LEGO Collectable Minifigures Series 4 discussion

[Dorothy Vader]

Series 4 is (imo) the best so far This is the only series where I'm actually going to buy a sealed box of 60 - but we need the box distribution! How many Frankenstein's Creatures are there? Have LEGO put 2 or 3 full sets in each case of 60? Will there be 3 Musketeers per case ?

Hopefully we'll know soon ...

[MicroJow]

I was on the computer system in my work (Tesco) and found that series 4 figures are listed on there. Barcode for those of you that are interested is 5702014734739. Also said that they would not be able to be sold until 06/03/2011, which is only a few weeks away. Could we be getting them sooner than we thought. Will check each week to see when we get our first delivery and will let you know anything as soon as I know.

Hey, would you do me a favor and double-check that barcode number? I asked them to run it at Target and they told me the number was too long - a UPC code is supposed to be 12 numbers, not 13.

- MJ

[Ro87n]

Series 4 is (imo) the best so far This is the only series where I'm actually going to buy a sealed box of 60 - but we need the box distribution! How many Frankenstein's Creatures are there? Have LEGO put 2 or 3 full sets in each case of 60? Will there be 3 Musketeers per case ?

Hopefully we'll know soon ...

Im to join aswell. Like I might have mentioned before I would love to buy a full unopend box.

But I wonder if $138 (€99,95) for a whole box is expensive or a good deal, anyone?

[the-bricking-builder]

Im to join aswell. Like I might have mentioned before I would love to buy a full unopend box.

But I wonder if $138 (€99,95) for a whole box is expensive or a good deal, anyone?

I think it's a great deal, you get 10 minifigs for free.

maybe buying a box of them.

[MicroJow]

Might I ask who is selling them at this price? :)

- MJ

[UsernameMDM]

Im to join aswell. Like I might have mentioned before I would love to buy a full unopend box.

But I wonder if $138 (€99,95) for a whole box is expensive or a good deal, anyone?

Where did you find that price at?

[the-bricking-builder]

Where did you find that price at?

the price in euro's is an offer on a dutch to shop,if you pay and order before april 1st you get a full box of 60 figs

[Ro87n]

the price in euro's is an offer on a dutch to shop,if you pay and order before april 1st you get a full box of 60 figs

Yea, and I don't even have to pay for any shipping cost too! I used to live in the same city as they sell from.

And since my parents still live there I could easly bypass the shipping costs.

[vicster]

I'm new to buying in bulk but after having terrible trouble getting the ones I wanted from S3, I think I'll just buy a box for S4.

But I've no idea where to look online, and google's not much help! Is anyone willing to suggest a few places that ship to the UK (or are in the UK!) that I can buy in bulk from, please? :)

[peterab]

I'm new to buying in bulk but after having terrible trouble getting the ones I wanted from S3, I think I'll just buy a box for S4.

But I've no idea where to look online, and google's not much help! Is anyone willing to suggest a few places that ship to the UK (or are in the UK!) that I can buy in bulk from, please? :)

Bricklink. Look for the box of 60.

[vicster]

Bricklink. Look for the box of 60.

Thanks :)

When I've looked on there before, I've only seen individual minifigs, and I was more looking for a sealed box - but I guess they'll only have the s4 boxes on there when they're actually available, as it seems to be private sellers?

[Markypops]

Hey, would you do me a favor and double-check that barcode number? I asked them to run it at Target and they told me the number was too long - a UPC code is supposed to be 12 numbers, not 13.

- MJ

The number that I have given is an EAN (European Article Number), so will not be relevant to the US.

Also not sure when Tesco will be getting series 4 in now, no sign of them so far but what I can say is that series 3 now has a stock end date of the 28th February, although my store just had 3 cases delivered this week.

[MicroJow]

The number that I have given is an EAN (European Article Number), so will not be relevant to the US.

Also not sure when Tesco will be getting series 4 in now, no sign of them so far but what I can say is that series 3 now has a stock end date of the 28th February, although my store just had 3 cases delivered this week.

Ah, well. Thanks for the info!

- MJ

[SilentMode]

The accessories were added to BrickLink yesterday. Get ready, folks.

[KristofBD]

the price in euro's is an offer on a dutch to shop,if you pay and order before april 1st you get a full box of 60 figs

Interesting! Could you tell me which store it is? I've been looking to order a box for a long time!

(PS you can also send the name of the store through private message if you prefer that)

[the-bricking-builder]

Interesting! Could you tell me which store it is? I've been looking to order a box for a long time!

(PS you can also send the name of the store through private message if you prefer that)

Sure I can.

It's brickshop.nl , but thecan deliver a box until 15 april.

they sell them for euro 120 but it's an offer if you order a box before april 1st you get it for 100 euro.

[peterab]

Thanks :)

When I've looked on there before, I've only seen individual minifigs, and I was more looking for a sealed box - but I guess they'll only have the s4 boxes on there when they're actually available, as it seems to be private sellers?

Yeah bricklink is mostly private sellers, but some are quite large. It takes a little while after release till the catalogue on bricklink is updated since it is done by the seller community and they need to be able to buy a set to do it. There will be an equivalent to this for the series 4 box.

Bricklink makes it pretty easy to search for the cheapest price, and if need be only from your area. I'm in Australia so for me buying from Europe has worked out the cheapest but it will vary depending on the local price.

[legomaniac83]

I know which figs are going to be most popular... just like I knew it in all of the past series.

Congrats! Get this guy a brand new box of Series 4 figs!

DaleDVM, Sounds like you couldn't get all of the figs you wanted to build your army. Your box ratio is ridiculous. Some figs will always be in a higher demand than others. That's just the way it is. If a box has 20 elves in it, "army builders" are going to buy the 20 elves, leaving the casual fan or kid out of luck, again. Saying that "one set is for keeping and one for trading" is also ridiculous. Why would I buy a complete set then turn around to trade it? If I was "army building" I would just buy the 20 elves/spartans/whatever in the next box........

Your post says that TLG should cater to the needs of army building and forget about everyone else. It doesn't matter what they do with the ratio - the current way/your box ratio/selling a box of 48 with 3 complete sets - someone will complain that they are being shortchanged.

Hopefully you can complete your army in Series 4.

Edited March 4, 2011 by legomaniac83

[the-bricking-builder]

just orderd a ful box of 60 minifigs

[DaleDVM]

Already expressed how silly this concept is in the Series 3 topic. You can't complain about LEGO creating artificial rarity in these figs (ranging from 3 percent of a box to 8 percent of a box-- not a huge range at all) only to claim the solution is creating a vast imbalance in ratios that favors people who buy multiples over casual collectors who just want a variety.

I rebutted your arguements on the thread for series 3. Now I will repeat again. I find it especially annoying that you put words in my mouth that I never typed at all. Actually TLG is exactly creating an artificial rarity for the figs because of the tiny percentage range 3% to 8% per box. I never said I wanted them to balance out the minifigs in a case. I want TLG to more closely balance the availability to the actual demand for the figs.

Anyway, the demand for a blind-packaged fig should have no effect whatsoever on its market availability. If LEGO could truly get the figs to the point that they can't be identified before opening them, this problem wouldn't exist at all.

Talk about selfish. It is not a problem for you who only wants a couple of each fig. You buy a case and you are golden. What about people who want many multiples of a certain figure? By the way you could accomplish getting a few of each by buying an entire case with my distribution as well. However with my distribution the extra figs you get will actually have some value. If demand isn't taken into consideration when LEGO plans the distribution of figures, then the minifigs are going to have drastically different values as soon as they are opened. This does not make for happy fans. It ruins the whole idea of collectable figs which is to trade them for one another. If the figs were in packaging that noone could decipher (like you suggest) the problem would actually get worse! If noone could pick out army figs they would be in even more demand on bricklink and prices would be even more out of whack! If it was truly a random purchase, you pick out a circus ringmaster open it and magically it dropped by 50% or more in value immediately. Are you happy? Did you get value for your money? You could have just bought it on bricklink for half of what you spent.

Also, the idea that popularity and demand are synonymous isn't very sound. If a lot of people like a certain fig, then it's popular. If some of those people want ridiculous numbers of that fig, that doesn't make it any more popular-- it just means that they're not happy with just one.

Demand and popularity aren't synonymous? What are they opposites? I never made that arguement in the first place but... Wow I am so sorry I used the word popular. I will correct myself and say I know which figs will have the highest demand. I am not omniscient. You don't have to be particularly bright to figure out which figs will be in high demand.

DaleDVM, Sounds like you couldn't get all of the figs you wanted to build your army.

Well actually I've now got 44 elves and only need ten more to finish my collection. But thank you for your concern. I like how you assume that I have been personally offended and that can be the only reason I would point out the problems with figure distribution not equalling demand. Actually I am not angry at all. I will always be able to get what I want as I have a lot of money to spend on LEGO. Actually what bothers me is that I see people on the forums who I know can't just buy what they want and find it impossible to afford an elf/spartan let alone get several of them for themselves.

Your box ratio is ridiculous. Some figs will always be in a higher demand than others. That's just the way it is. If a box has 20 elves in it, "army builders" are going to buy the 20 elves, leaving the casual fan or kid out of luck, again.

So what you are saying is that if a box contains a lot of the high demand figs it will not increase the chances for casual fans to be able to get some? Really? If the distribution was closer to demand resellers would never even go to stores to cherry pick figs at all. There would be no money in it. Army builders might still take them and I cannot speak for them. Personally I wouldn't take them all. If on a trip to the store I could pick up 20-30 out of just a couple of cases I would be more than satisfied. In a few trips to the store I could get a large collection. As it is right now I make the long trip to the lego store and get a few and sometimes even none. Do I leave any behind? No because they are just too rare and hard to come by.

Saying that "one set is for keeping and one for trading" is also ridiculous. Why would I buy a complete set then turn around to trade it? If I was "army building" I would just buy the 20 elves/spartans/whatever in the next box........

Wow you really think I am self centered. I wasn't even referring to army builders but to all collectors. I was talking about buying a whole case of figs here. Some people actually do that and do trade away or sell their extra sets.

Your post says that TLG should cater to the needs of army building and forget about everyone else.

My post said that? Go back and read it again.

It doesn't matter what they do with the ratio - the current way/your box ratio/selling a box of 48 with 3 complete sets - someone will complain that they are being shortchanged.

After this statement I shouldn't have taken your post serously at all. So if they put 1 of each figure and fill out the box with punk rockers it is okay because someone is going to be upset anyway? Why wouldn't you think that if the ratio of figs in the cases was closer to the actual demand, it would be a good thing? Do you like the fact that people are having a hard time getting the figs they want? I find it sad.

Hopefully you can complete your army in Series 4.

I'm not even slightly worried about it, but again thanks for your sarcastic concern for my well being. I will get a couple of complete sets and about 50 vikings no problem. Not sure if I want to collect a bunch of muskateers or not.

By the way the hockey player, hazmat suit guy, wolfman, and to a lesser extent the football player will be in demand as well. Why? Because all of them can be used in larger numbers. (i.e. army building) In my distribution there would have been extras of all of those figs along with the 2 complete sets. But alas I am crazy!

Edited March 4, 2011 by DaleDVM

[UKver2.0]

I feel that a box of 60 figs should contain two complete sets of the series. One for keeping and one for trading. I think the remaining 28 figs should have come from the army building figs. I define an army building fig one that someone would want in multiples larger than 10.

I think your proposal would work out well at my local LEGO store which keeps a bin of 200-300 constantly stocked.

On the other hand, I don't think it would work well at my local toy store / mass merchandiser which keeps one or two boxes out until the count hits the reorder quantity / is depleted.

And by "work out well" I mean a distribution that would lead to the average non-collector grab to yield the highest number of unique figures (even if some figures remain impossibly hard to get).

I've spent a lot of time in front of these displays feeling up bags and reading codes. In my experience, the vast majority of the figures are going to small random grabs by people who know nothing of distribution, know nothing about how to tell what figure is in each pack, and have not previously purchased them. I would think maximizing the number of unique figures in these grabs is more important than making sure there isn't one or two figures that are impossibly hard to get or that the most sought after figures can be obtained by the bucket load.

The obsessive collector / army builder will do what they have to to get what they want. I don't think that should be a priority for TLG. If these were to get the reputation that you only ever get one of a few different figures (even if it's something desirable like a ninja, spartan, or elf), I think that would be much worse for TLG.

[Dorothy Vader]

At the end of the day people will cherry-pick the box(es) that they come across for the figures that they want multiples of. It doesn't always mean that the ones you want will be picked clean - I loved the Crash Test Dummy from S1, and have a fair few of him.

On the score of Spartans and Elves, I'll admit that I've got quite a few Spartans (33) and Elves (21), but I have never taken more than 1 of these per box that I've found. As you can tell, I live in a well-stocked region for minifigures (8 WHSmiths, 6 Argos stores, 3 TRU stores, 3 Tescoes, and about 9 independent toy sellers all packing minifigs.).

Bottom-line: everything in moderation

[FinalFeature]

Looks like Series 4 is coming out in mid april for LEGO Stores (Maybe april 1, like Series 3 was on the LEGO calendar for a later date but came out on January 1). Which means that other stores should get them in earlier(Toys, r us).

Also Series 1 parts will be available at the mini figure bar!

LegoGalactus

Edited March 4, 2011 by LegoGalactus

[SpiderSpaceman]

Also Series 1 parts will be available at the mini figure bar!

Holy Smokes! I'mma have to drive for 12 hours to get to a store and back

[Aanchir]

I rebutted your arguements on the thread for series 3. Now I will repeat again. I find it especially annoying that you put words in my mouth that I never typed at all. Actually TLG is exactly creating an artificial rarity for the figs because of the tiny percentage range 3% to 8% per box. I never said I wanted them to balance out the minifigs in a case. I want TLG to more closely balance the availability to the actual demand for the figs.

And I never claimed you wanted TLG to balance out the minifigs in a case-- now you're the one putting words in my mouth. But I don't see how having a uniform rarity for each fig is creating an artificial rarity. When the figs are initially put up for sale at a retail store, there's a near-even availability for every fig. It doesn't make sense to change the initial rarities to compensate for the aftermarket value when the initial retail sales are LEGO's primary concern. Meanwhile, LEGO's being comparatively honest in their approach: the typical approach to collectible products is to make the products with the highest demand the rarest. Why, then, is LEGO being criticized for not doing the exact opposite to this approach? Perhaps "only the best is good enough", but something can be "the best" just by surpassing the usual standards-- if LEGO were expected to reach the upper limits of customer satisfaction, they'd increase the quality of their every product, charge nothing for their sets, and drive themselves into the ground.

Talk about selfish. It is not a problem for you who only wants a couple of each fig. You buy a case and you are golden. What about people who want many multiples of a certain figure? By the way you could accomplish getting a few of each by buying an entire case with my distribution as well. However with my distribution the extra figs you get will actually have some value. If demand isn't taken into consideration when LEGO plans the distribution of figures, then the minifigs are going to have drastically different values as soon as they are opened. This does not make for happy fans. It ruins the whole idea of collectable figs which is to trade them for one another. If the figs were in packaging that noone could decipher (like you suggest) the problem would actually get worse! If noone could pick out army figs they would be in even more demand on bricklink and prices would be even more out of whack! If it was truly a random purchase, you pick out a circus ringmaster open it and magically it dropped by 50% or more in value immediately. Are you happy? Did you get value for your money? You could have just bought it on bricklink for half of what you spent.

So if you want something more specific than what I want, it should be just as easy to get? Suppose I bought a Star Wars set while the gold C-3PO promotion is going on, and that I didn't care whether or not I got the gold C-3PO. Does that mean that you deserve to get the same set, with the chrome C-3PO, in one purchase? Keep in mind that I have never bought a case, and most kids probably haven't either (even if they do intend to "collect them all", something I personally don't consider a wise objective).

Also, you seem intent on interpreting "value" as the amount you can sell something for. Perhaps this applies from a business perspective, but for an actual fan who intends to use the product rather than re-sell it, "value" is an individual thing, based on how much appreciation you invest in the product. As far as trades were concerned, only the individuals involved in the transaction mattered. That was how I saw things when I collected Pokemon cards during my childhood-- I didn't automatically look to a price guide before any trade, but rather judged how much I wanted the card the other person had, and whether I'd be happier keeping mine. Naturally, a designated "rare" card was something I valued more than a designated "common" card, but only to the extent that in the original packs, it was easier to get a rare card than a common card. I never had any intent on selling my cards, except some time decades in the future when I had no more use for them. In the same sense, I have no intention of selling my LEGO sets, and have never bought a set just because other people valued it highly.

Demand and popularity aren't synonymous? What are they opposites? I never made that arguement in the first place but... Wow I am so sorry I used the word popular. I will correct myself and say I know which figs will have the highest demand. I am not omniscient. You don't have to be particularly bright to figure out which figs will be in high demand.

No, they're not opposites, and they do have related meanings. And it's a good thing you aren't omniscient, because if you were I'd feel awfully silly for having this debate!