Esvald Forceswoop

I'm surprised to say but... none really. I mean of course I wanted a Death Star like every Lego Star Wars kid wanted, but I understand it's far out of my reach. What was in my reach I got everything. Republic Gunship, AT-TE, Turbo Tank etc... my biggest "set of my dream" was 10195 - Republic Dropship with AT-OT Walker, and thanks to an auction I got that one too. I didn't even see I was such a spoiled child back then. If I could go back in time I'd slap myself for not being grateful for what I had.

Interesting points of view! It certainly helped me understand the situation better. I will share my experience too, perhaps you can see where I came from: When I was a child the first toy I fell in love with was Hasbro's Star Wars action figures. They had great detail and playability. They were like my favorite franchise coming to life, and that was awesome. But even with all the details, weapons and extended range of movement aside, playing with them was more like a chore. It was like the setting up and the correcting always took up most of the time. They dropped their weapons, they fell down easily etc. I remember having Obi-Wan Kenobi and Darth Vader, so I can finally have my own lightsaber battle! Only to get disappointed and frustrated with how every second or third time the lightsabers clashed one of them would fall out of the hand of the figure and fly all over across the room. Needless to say I don't have any of those lightsabers from my "playing age". Not to mention Hasbro didn't even include baseplates for their figures (I found out they don't give them today either, and even the accessories are most of the time useless junk - but Hasbro's denying quality is a good topic, for another time) so they kept falling and falling. Really they were only good for displaying purposes, but I was a 10-12 year old child, I wanted to have my own Star Wars in my room. So I got interested in Lego thanks to the Lego Star Wars Video Game. I had to beg for my mom for hours to get my first set which was 7655 - Clone Trooper Battle Pack. And what a blast it was! Not only for the price of one (ONE!) Hasbro figure, I got 4 clone troopers (3 of them were different too!) but also a speeder bike and a turret. The value compared to the Hasbro figures was through the roof. Not to mention the biggest benefits: No weapon dropping, no falling down. Sure they were less detailed, but I could play with them. Getting 7654 - Droids Battle Pack really bought Star Wars to the room, as the clones now had opponents. And for this price, I could only get a single Clone Trooper and Battle Droid from Hasbro. Soon after I had my Jedi and Sith and I could play lightsaber battles too - sure the blades would sometimes fall out and due to the limited mobility of the minifigure arm and hand the attacks were less diverse - but it was fun, enjoyable and playable. Not to mention the buildable vehicles I had, although it was more like destructible, as my rebels blew up the imperial transport and it could really fall apart without any real damage to the product. If Lego figures had the mobility of the minidolls I don't think I would have switched. With minidolls you cannot really do lightsaber duels, they also cannot really sit in a speederbike etc. It's not like my imagination was limited, the stories me and my friends made were creative for children of our age, but we were just unable to play them out.

Lost not much but stolen, yes... the good old school camp (or I don't know how to call it in English since it's not my native; sorry about that; it's a place where children from schools around the same area went during a summer vacation). I lost like a dozen of clone troopers, and many other stuff I can't even remember. There are two minifigures I couldn't replace since then: Rocket Battle Droid Commander and Darth Vader (from 8017). They even tried to steal Assajj Ventress (from 7676) but lucky me they weren't successful that time. And they got back what they deserved too, but let's not get too deep into it. I know it sounds like a terrible place but I had a Lego/Star Wars fan club there and I met a lot of good friends, so it wasn't that all bad. It had it's ups and downs. Ah nostalgia hits me whenever I think about it.

I keep all of them and use them as background decoration behind my collection. I don't go out of my way to buy one if I bought a used set though. I also try to match the themes and subthemes (Star Wars Republic boxes go behind my Republic army, Harry Potter boxes go behind the Harry Potter stuff etc).

I think it's not going to happen, due to Hasbro owning the rights to release Star Wars figures individually. Or something like that. I'm not too sure about the official name of their right, but I do know Hasbro is the reason why sets like 7201 - Final Duel aren't being made anymore, and why every battle pack needs a vehicle (or turret, or anything in addition to figures).

Picked up 75156 - Krennic's Imperial Shuttle and 75149 - Resistance X-Wing Fighter for around 163$ Really happy with my newest additions to my collection, the Empire/Rebel army is finally growing.

Star Wars battlepacks mostly: 8014, 7913, 9489. Oh and also built another 7676 with spare parts and slightly modifications (weapon systems, color etc).

Having my own minidolls now (couldn't resist 41180) my opinions are somewhat changed. I still don't like them overall, but I can come up with a few solutions at least. The height is no longer a problem, since they are not human. Elves can be any height, so it's okay. The castle also functions perfectly for minifigures, I don't need to alter it in order to fit them it, so it's also okay. At times like this I'm glad I'm not a fan of modern day themes, because I couldn't just say to minidolls from Friends "Ah well they are not human so it's okay" There's a new problem though: Restriction. They can barely move. Sure the detailing is much better than a minifigure, they look better than a minifigure but they are so restricted. They can't move their legs, neither their hands; only their arms and their heads when the hairpiece lets them. This is not good at all. Isn't this theme, these themes with minidolls are dedicated to little girls? People who want ti play with them? I don't know about you, but I think playing with a figure/doll/whatever is really hard and now fun. I can compare minidolls to anime figures made by Alter, Kotobuyika etc... and minifigures to May Factory's figma line. You see the first is more detailed, but not meant for play, only display since they are more like statues: Looks nice, but that's all there is to it. The latter is more for playing: They are movable and coming with a lot of accessories, so you can actually play with them. Now the problem is the target audience: Most of the buyers for the first group is people who are 16-18+ in terms of age. What we are calling late TFOL and AFOL. But isn't this theme is made for little girls? I doubt they are into collecting and displaying stuff only. As a collector myself, I find this situation very weird. As if the minidolls were designed in our favor. But I'm sure I'm not gonna make a stop motion series with them (which is a shame, because I had a plan in my mind).

7676 - Republic Attack Gunship when I was like 14 years old. I remember the set having Clone Commander Cody was the biggest motivation to negotiate for it for my birthday. The overall set and the building experience way exceeded my expectations. Despite it's flaws still one of my favorite sets today. My recent emerge from my Shadow Age is also thanks to a 100$+ set: 41180 - Ragana's Magic Shadow Castle. Yeah I became overly obsessed with medieval fantasy, and when I checked what kind of fantasy stuff is available I couldn't say no to a dark castle despite it having no minifigures whatsoever.

Loving this series. I just read through the whole topic and laughed like... um, when 9gag was actually about the funny comics. Since I'm really into the fantasy (mmo)rpg genre the comics really gets me. And I'm kinda jealous how awesome figures you have. Returning from my Shadow Ages with a collection of Star Wars sets and nearly nothing fantasy themed it kinda hurts.

Visited the flea market today and bought two old Phase II Clone Troopers (7655). They were around 3.5$ each so it was a nice find, since those minifigures are rare nowdays. I would have bought more, but my wallet is empty right now, and I also wanna focus on Empire/Rebel stuff for now.

Well I'm returning from my "grey age" (not really dark age, since I still picked up LEGO once in a while), first I picked up a non Star Wars set (90% of my collection is Star Wars) 41180 - Ragana's Magic Shadow Castle. After putting LEGO and Star Wars to a hold I got into the fantasy theme (with animes like Sword art Online, Log Horizon, Tower of Druaga, Re:Zero etc, video games like The Elder Scrolls, Mabinogi, Aura Kingdom, Dragon Age etc and the Game of Thrones books) so despite my dislike for the minidolls (which also seems lifting) I couldn't resist buying this cool dark castle I can use for many custom themes. Since I'm working full time now, I'll be able to pick up more Elves stuff (mainly looking for 41078 - Skyra's Mysterious Sky Castle and 41174 - Starlight Inn) as well as buying tons of new Star Wars sets (need to catch up with like 6 battle packs and wanna buy the full Rogue One wave. And next year is almost here, Y-wing, Grand Admiral Thrawn, pure awesomeness, wallet is sad though. I also want to save up for the new Death Star. Offical themes aside I really want to start my custom Galaxy Angel theme (need my brother's help with this, since he's good with designing ships, I'm the minifigure maker) and continue developing the my Sword Art Online minifigure collection. Actually the Elves stuff like the castles or the inn are fine for a medieval fantasy VRMMO setting like Sword Art Online, so that's also very nice. I am also really disappointed about the lack of Fantastic Beasts related sets - the Harry Potter license doesn't seem to rise once more the Dimension sets aside. For my collection only (not owning the game) it is quite expensive, but I know I'll get Tina Goldstein, cause it's still more than nothing. I'll need a therapy to forget about the price after though haha. So that's about it. Growing the collection, MOCing themes LEGO never ever gonna make (also MOCing into themes LEGO already makes like my custom Venator or T2B Tank from Star Wars), that kind of stuffs.

Really hyped for the Fighter Tank and the Jedi Starfighter with Hyperdrive Ring. Also glad for the other chance for the FO battle pack, I really hope it comes at least with 3 regular FO Stormtroopers.

This shows how tiny the space inside is. This ship really needed to be bigger. Granted, more expensive too, but it's supposed to be a Capital Ship. Nice mods though, I can see you tried your best to make this ship... viable to some extent, but I feel you can't really fix this unless you completely start it over and make it at least 2-3x bigger.

Tell me about the 7676. It was my first big set, I spent a good 8-10 hours building it as a kid. The next day when I wanted to play with it, it broke down in my hands... Still a great set though, I love it. As for the 8039, it's not bad but not great either. Once I tried to build it, and when my best friend saw it, he told me to step aside and we heavily modified it to a Venator that's actually looks like a Venator. Granted it doesn't have many play features but it looks nice and that's enough. But if you think 8039 is the worst SW set, just take a look at things like Podracer Bucker, Ultimate Lightsaber Duel or the original Sith Infiltrator.