No leadership that what they want you to think, but the real villian the true leader of the dragon knights ,is the Knight on horse back,who had the princess captured so he could rescue her to get closer to the king, kill the king and rule the kingdom. So really the only good guy in the set is the princess

2 Green warriors with their own fortress VS 2 Red knights trying to save a princess that doesn't look prepared to fight and is locked in a tower. Why do they need a leader? The only thing that prevents one of them from being one is the name on the box.

You have to admit, that there are too few dragon knights minifigs in the Kingdoms theme. If I counted right there are 24! red minifigs, including a royal family and a mounted knight if you put all sets together (I counted the 5 minifigs of the battle packs). But the serie contains only 16 green minifigs (one of them isn´t actually a real green minifig, because it doesn´t have neither a green tabard nor a green plume. It just shares the torso design with the green knight auf that "Knight Showdown" set), including the 5 battlepack minifigs. I really miss a green mounted knight, or a dark green saddle to build a green knight. I mean, well how can you call them "knights" when that fraction does not have any mounted men?

The Prison Tower is the biggest set of the green fraction... so why there are more minifigs of the other faction? Ok, there are only two red warriors, but they are much better armed and have a steed... so the green knights are the underdogs... In fact there is not any set, which contains more green minifigs then red ones (excluding the impulse sets). Although the sets main theme are the dragon knights:

King´s Castle (red set) 5 red minifigs + a steed vs 3 green minifigs

Prison Tower (green set) 3 red minifigs + a steed vs 2 green minifigs

Outpost Attack (red set) 2 red minifigs vs 1 green minifigs

Prison Carriage (green set) 2 red minifigs vs 1 green minifig

Knights Showdown (neutral set) 1 red minifig (+ catapult...) vs 1 green minifig

Adevent calendar ("neutral" set) 4 red minifigs (including a queen and a prince) vs 1 green minifig (that does not have a plume)

All in all we need more green minifigs... (Maybe a green Castle? Or a big siege set with a ram, a siege tower, catapults and some tents)

Edited May 27, 201014 yr by josykay

You have to admit, that there are too few dragon knights minifigs in the Kingdoms theme. ...(one of them isn´t actually a real green minifig, because it doesn´t have neither a green tabard nor a green plume. It just shares the torso design with the green knight auf that "Knight Showdown" set

All in all we need more green minifigs... (Maybe a green Castle? Or a big siege set with a ram, a siege tower, catapults and some tents)

I was just talking about this specific set, not the whole theme. But why isn't that a Green fig? Alot of the Red knights don't have plumes either.

I'm geussing/hoping they'll be like the Castle Trolls, they appear in some sets and then come out with a giant castle with a leader. Besides, if you want to be Green, you can reduce, reuse and recycle buy a BP.

Edited May 27, 201014 yr by indianajones

I was just talking about this specific set, not the whole theme. But why isn't that a Green fig? Alot of the Red knights don't have plumes either.

But that knight of the advent calendar does not have any green parts at all. No dragon knights crest, no plume, no green glothes, no shield... there is nothing. So you can not say, if that minifig is the stereotyped "Black Knight"-Antagonist or a member of the dragon knights. A shield or a green plume for that minifig would have been fantastic and it wouldn´t be that hard to include a green plume or something like that. But there are goot news for me. I It seems, that the "Prison Tower" set contains one more green plume. So the Advent calendar minifig can get one.

I'm geussing/hoping they'll be like the Castle Trolls, they appear in some sets and then come out with a giant castle with a leader. Besides, if you want to be Green, you can reduce, reuse and recycle buy a BP.

I´m hoping so too.

Yeas BPs are great army builder, but they are not available in regular german stores. You can just buy them at mail order stores. I have to admit, that the green BP is just great. Two bucket helmets (with green plumes), one printed! breastplate are just fantastic. The green BP is superior to the red one, thats right. I just wish, there would be more green stuff in regular boxes.

Thanks for the great review, TheBrickster!

I have to say that I'm no enthusiast of this set - it's probably one of the poorest I've ever seen (sorry for the negativity, guys, but I spent the past three days reading reviews of all the previous castle sets).

I may get it because of the minifigures, which I find great (although I'm not in love with the Lion's color scheme and grill helmets), and some pieces, great for custom building.

Great review, the left side looks pretty sweet! *start rant* I'm a bit disappointed that unlike shown by the Toy Fair, there's only 2 dragon knights. Oh well, they put Asoka from PoP in with the King's Castle too. I love that Kingdoms is putting the normal triangle shields on the castles, unlike Castle, (as much anyway) because I'm one of those that needs everyone to have a shield, or no shields for anyone. *end rant*

-Santhor

Edited June 7, 201014 yr by Santhor

Here's the prison tower with brand new interior It fits so good, that i start thinking, that it actually was TLG's plan that you have to buy the tower plus the wizard impulse to get a building with interior.

Here's the prison tower with brand new interior It fits so good, that i start thinking, that it actually was TLG's plan that you have to buy the tower plus the wizard impulse to get a building with interior.

I bought the Wizard impulse with this set last week, and I also "decorated" the interior like you did - I only placed the items in a different way. I put the chest with the rat to the small "room" on the left, the barrel with the weapons to the second floor on the right, and the wizard's table and scroll to the alcove on the right.

I have to say that even though this set could be much better in terms of design, it offers many great new pieces and minifigs that make it a worthwhile set to buy - even if you do not put it on display.

The way I see it, the green knights are just much more well trained than the red knights, creating something of a Spartans v. Persians scenario. One Green Knight is equal to two or three Red Knights, so it all balances out.

What does make you think that?

It's just that the Green Knights seem more battle-hardened and more experienced than the red knights, many of which have the generic smiley beard face.

I just built this set and found it better than expected. The design is taller and more imposing than it seems from pictures, and I really like that so much of it is brick-built and solid (like the side rocky wall; they could have just used a BURP but instead its made of slopes). I think the colour scheme is nice and I really like the new portcullis piece.

Interestingly, I didn't get *any* extra plume pieces at all, let alone 3? I wonder if sets packaged in Europe are being treated differently when it comes to extras.

The biggest let-down of the set to me and the greatest disappointment is the quality of the printing on the figs. This is true of Kingdoms as a whole but in this set alone I had:

- pink horse-barding where the white-on-red was not thick enough

- horse-barding blurred on one side

- Princess' dress looks a distinctly lighter shade of red than the torso, almost orange

- back of the Princess' torso misprinted (red doesn't stay in the lines)

- back of the Princess' head misprinted (lip colour floating above lip lines)

- 3/4 of the dragon shields had printing issues beyond slight colour overlap (grey areas of shield piece visible in middle of shield)

Really, I want to say good things about this line but the gap between the pretty pictures on the box art and the shoddy quality of pink Lion Knights, dodgy shields and a Princess who looks like they ran out of ink when doing the dress piece is really saddening me. I compared these figs with Prince of Persia soldiers and Hassansins, the Collectable Minifigs, and some pre-2006 figs and shields, and none of them had issues as bad as I see here.

Have any other people buying from Europe had similar issues?

I want to complain to LEGO about their crappy quality but feel stupid saying 'All your figs are horribly printed! What the hell are you doing these days?'

The biggest let-down of the set to me and the greatest disappointment is the quality of the printing on the figs. This is true of Kingdoms as a whole but in this set alone I had:

- pink horse-barding where the white-on-red was not thick enough

- horse-barding blurred on one side

- Princess' dress looks a distinctly lighter shade of red than the torso, almost orange

- back of the Princess' torso misprinted (red doesn't stay in the lines)

- back of the Princess' head misprinted (lip colour floating above lip lines)

- 3/4 of the dragon shields had printing issues beyond slight colour overlap (grey areas of shield piece visible in middle of shield)

Have any other people buying from Europe had similar issues?

I bought this set a few weeks ago, and apart from the light pinkish tint on the barding, I had none of the problems you mentioned (or at least I didn't notice any of them).

Sorry that your copy of the magnificent princess was so badly misprinted.

I just built this set and found it better than expected. The design is taller and more imposing than it seems from pictures, and I really like that so much of it is brick-built and solid (like the side rocky wall; they could have just used a BURP but instead its made of slopes). I think the colour scheme is nice and I really like the new portcullis piece.

Interestingly, I didn't get *any* extra plume pieces at all, let alone 3? I wonder if sets packaged in Europe are being treated differently when it comes to extras.

The biggest let-down of the set to me and the greatest disappointment is the quality of the printing on the figs. This is true of Kingdoms as a whole but in this set alone I had:

- pink horse-barding where the white-on-red was not thick enough

- horse-barding blurred on one side

- Princess' dress looks a distinctly lighter shade of red than the torso, almost orange

- back of the Princess' torso misprinted (red doesn't stay in the lines)

- back of the Princess' head misprinted (lip colour floating above lip lines)

- 3/4 of the dragon shields had printing issues beyond slight colour overlap (grey areas of shield piece visible in middle of shield)

Really, I want to say good things about this line but the gap between the pretty pictures on the box art and the shoddy quality of pink Lion Knights, dodgy shields and a Princess who looks like they ran out of ink when doing the dress piece is really saddening me. I compared these figs with Prince of Persia soldiers and Hassansins, the Collectable Minifigs, and some pre-2006 figs and shields, and none of them had issues as bad as I see here.

Have any other people buying from Europe had similar issues?

I want to complain to LEGO about their crappy quality but feel stupid saying 'All your figs are horribly printed! What the hell are you doing these days?'

I did get some pink in the Prison Tower Rescue barding, but everything else is just great.

Also, I bought all sets in the past two weeks, and I got lots of extra parts and pieces (including plumes).

I guess stand alone the prison tower isn't all that great but I'm hoping it will fit in with some of the future sets. I mean there's a pretty good chance they'll give us a dragon knight fortress sooner or later :P

- pink horse-barding where the white-on-red was not thick enough

- horse-barding blurred on one side

- Princess' dress looks a distinctly lighter shade of red than the torso, almost orange

- back of the Princess' torso misprinted (red doesn't stay in the lines)

- back of the Princess' head misprinted (lip colour floating above lip lines)

- 3/4 of the dragon shields had printing issues beyond slight colour overlap (grey areas of shield piece visible in middle of shield)

Pink on the horse barding and a bit blurred yes, but my princess didn't have any quality issues. The dragon shields came better than in the smaller sets I've bought.

@Svelte:

I also bought this set in Europe. I guess you were just unlucky: I got the three extra plumes and have none of your errors except for the pink horse barding (that seems to be a common printing error).

Regarding the lip printing: isn't that just the normal lip printing? (All my female heads with this print look exactly the same)

I just built this set and found it better than expected. The design is taller and more imposing than it seems from pictures, and I really like that so much of it is brick-built and solid (like the side rocky wall; they could have just used a BURP but instead its made of slopes). I think the colour scheme is nice and I really like the new portcullis piece.

Interestingly, I didn't get *any* extra plume pieces at all, let alone 3? I wonder if sets packaged in Europe are being treated differently when it comes to extras.

The biggest let-down of the set to me and the greatest disappointment is the quality of the printing on the figs. This is true of Kingdoms as a whole but in this set alone I had:

- pink horse-barding where the white-on-red was not thick enough

- horse-barding blurred on one side

- Princess' dress looks a distinctly lighter shade of red than the torso, almost orange

- back of the Princess' torso misprinted (red doesn't stay in the lines)

- back of the Princess' head misprinted (lip colour floating above lip lines)

- 3/4 of the dragon shields had printing issues beyond slight colour overlap (grey areas of shield piece visible in middle of shield)

Really, I want to say good things about this line but the gap between the pretty pictures on the box art and the shoddy quality of pink Lion Knights, dodgy shields and a Princess who looks like they ran out of ink when doing the dress piece is really saddening me. I compared these figs with Prince of Persia soldiers and Hassansins, the Collectable Minifigs, and some pre-2006 figs and shields, and none of them had issues as bad as I see here.

Have any other people buying from Europe had similar issues?

I want to complain to LEGO about their crappy quality but feel stupid saying 'All your figs are horribly printed! What the hell are you doing these days?'

This is very discouraging. I thought the pink printing issue was only happening in North America. I'm personally waiting a few months to buy the two big Kingdoms sets (maybe around Christmas time) in hopes that LEGO will solve all the printing and color issues in the Kingdoms line by then.

Edited June 20, 201014 yr by BearHeart

I really have mixed feelings about this set. While the minifigs are awesome, the tower itself simply looks crappy to me. I REALLY can't understand why TLC can't give "evil" factions a decent castle (happened the same with the skellies). It surely isn't a question of the sets size. If you consider that 6073-Knights Castle of 1984 had only 386 pieces, why can't we get a decent small but great castle or fort for the Dragons faction instead of just a stupid tower???? It doesn't has to do with playability either!!! Another thing that bugs me a lot is to ALWAYS have more "good" knights or minifigs than "evil" knights in sets!!! If we go to classic tales, the heroes usually are outnumbered.... so please give us more of the dark bad awesome dragon knights... Really TLC, sometimes I don't get you... :)

Edited June 21, 201014 yr by frogstudio

I really have mixed feelings about this set. While the minifigs are awesome, the tower itself simply looks crappy to me. I REALLY can't understand why TLC can't give "evil" factions a decent castle (happened the same with the skellies). It surely isn't a question of the sets size. If you consider that 6073-Knights Castle of 1984 had only 386 pieces, why can't we get a decent small but great castle or fort for the Dragons faction instead of just a stupid tower???? It doesn't has to do with playability either!!! Another thing that bugs me a lot is to ALWAYS have more "good" knights or minifigs than "evil" knights in sets!!! If we go to classic tales, the heroes usually are outnumbered.... so please give us more of the dark bad awesome dragon knights... Really TLC, sometimes I don't get you... :)

Maybe the Dragon Knights are the heroes?

For me this set was quite a nice addition. First of all, I really like the green colourscheme of the dragon knights, second I like the colours of choice for this set a lot. For me it is more a gate house as a tower and I can imagine it will be usable as such in future sets or in MOCs.

Downside is the number of dragon knights, but I will correct that with some battle packs.

Finally on the whole colour thing: I checked and double checked, but unless I am starting to get colour-blind, I don't see any problems with Pink, fading colours or less then bright red figures?

So lets hope it is just a "wrong" batch, although its a pity it was made...

First of all, thanks for the review!

I think that I'm going to buy this set. I like the green dragon knights. OK, The "prison tower" itself is not that great... But it's still a good structure. I love bases and forts. Classic Castle sets are still better, but this set is good in its own right.

I really have mixed feelings about this set. While the minifigs are awesome, the tower itself simply looks crappy to me. I REALLY can't understand why TLC can't give "evil" factions a decent castle (happened the same with the skellies). It surely isn't a question of the sets size. If you consider that 6073-Knights Castle of 1984 had only 386 pieces, why can't we get a decent small but great castle or fort for the Dragons faction instead of just a stupid tower???? It doesn't has to do with playability either!!! Another thing that bugs me a lot is to ALWAYS have more "good" knights or minifigs than "evil" knights in sets!!! If we go to classic tales, the heroes usually are outnumbered.... so please give us more of the dark bad awesome dragon knights... Really TLC, sometimes I don't get you... :)

I have to agree with most of your points, man. This set is supposed to be the homebase of the Dragon Knights. Yet, the tower is small and the number of dragon knights is quite small as well!!

I'd like this set a lot more if the pricing were more on par with the fantasy Castle line.

Compare its 365 pieces and 5 Figs and 1 Horse at $50 to Drawbridge Defense's (7079) 335 pieces, 7 Figs and 1 Horse, all for $40.

The pricing is even worse for outside the US, like in my case, where DD cost $50 compared to the Prison Tower's $70! On sale, the pricing for the new line becomes barely reasonable for us Canadians.

Thanks for the review! The set does look a little lacking as a home base, but since it's called "Prison Tower Rescue," maybe it's a separate building from the main dragon knight castle; like a prison outpost or something. That would keep open the possibility of a dragon knight castle next year.

The thing that I find interesting is the armor mixing in the minifigures. I really like the armor design on the lion knight. I didn't like the design on the crown knight plate armor, so I switched it out for unprinted armor. This one I would use--it's very nicely detailed. But they use it with a great helm! As far as I know, great helms and plate armor never really went together, and it would look much better on the red and white tunic torso that some of the soldiers have. I know LEGO has never been great on historical accuracy as far as armor goes, but it still bugs me a little. Fortunately, it's an easy fix.

I really like this set, especially the minifigures. The only downside for me is that it is so empty inside! Great review!