8 hours ago, Lordhelmet said:

Just saw someone post that the Nazgûl torso from the GWP will be in pick a brick soon.  Crazy, that makes those wings the only unique part.

And the wings are the worst part if you ask me...

I'm currently working on building the 2012 Bag End with used parts from BrickLink (I'm 70% there!). While I'm sure whatever the rumored set ends up being will be spectacular, I'm also sure it will be well out of my price range. I'm hoping there will be some cool prints or minifigs in the new set that I can purchase from BrickLink to compliment the old set! (I would particularly love to see a Bilbo minifig wearing his attire from his 111th birthday).

Nazgul torso’s are up at PaB for those interested. 

1 hour ago, unclejeffie said:

Nazgul torso’s are up at PaB for those interested. 

Now out of sock!

I wonder if the reason that Nazgul torso reappeared is because they're going to include one with The Shire set, and they're trying to keep it in production? Yeah, it doesn't 100 percent work, especially if they focus on the party scene, but Sam and Frodo were a little off in Barad Dur, and it would be another minifig they could add without needing to use new prints.

Or, of course, it could be nothing - other GWP parts have ended up on there for whatever reason.

Now waiting for 9 black horses at some point 😉

Shiiiiiirrreeee???? Bagginnnsssssssss???

Does anyone have a good Celebor mini figure that they have made?  I am a lego purist, and was wondering if anyone had found a decent print combination for Celebor (or other LOTR characters). 

They are no longer cheap, but Saruman's torso and skirt piece (or plain white legs for a cheaper option) with standard elf hair and head make a reasonable Celebor.

28 minutes ago, MAB said:

They are no longer cheap, but Saruman's torso and skirt piece (or plain white legs for a cheaper option) with standard elf hair and head make a reasonable Celebor.

Good call, I have a spare Saruman torso I can try out, wondering if it works best with a grey cape and grey skirt piece.  

How exactly do retirement dates correlate with how well a set sells? Because I know that if a set sells well it stays in production for longer but looking at the Brickset retirement dates this has some interesting implications on what sold best from the original run of Middle earth sets (in that case apparently the Hobbit spider set sold better than any LotR set bar Orthanc) and I'm wondering if there are other factors that can influence this apart fromt a remake coming out since that wasn't the case with any of these.

Maybe something to do with how many sets they make in a run or if they use up some of the parts in the set? Is it worth making a new run of sets or make more of the parts

E.g. B-bay 21322 had a short shelf life and in addition was sold out months at the time, made very little sense to me why they retired that when they could not meet demand for it

13 minutes ago, Roebuck said:

Maybe something to do with how many sets they make in a run or if they use up some of the parts in the set? Is it worth making a new run of sets or make more of the parts

E.g. B-bay 21322 had a short shelf life and in addition was sold out months at the time, made very little sense to me why they retired that when they could not meet demand for it

Maybe, sounds plausible. Though I think regardless of any other factors it's almost certain that Bilbo's house and Orthanc sold the best as their production runs were so much longer than all of the others.

 

1 hour ago, Roebuck said:

Maybe something to do with how many sets they make in a run or if they use up some of the parts in the set? Is it worth making a new run of sets or make more of the parts

E.g. B-bay 21322 had a short shelf life and in addition was sold out months at the time, made very little sense to me why they retired that when they could not meet demand for it

Yes, it could well have to do with part manufacturing capacity availability, but also possibly shelf space in stores. BB was a pretty large set, taking up shelf space that they wanted other new large sets to take up. I also agree that it was very confusing. I had the LEGO site refreshing every day for about two months, maybe longer, waiting for it to come back into stock!

4 hours ago, Renny The Spaceman said:

How exactly do retirement dates correlate with how well a set sells? Because I know that if a set sells well it stays in production for longer but looking at the Brickset retirement dates this has some interesting implications on what sold best from the original run of Middle earth sets (in that case apparently the Hobbit spider set sold better than any LotR set bar Orthanc) and I'm wondering if there are other factors that can influence this apart fromt a remake coming out since that wasn't the case with any of these.

The original sets were of a different time. Sometimes popular sets sold fast and that was it, they had their production run(s) and that was that. Especially for the one year themes/sets, they didn't necessarily make more production runs due to demand to keep a popular set on shelves. If anything, stores were proactive in clearing all stock near the shelf end date. Anything popular wasn't discounted but wasn't replenished near retirement date whereas poor sellers often got discounted heavily by supermarkets. Whereas LEGO tended not to heavily discount like supermarkets and sometimes stock hung around, and that would be what brickset records.

3 hours ago, Renny The Spaceman said:

Maybe, sounds plausible. Though I think regardless of any other factors it's almost certain that Bilbo's house and Orthanc sold the best as their production runs were so much longer than all of the others.

 

Orthanc was D2C. It stuck around a long time as it was not a regular retail set. Retailers want new inventory on their shelves, not sets that have been out for years. Whereas for D2C sets, LEGO could keep them in stock, selling slowly over a long time period.

I'd imagine Orthanc was the worst selling LOTR set. For its time, it was very expensive and Saruman had been done in a very cheap set. There weren't huge numbers of adult LEGO LOTR fans back then either so far fewer people willing to pay high prices for sets compared to now. 

24 minutes ago, MAB said:

The original sets were of a different time. Sometimes popular sets sold fast and that was it, they had their production run(s) and that was that. Especially for the one year themes/sets, they didn't necessarily make more production runs due to demand to keep a popular set on shelves. If anything, stores were proactive in clearing all stock near the shelf end date. Anything popular wasn't discounted but wasn't replenished near retirement date whereas poor sellers often got discounted heavily by supermarkets. Whereas LEGO tended not to heavily discount like supermarkets and sometimes stock hung around, and that would be what brickset records.

Orthanc was D2C. It stuck around a long time as it was not a regular retail set. Retailers want new inventory on their shelves, not sets that have been out for years. Whereas for D2C sets, LEGO could keep them in stock, selling slowly over a long time period.

I'd imagine Orthanc was the worst selling LOTR set. For its time, it was very expensive and Saruman had been done in a very cheap set. There weren't huge numbers of adult LEGO LOTR fans back then either so far fewer people willing to pay high prices for sets compared to now. 

All good points, this wasn't ever supposed to be a one year theme though TBF.

I don't think the wizard duel would have factored into Orthanc's sales though, regardless of how well it did, D2Cs were much more about the build than the figures back then, I don't think buying a set that big for a single character would have been a common enough mindset back then to make any notable impact

I don't know if that's the whole story though, if what lasted longest was purely a result of what LEGO stores couldn't get rid of I doubt that the more expensive Goblin Town set would have gone so quickly compared to Bag End. Hell in that case, even when we discount the Battle of five armies sets that were almost certainly made in smaller batches than the rest, most of the LotR sets languished on shelves for longer than the majority of Hobbit ones which I do not think is particularly likely.

9 hours ago, Renny The Spaceman said:

All good points, this wasn't ever supposed to be a one year theme though TBF.

I don't think the wizard duel would have factored into Orthanc's sales though, regardless of how well it did, D2Cs were much more about the build than the figures back then, I don't think buying a set that big for a single character would have been a common enough mindset back then to make any notable impact

I remember comments of the time saying that the set was too expensive, too big to display, too black for dust, not enough minifigures and that there was only one exclusive figure.  It also didn't help that they sold Saruman's skirt piece and the Zamor sphere palantir on the bricks and pieces service ( both under $1 each at the time!).

Of course, there was also positive discussion from those that bought it.

TandNbricks has teased “You shall not pass”

You’re in for a good year lads

Edited October 23, 2024Oct 23 by CloneCommando99

53 minutes ago, CloneCommando99 said:

TandNbricks has teased “You shall not pass”

You’re in for a good year lads

I wish they would make somewhat more substantial posts instead of something that can just mean anything really ;). I mean it could be refering to the bridge of Kazad-Dûm or just be used because it is a famous quote and kinda fits used for anything anyways

4 hours ago, CloneCommando99 said:

TandNbricks has teased “You shall not pass”

Adama Traore Brickheadz?

TandNbricks released a hype reel for 2025 and there was THE FREAKING BALROG. I am just praying it's not a GWP for the shire because that would be awful

10 hours ago, Black Falcon said:

I wish they would make somewhat more substantial posts instead of something that can just mean anything really ;). I mean it could be refering to the bridge of Kazad-Dûm or just be used because it is a famous quote and kinda fits used for anything anyways

It is presumably as they don't know anything else.

If this means we‘re getting a Balrog figure, 2025 could shape up to beat 2024 even, and that is a tall order!!

I hope it‘s a diorama. I feel it‘s wayyyy too early to know about a GWP set and there‘s no connection to the Shire anyway.

13 hours ago, CloneCommando99 said:

TandNbricks has teased “You shall not pass”

You’re in for a good year lads

3 hours ago, kuzyabricks said:

TandNbricks released a hype reel for 2025 and there was THE FREAKING BALROG. I am just praying it's not a GWP for the shire because that would be awful

Didn't the post before say this was not leaks and that he will stop more or less leaking in the future?

 

On 10/22/2024 at 2:40 AM, MAB said:

It also didn't help that they sold Saruman's skirt piece and the Zamor sphere palantir on the bricks and pieces service ( both under $1 each at the time!).

Wish I had known that at the time.  I would have bought a bunch of those.  

Bought the set though so I got them, but getting spares would have been awesome.