40567 Forest Hideout (GWP)

[Something_Awesome]

8 hours ago, jodawill said:

This might be a minority opinion, but I hope they don't make any more minifigure based 3 in 1 sets. I think they look completely awful. That theme is fine for things like airplanes and large animal builds, but I'm not at all a fan of the style of the minifigure scale sets. I mean, just look at the recent castle. Even the parts selection is completely dreadful, and it doesn't include enough minifigures for that price range. And it needs real animal molds.

 

I do hope to see more forestmen sets though. A new Forestmen's Crossing would be a big hit, especially if it includes a printed baseplate!

Could not disagree more. It's probably the best castle that has been made up until this point. The problem with the set is that, because it is not part of a castle theme, it does not have the minifig count and animals that a real castle set would have. Perhaps the dragon would have been a mold as well. But, all the figs, animals, dragons aside. It is an amazing set. I find LEGO has the most charm with a playset over something that is meant to be a replica. 

[KuhlAidMan]

1 hour ago, Weil said:

 

I think we could get a forestmen figure in a 3 in 1 creator set (would have worked well in the current 3 in 1 castle), and that a 3 in 1 forestmen set would be great.  However, I think an out-and-out forestmen 3 in 1 creator set is quite unlikely.  I don't think it has that widely recognisable feel of a stand-alone set characteristic of a particular genre, like a pirate ship or a castle.

I guess it depends on how the 3/1 castle performed and how big of a response Lego sees with the forestmen. I would wager they could either do a full line and see success or continue the 3/1 trend. I’m just putting out some wishful thinking. 

[Rattlebricks]

On 7/4/2022 at 7:32 AM, MAB said:

No, that first happened way back in Series 1:

 

 

These two both appears in this set:

 

 

Sorry I dont mean the whole minifigs being on another sets but rather the head, torsos or printed legs being used on another sets

Edited July 7, 2022 by Darkdragon
please don't quote pictures

[DaleDVM]

The 3 in 1 castle is a pretty good design IMHO.  As far as it goes as an overall set, I think it is pretty awful.  

The castle is nice, but most AFOLs build much better.  The most important component LEGO sets provide for me is good parts that I can't get cheaper in other sets.  

I do not want more castle 3 in 1's to come out.  None, zero, never ever again.  The part selection will be garbage and the price to obtain those few good minifig, accessory, armor, weapons, shields, animals, heraldry, etc. will be WAY too high, if they are included at all.  

People are buying the 3 in 1 because we are desperate for castle.  For no other reason.  If a castle theme was on the shelves, with all of the cool minifigs, animals, and medieval bits, would anyone buy the 3 in 1 castle?  I highly doubt it. 

As far as I am concerned, if they keep castle in the creator line of sets, we will all be getting an inferior product at a premium price, and TLG will be taking advantage of castle fans... because we will buy it simply because of a scarcity TLG is causing in the first place.  

Worse yet, I believe the 3 in 1 castle sets will not sell as well simply because they are not as good as regular castle sets.   Then TLG will simply deny us any castle sets at all for close to another decade... because they never realize the real reasons their sets don't sell is their idiotic decisions.  

[MAB]

10 minutes ago, DaleDVM said:

The 3 in 1 castle is a pretty good design IMHO.  As far as it goes as an overall set, I think it is pretty awful.  

The castle is nice, but most AFOLs build much better.  The most important component LEGO sets provide for me is good parts that I can't get cheaper in other sets.  

I do not want more castle 3 in 1's to come out.  None, zero, never ever again.  The part selection will be garbage and the price to obtain those few good minifig, accessory, armor, weapons, shields, animals, heraldry, etc. will be WAY too high, if they are included at all.  

That's pretty much where I am coming from too. I don't think there is necessarily anything wrong with the set as a set. If you want a castle that looks like it is made from LEGO or even a stable play set for a kid, it does the job perfectly well. But it is nothing like what I would build as an AFOL. And a lot of the parts are not so useful in what I would build. The LBG 1x? bricks would be fine, but a lot of it wouldn't. Over the years, I have found some of the best parts packs for (my) castle builds are small Star Wars sets. If you buy 20 of the same small set, then chances are you will have enough of each useful piece for repetition of any design feature. And the figures and any printed parts are very easy to sell on being Star Wars, and you get the useful parts for free or next to nothing (more usually actually end up in profit and free parts!).

The issue with the minifigures is also a big deal. Unless they start putting unique figure parts in Creator and if we keep getting the same old existing torsos or, even worse, more pirates then no new factions or updates will come. I was lucky and bought a load of horses when they had them in PAB back in about 2013/14 (although they charged individually by the horse and were not allowed in a cup).

[jodawill]

To me, the 3 in 1 castle fails even as a kid's set. They used to make some great kid friendly castles like Black Knight's Castle. They were simple to build, but included tons of great parts. The 3 in 1 castle is just beyond saving because the parts it includes look so bad together, and it doesn't have much in the way of castle accessories and minifigures. I actually prefer those old playset type sets to the more elaborate designs.

However, if they could leave out the brick built animals and include four unique forestmen designs, I think a 3 in 1 would be a great idea. Imagine if you could build three of the original forestmen sets with the same parts. But don't make it look like a Creator set. Make it look like this GWP, but include enough parts to build whichever set you want. (And to me, the trees would have to be black.)

[woodford86]

2 hours ago, DaleDVM said:

Worse yet, I believe the 3 in 1 castle sets will not sell as well simply because they are not as good as regular castle sets.   Then TLG will simply deny us any castle sets at all for close to another decade... because they never realize the real reasons their sets don't sell is their idiotic decisions.  

I've got to agree with this, its the same problem with all the 3/1's - they just lack in context. There's no supplemental sets to create a world, there's no good guys/bad guys, the only animals are brick built.

As an AFOL I'm only buying it because I'm desperate for castle stuff, and I know my nephews couldn't care less not because its castle (they obsess over my stuff) but because its just a boring standalone set with no bad guys, no vehicles, no "enemy bases", nothing.

[Rjbricks]

I suppose it depends why you like Lego too.

I actually like the 3-in-1 set (though obviously I’d prefer a castle theme) but my son loves all the 3-in-1 stuff. Because he love the building of it.

[Blazej_Holen]

32 minutes ago, woodford86 said:

I've got to agree with this, its the same problem with all the 3/1's - they just lack in context. There's no supplemental sets to create a world, there's no good guys/bad guys, the only animals are brick built.

As an AFOL I'm only buying it because I'm desperate for castle stuff, and I know my nephews couldn't care less not because its castle (they obsess over my stuff) but because its just a boring standalone set with no bad guys, no vehicles, no "enemy bases", nothing.

Thats the beauty of Lego. You can always build your own “context”… :)

[Triceron]

35 minutes ago, woodford86 said:

I've got to agree with this, its the same problem with all the 3/1's - they just lack in context. There's no supplemental sets to create a world, there's no good guys/bad guys, the only animals are brick built.

As an AFOL I'm only buying it because I'm desperate for castle stuff, and I know my nephews couldn't care less not because its castle (they obsess over my stuff) but because its just a boring standalone set with no bad guys, no vehicles, no "enemy bases", nothing.

You know, this hits a really strong point.  I think Lego's strong point was in creating a world.  They had solid building designs, but the concept of their new themes were always the bigger draw to me as a kid, and I would buy sets that looked awful if it meant getting that one or two pieces that helped expand the world I was building.

I often wonder what new themes for Classic Castle (90's era) could be.  CMF certainly helps expand on that.

Edited July 5, 2022 by Triceron

[natesroom]

3 hours ago, MAB said:

The issue with the minifigures is also a big deal. Unless they start putting unique figure parts in Creator and if we keep getting the same old existing torsos or, even worse, more pirates then no new factions or updates will come. I was lucky and bought a load of horses when they had them in PAB back in about 2013/14 (although they charged individually by the horse and were not allowed in a cup).

thats stinks... they let me put them all in a cup. Foliage was there also.

 

[jodawill]

5 minutes ago, natesroom said:

thats stinks... they let me put them all in a cup. Foliage was there also.

 

I feel like an idiot for selling all of my horses. I got both the old white ones and the new brown ones with moveable legs from the PAB wall years ago. If I remember correctly, I was able to fit 22 of the new horses into a single cup. It will cost me a lot more now to stock up on horses. (I went through a huge purge a few years ago because my collection had gotten completely out of hand. In retrospect, I should have kept a bit more than I did.)

Edited July 5, 2022 by jodawill

[Triceron]

I don't know how all you guys are getting full animals out of the pick a brick wall.  I've never seen that in any of my local Lego stores here.  It's always odds and ends bricks of random colors that I would never be able to find a use for, lol.

[jodawill]

20 minutes ago, Triceron said:

I don't know how all you guys are getting full animals out of the pick a brick wall.  I've never seen that in any of my local Lego stores here.  It's always odds and ends bricks of random colors that I would never be able to find a use for, lol.

This was about 10 years ago. The PAB wall used to be a lot better.

[MAB]

43 minutes ago, natesroom said:

thats stinks... they let me put them all in a cup. Foliage was there also.

I got the movable brown ones. They charged I think 60p each, so probably no different to filling a cup but no filler 1x1 round plates!

[Aanchir]

I'm surprised to see so much hate for 31120 Medieval Castle! Honestly, I feel it looked pretty outstanding, myself — at least by the standards of the Castle theme! And it's packed with authentic features that were rare or absent in earlier LEGO castle sets, such as machicolations, arrowslits, a moat, a millwheel, and even a garderobe — notably, all of which are features making a return appearance in the new 18+ Lion Knights' Castle.

Even from a parts standpoint, I feel like 31120 was a pretty outstanding parts pack for medieval builds, and the sort of set that is well-suited to buying in larger quantities. While it lacks a lot of specialized parts like the large castle wall panels, arched doors, parapet bricks, raised baseplates, and BURPs that characterized many LEGO castles of the 90s and 2000s, it compensates for that with loads of other useful Castle-building parts like grey arches, slopes, SNOT bricks, masonry bricks, palisade bricks, and of course basic bricks in large quantities. And it also has some great parts in other colors, like arches and ingot tiles in Reddish Brown or slopes in Olive Green, Earth Green, and Earth Blue.

The biggest drawbacks of its 3-in-1 theming from a parts standpoint, as many folks here have rightly mentioned, are its relative lack of minifig parts, minifig accessories, and molded animals compared to similar-sized sets from "play themes" like City, Castle, Pirates, or Ninjago. And the main design complaint I've seen about the castle itself is that the Bright Yellow and Reddish Brown parts used for the half-timbered portions feel too bright, and that it should have used a darker color for the wood and/or a less saturated color for the infill.

It goes without saying that a set like 31120 could never measure up to many MOCs from the AFOL community — no KFOL-targeted Castle set could ever reaolistically be expected to do so. And many of the negative responses to the 2013 Castle wave on this very forum should amply demonstrate that a lot of the frustrations people have with its design (such as its bright colors and simple, rectangular structure) are in no way specific to the Creator 3-in-1 theme! That said, one of the other big complaints about the 2013 King's Castle was that it was over-reliant on castle wall panels in place of more elaborate building techniques that would give it more complexity and textural detail — an area where the 3-in-1 castle excels.

 

All this aside, one of the main reasons I think a 3-in-1 forest hideout set would be fun to see in the future is how conducive it'd be to the sort of alternate builds that define the Creator 3-in-1 theme. Honestly, I find 31120's alternate builds immensely charming in their own right — after all, they feature many of the same design strengths as the main model such as their complexity and textural detail, and also full compatibility with the main model's modular segments!

And given the tendency of old-school Forestmen sets to use very similar sorts of parts (lots of black slopes, arches, and corner panels for trees, green limb elements for leaves, and grey bricks and panels for natural rock formations and/or stone fortifications), I can't help feeling that you could easily come up with a selection of bricks that would allow for a single set to build a similar variety of different structures. Between that uniformity and the apparent popularity of tree houses/tree forts among Creator 3-in-1 buyers (e.g. 31010, 31053, 31078, and 31116), it seems like a very natural choice for a future Creator 3-in-1 set.

Of course, a 3-in-1 forest hideout would probably differ from the recent 18+ ones in a number of ways — for instance, I expect it'd use a couple different shades of brown for the trunk/branches/bark instead of monochrome black, both because kids associate brown more with tree bark and because it'd make the instructions easier to read without extra accommodations like outlining parts in red as they're added. But I doubt that'd completely spoil the appeal of a 3-in-1 forest hideout, especially considering how many people wanted/expected the 18+ GWP set to use Reddish Brown or Dark Brown for the bark instead of the classic black.

30 minutes ago, Triceron said:

I don't know how all you guys are getting full animals out of the pick a brick wall.  I've never seen that in any of my local Lego stores here.  It's always odds and ends bricks of random colors that I would never be able to find a use for, lol.

The Pick-A-Brick wall selection has varied at times in the past, but LEGO usually tends to revert back to a selection of basic parts in assorted colors since "average" buyers (e.gg. parents of young kids) often just DO want just the sort of standard bricks you'd typically find in a generic brick bucket. The most "out there" the selection got was a brief window of time in 2011 when they added an assortment of Hero Factory parts as a promotion/tie-in for the "Hero Recon Team" spin-off of LEGO Design byME.

[Triceron]

My only real issue with Creator 3-in-1 is that they're built around Lego Classic design goals.  Everything is brick built, so no special molds for animals.  They incorporate pieces of every primary color to meet a 'color variety' status quo.  And of course the lack of minifigure customizations and themed accessories, like banners and bardings.

They're great for supplementing parts when you need a lot of extra masonry pieces or roof slopes or brown arches, but they don't really fill the niche of a themed set.  To me it's about the same as ordering bags of Bricks and Pieces parts, or sifting through what you need out of a Lego Classic box.

Edited July 5, 2022 by Triceron

[woodford86]

Yep, I bought way too many 3/1 castles partly justified by pumping up Lego's sales numbers, but it was really just to build up a collection of pieces and BF's. And now in hindsight I have a ton of yellow bricks that I'll probably never use, so I should have just went the PAB/Bricklink route

Ergo, the problem with 3/1's. They're a creator theme selling a castle, not a castle theme.

[GeoBrick]

If I hadn't been lucky in getting one of the Bricklink " Castle in the Forest" sets, I'd have bought the 3-in-1 castlese too. I still might if there's a nice discount near their EOL time. But the set will battle with the recent viking longship set. Must get the torso's in that one.

 

[TeriXeri]

1 hour ago, Triceron said:

My only real issue with Creator 3-in-1 is that they're built around Lego Classic design goals.  Everything is brick built, so no special molds for animals.  They incorporate pieces of every primary color to meet a 'color variety' status quo.  And of course the lack of minifigure customizations and themed accessories, like banners and bardings.

They're great for supplementing parts when you need a lot of extra masonry pieces or roof slopes or brown arches, but they don't really fill the niche of a themed set.  To me it's about the same as ordering bags of Bricks and Pieces parts, or sifting through what you need out of a Lego Classic box.

My thoughts as well, I think it's a fairly good basic parts pack if you don't have a massive collection, nothing really Castle specific, and yes animals/figures are the weak point in that set (the brick dragon is fine) , 2 falcons and the shields, extra armor/helm are ok, but not a typical populated castle.

3-in-1 still has had some good figs, with the pirate captain, or recent vikings.

My concern with 3-in-1 is that the theme goes all sorts of directions, and especially recently, it's trying to fill too many shoes at once, Town, Theme Park, Castle/Pirate/Viking big sets, some outdoor/exploration sets, brick build animals and some space stuff.

 

I'm not a long-time collector so my viewpoint is basicly from 2018 onward, so I do value this set higher.

 

Still, there are other examples of a Castle being even less appealing to AFOL. 

A set like of the overpriced , uber basic 4+ 10780: Mickey and Friends Castle Defenders , "castle" where a lot of the budget went into special moulds+prints, parts wise it's nothing of interest.

But maybe it can be a stepping stone to get such young people interested in knights again as this set, while very specialized, covers some basics.

On the product page of the new lion knight castle, that 4+ set even gets suggested as other products, alongside 3-in-1 and Blacksmith.

Edited July 5, 2022 by TeriXeri

[Rattlebricks]

4 hours ago, Triceron said:

My only real issue with Creator 3-in-1 is that they're built around Lego Classic design goals.  Everything is brick built, so no special molds for animals.  They incorporate pieces of every primary color to meet a 'color variety' status quo.  And of course the lack of minifigure customizations and themed accessories, like banners and bardings.

They're great for supplementing parts when you need a lot of extra masonry pieces or roof slopes or brown arches, but they don't really fill the niche of a themed set.  To me it's about the same as ordering bags of Bricks and Pieces parts, or sifting through what you need out of a Lego Classic box.

This is why I dont buy the 3 in 1 cAstle. Lack of themed accessories / unique parts . Brick build animal & flag in Creator sets just doesnt do it for me. If they want everything to be brickbuild, then why not the minifigs aswell... It feels gimmicky.

Edited July 6, 2022 by Rattlebricks

[Aanchir]

3 hours ago, Triceron said:

They incorporate pieces of every primary color to meet a 'color variety' status quo.

I don't really think this need for 3-in-1 sets to meet a "color variety" status quo is a real thing at all, to be honest. There are a LOT of Creator 3-in-1 sets with fairly limited color palettes, such as 31129 Majestic Tiger, 31126 Supersonic Jet, and  31121 Crocodile. For that matter, it's not as though modern day inspired Creator 3-in-1 sets like 31117 Space Shuttle Adventure or 31130 Sunken Treasure Mission are really any more colorful than their counterparts in modern day "play themes" like City and Friends.

As such, rather than any sort of theme-wide creative mandate, I think the number of differently colored parts in many 3-in-1 sets (especially larger ones) is mainly individual creative choices on the part of the designers. Let's consider the colors of the new Viking Ship as an example. For starters, the bright stripes on the hull and sails were likely inspired by real-life viking ship recreations such as this one from the Viking Ship Museum in Denmark (which, in turn, uses colors inspired by historical depictions of Viking ships such as the Bayeaux Tapestry, as well as paint pigments and binders that Vikings were known to have access to, as described here).

Theoretically, one of these hull colors could have also been reused in place of the Sand Green roof slopes — but then there would've been far fewer green parts to use for plant life in the B- and C-models. And while the Midgard Serpent's colors are of course pure fantasy, they were likely chosen specifically to contrast with the colors chosen for the ship. Just like that, nearly all the vivid color choices can be neatly explained without having to invoke any sort of managerial directive.
 

And of course, if there's anything I've learned from all the criticism that numerous Creative Expert, Ideas, and 18+ sets have gotten over the years for being "too colorful", it's that AFOLs often have a far lower baseline expectation than official LEGO designers when it comes to how brightly colored particular subjects ought to be! I mean, even 10247 Ferris Wheel and 10257 Carousel were met with a number of complaints about the amount of bright colors the designers used — and it's not as though fairground rides in real life are expected to have understated color palettes!

Your concerns about 3-in-1 sets' limitations on minifigs, minifig accessories, animal molds, and other specialized/theme-specific molds are entirely legitimate, though. Creator 3-in-1 is certainly a very different beast than a typical "play theme" in those regards.

[jodawill]

I haven't seen anyone creating MOCs from this set yet. I just spent some time trying to come up with my own forestmen set from two copies of the GWP, and I'm pretty pleased with the results. I'm afraid I'm not much of a photographer, unfortunately. This MOC is somewhat inspired by Camouflaged Outpost, but re-imagined as a waterfall. Here's the full album. You can't tell from the photos, but the secret hideout under the waterfall is quite deep, extending more than half of the baseplate (which is the only part that isn't included in two copies of the GWP).

Edited July 9, 2022 by jodawill

[SirBlake]

Looks good!

That’s the great irony of Forestmen. Three outstanding sets and a bunch of carts, when the possibilities are really endless. It does leave the door wide open for MOCs though. 

[jodawill]

On 7/9/2022 at 12:10 AM, SirBlake said:

Looks good!

That’s the great irony of Forestmen. Three outstanding sets and a bunch of carts, when the possibilities are really endless. It does leave the door wide open for MOCs though. 

I think the real irony of the forestmen is how quickly the theme would have gotten old if they had given us as many sets as we thought we wanted. The entire idea only lends itself to a handful of small sets. I wish we didn't have to wait over 30 years between waves, but I think what they've done here is the most tasteful way to represent the faction - this GWP and a little hideout in the castle. I would love to get a new version of Forestmen's Crossing though.