that seems to heavily influence which sets can be found in many stores.
If stores won’t buy them, they can’t afford to dump as much money into producing
them. The Rebel Blockade Runner and ISD models were released as S@H exclusives
because they honestly didn’t think they’d sell well enough to be worth
marketting to stores. In this day and age, if they did make old-style TECHNIC
sets, the medium/large ones would probably all have to be S@H exclusives, which
really cuts into how much value there is in producing an old-style sub-group in
the first place.
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: A fan no more
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| (...) Yes, and that's my whole point. Technic _was_ part of the System and it's not anymore. It's more Znap than System and that's what I (and probably some others) don't like. (...) You misread what I wrote. Modern Technic is cumbersome, not (...) (20 years ago, 13-Jul-04, to lugnet.general)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: A fan no more
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| (...) I'm biased basic brick user. You're biased Bionicle user. (...) Stud free Technic liftarm is {almost} useless when you want to use other (non-Technic) studded parts. Technic bricks with plates make better frames for stuff like cars. Usage of (...) (20 years ago, 12-Jul-04, to lugnet.general)
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