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This is an Idea I’m certain we’ve all thought of, but I figured that I would
try to put my ideas into words and pictures. It’s a Castle theme that I’ve
developed in my spare time.
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31954
The main purpose of these designs was to try to put together a castle theme
that Lego could feasibly produce, and I would want to purchase. The first
area is fairly simple. I stuck with existing parts that are widely
available in retail or Lego Direct sets. No Retooling of molds or
commissioning new ones would have to take place. To make certain that the
sets could be sold at a reasonable price through the local retailer, I
determined a price per part index (for how this index was determined, see
the bottom of the page) and started building.
The second idea was a little more complex, but a lot more fun. Set’s I like
to purchase (and I think it’s fair to say the general public as well) are
generally strong in a few important areas: Play Value, Price per piece,
Unique parts, and Expandability.
This is only one years worth of sets that could be produced, many other
items could follow, because the possibilities really are endless.
Here are the pictures of the sets as well as brief descriptions of each, and
a piece count and MSRP. For more info on the witherfores and the why’s
continue on to the bottom.
Set 001
Gatehouse - 207 pieces - $19.99
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31962
The gatehouse is a designed to keep invaders out of the castle. Three brave
soldiers guard the entrance and operate the independently working drawbridge
and portcullis.
Outside the gate, the determined forces operate their battering ram, hoping
to get inside.
Set002
Princess tower - 252 Pieces - $24.99
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31958
This tall tower keeps the princess safe from the invaders. Two brave
soldiers guard the entrance. Play is a snap as the tower pops open to
reveal three chambers inside.
Set 003
Livery Stable - 220 pieces - $19.99 (.07 index)
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31964
Mounted knights can cover a lot of territory. In the stable, the Smithy can
give their horses excellent care. Protect your realm with this sturdy cavalry!
Set 004
Corner Tower -180 pieces - $15.99
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31955
The castle is protected by towers along the wall. Can the defenders hold
their position, or will the Black Knights climb the walls and force them
into the tower?
Upper and lower chambers inside the tower provide shelter from the weather
and the enemy.
Set 005
Battle Station - 68 pieces - $9.99
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31961
The fiercest soldiers do battle on the walls of the castle. Who will gain
the victory, The Crusaders or Black Knights? With the Battle Station,
expanding your empire is a snap.
Set 006
Catapult - 52 pieces - $6.99
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31959
The Black Knights are preparing their assault on the castle. The Catapult
hurls stones high over the walls. Two soldiers operate this attack machine.
Set 007
Dark Archer - 33 pieces $2.99
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31957
The Dark Archer fires a volley of arrows at enemy soldiers. Crossbows are
excellent supports for siege troops.
Set 008
NobleMan's Hall - 304 pieces - $29.99
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31966
The Nobleman's Hall is the place to enjoy dinner and ale, or sit and relax
by the fire. Includes the Nobleman, two soldiers, and 1 serf. Connect
Towers or walls to the Hall, or place it in the middle of your castle!
Set 009
Castle Pack - 995 pieces $95.00
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31965
A complete Guarded Castle and Siege Army, plus plenty of Bricks to Build
your Castle any way you like! Who will prevail, The Lions or the Dragons,
You Decide. Contains 1 Battle Station, 1 Gatehouse, and 4 Corner Towers.
The Greatest thing about these sets is that they are all compatible with
each other. Technic pins and pin hole blocks allow for instant
reconfigurations. The combinations you can create are nearly
inexhaustible. You can create castles as large or as small as you like. You
can amass armies, lay sieges, or design a medieval kingdom to your own
specs. Even if you hate these sets, there are more than enough pieces here
to build whatever kind of castle you want! This is a level of
interchangeability only hinted at by the Lego sets of the 1980’s
CONNECTIVITY OPTIONS
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=31968
PLAY VALUE – If the set doesn’t look fun, who wants to buy it? The set gets
picked up or passed by based on how well it arouses consumer interest. Lego
sets that feature a man and a car are lame, sets with two men and two cars
create a day at the races. Opening doors, launching catapults, secret
entrances etc… make the model interesting after it is built. PICK UP A BOX
WITH PIRATES ON IT AND YOU ARE INTERESTED, PICK UP A BOX WITH A PIRATE
BATTLE ON IT, AND YOU START LOOKING FOR A PRICE TAG!
PRICE PER PIECE – If a Lego set costs 10 bucks and you get 10 parts (Jack
Stone, how I hate you!) you are not buying Lego, you are buying PlayMobil,
and the last time I checked PlayMobil and Lego were two different companies.
Playing your game is the best way to ensure your personal success, playing
someone elses game plays to their advantage.
The more parts you get, the more alternate models you can make, the more you
can enhance your existing creations, and it becomes easier to convince
Grammy and Gramps that this would be a good value at Christmas time.
Not many of us complained shelling out $100 U.S. on the Black Seas Barracuda
(we aren’t even complaining now) But none of us liked paying $ 100 U.S. for
the Red Beard Runner. WHEN YOU CAN JUSTIFY THE PRICE TAG, YOU START
DREAMING ABOUT THE PURCHASE.
UNIQUE PARTS – Even the most rational of us has walked into store displays
while making our way to the counter as we stare at the box, wondering about
all the things we could do with all those parts, “Three more Knights!” “If I
bought nine of these, I could….” WHEN YOU GET THE PARTS YOU WANT, YOU ARE
HAPPY.
EXPANDABILITY – I don’t know about you, but I get wired when I see the
possibility of creating a small little world within a theme. Gas stations
AND Car Dealerships, Pirate ships AND Harbors, adding to an existing world
is a lot more fun than not. Remember trying to figure out what to do with
your Knights’ Procession? IF you didn’t have 60 bucks for the castle too,
those guys just marched around your TV tray during Tom & Jerry untill
Christmas morning!)
I like to think that this is the direction the castle theme COULD have gone
in 1990, IF TLG had kept with their modular design scheme instead of moving
to the raised baseplate motif begun with the Kings Mountain Fortress. I
used the black knights and the crusaders, for illustrative purposes only,
any group (I’m partial to the falcons, I just don’t have a lot of them) or
groups could be used.
By keeping the parts basic, giving each model moving parts and multiple
features, keeping the line expandable, while maintaining a level of
affordability, I believe that it is entirely possible to produce sets that
will fly off of the shelves.
*The Price per parts index is as follows: Lego Direct has offered us the
Black Falcons Fortress, and the Guarded Inn for $.10 per part USD. (Thank
you, Thank you, Thank you!) This is well below the almost $.17-$.20 price
per part in their recent offerings. This low price point can be achieved
for many reasons, but chief among them is that nearly all of the R and D,
and packaging costs were already absorbed by the initial releases of the
product. In This case I have done all of the R and D, so achieving this
index is definitely feasible. The Larger pieces : Walls, Corners, etc. keep
the index in the point tens range.
TLG themselves have given us Daniel Siskind’s brilliant Blacksmith’s Shop
at an unheard of $.07 pricing index, this appears to be because Daniel did
all of the R and D, and used small parts almost exclusively. Smaller parts
cost less.
The sets I’ve designed that use wall pieces and large baseplates are
generally calculated at a 10 cent index and the ones built using only small
parts are calculated using the 6 cent index.
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Message has 19 Replies:
 | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| (...) Then why do they keep giving us BURPy-LURPy parts? Drive me crazy... Jon, I really like all of your sets, and, as you pointed out, even if someone hated them, there's enough variety of parts to build something else. (Yay!) I have a question, (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| Jon, Beautiful creation. (Though why aren't you busy making LotR MOCs!?!? :) ) I really like this as a theme, even though I'm not a fan of panel wall pieces. One question, in the corner tower subset, can the walls be attached to any of the 4 sides (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| (...) battlements), but the concept is excellent, and the execution is very good. The Great Hall is especially nice---things like the fireplace and the food give ideas for what to do if you get the bricks to rebuild larger, but are cleanly executed (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| Jon, this is lovely, and you've set yourself a hard problem. The thing that seems not quite in theme about it is the monochrome colors. Most Lego castles have a spot of color, a red, black, or blue roof. It keeps the minifigs smiling. -Erik (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| I love this stuff. In my wildest dreams Lego would pick up on this. Perhaps when the HP license runs out. I think the design is perfect. Reminds me of the old 80's castle lego made. The blacksmith shop, the seige tower, the guarded inn, stuff that (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| I couldn't agree with you more Jon. We castle fans don't need any fancy new pieces to make us happy; just a reappearance of castle sets. Those modular sets you're created are exactly the kind of thing I want LEGO to bring back to the market. I've (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| Mr. John Furman sir, That is very well thought out and nicely done. I am very impressed with your acheivement of what all of us have been thinking of. The only change I would like to see might be different knightly characters (think armor like in (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| Jon - absolutely superb (and an awful lot better than the attempt I made to do something similar a few month ago). Well thought out from the commercial axis as well - a nice mix of subjects & good 'price points'. I for one would like to see your (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | RE: My modular castle creations
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| Jon, I just had to say, very tastefully done! I really like the livery and the gate house. The nice part is, you can 'buy' extra wall sections to expand the sides making it a much deeper walled city. That way you could fit everything inside the (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| (...) Which is exactly what the original classic-gray castles promised but never quite lived up to. Your designs are so simple as to be brilliant, and I like how there would be a range of sizes and prices within your hypothetical theme. Also, your (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| (...) First off awesome designs but I must also add that they are very monochromatic. Colors would have been nice. If nothing else perhaps some of the banners used in HP but in different colors. They could be hung off of the corner towers. Overall (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| oh wow beautiful. if i ever saw these in a store i would poop my pants! thanks so much for sharing.. this makes me wish i wasn't at work so i could do some amazing castle work. this is great, not just because it would regenerize Lego Castle, but is (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| Beautiful! I have also been thinking along similar lines recently, and you have captured much of what was on my mind. The monochromality of your stuff doesn't bother me so much, castle tended to be all the same colour. I would however, suggest you (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| I really like the overall idea, and it's quite similar to something I have been slowly developing. (school and work get in the way) I especially like the way you have ladders and doors connecting almost everything and I hope you will post more of (...) (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| Jon, I just saw that the "Connectivity" folder is up (it wasn't moderated yesterday). Your castle looks even better when you put the other buildings in the middle. Bruce (22 years ago, 22-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| Very well thought out Jon! I have a feeling Lego Direct may already be up to something like this, considering both of their classic castle re-issues are from back in the modular castle days. It also fits into the modular My Own Train and Super (...) (22 years ago, 25-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
| | | Re: My modular castle creations
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| OK, I would buy this. I would buy all of these. They're fun, they're "real Lego", they're modular, they're open to possibilities. AND they're all priced within a lower price range, which would oddly encourage me to spend more overall in buying each (...) (22 years ago, 25-Jan-03, to lugnet.castle)
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