The Orc Forge 9476: A Set Forged Into a Masterpiece? Or Will the Resultant Burn Leave Your Investment in Ashes?

So I think it would be a little bit of an understatement to say that the Lego Lord of the Rings Orc Forge (9476) has caused a stir in the last couple of weeks. If you haven't been paying too much attention, here is the rundown of what happened:

• The Orc Forge goes to “retiring soon” status in the Lego Store in late June
• The Orc Forge Sells out in the Lego Store around the first week of June.
• About a week later, it sells out at Target.com (it is a target exclusive so now it is technically unavailable via retail.
• It comes back in stock on Target.com a few days later
• It sells out again about a day later
• It comes back in stock again on Target.com
• It sells out again another day later
• Several days later it comes back in stock again on Target.com
• Lego changes it to “temporarily out of stock” from “sold out” on the website.
• Slight panic ensues

This has mattered so much to everyone because there is a general consensus that this set will do really well after EOL. It is an exclusive, so there have been less made and bought than normal sets. It is also part of a theme in LOTR, that is expected to do really well – most likely match the Harry Potter series.

I have recently ordered 8 in the last several weeks as we have seen them sort of, almost, maybe go retired. I love LOTR, so I decided I wanted to pop one open and actually build it, And of course, write a review/investment article about it. For all the talk we have seen about this set, I really feel like no one has offered any first hand experience about how great, or not so great, the set is build and playing wise. Isn't that what really matters?

So once again, I am writing this for you as I put together the set. This one should be really fun as it is a perfect build – 363 pieces – it will most likely only take about an hour.

The box itself:

I think the box matters more to a Lego set's popularity than a lot of people think. You cannot take a good box for granted. Take a look at the first Tie Interceptor in the Lego SW theme – the box is more impressive than the actual set. Sure, people would probably buy a Lord of the Rings set if it was in an unmarked card board box, but these sets are for children. We know children have to see something spectacular on the box so that they run up to their parents and say “I want it, I want it”. I think this makes a big difference after EOL as well. When people see a sealed one and it looks impressive , it will influence their decision to buy it.

In this case, I really love the box. The Lord of the Rings boxes are all pretty good, but this one just has a lot going on. I love how they made the torches and the actual forge smoke and light up. They also have the rocky lava area in the background. On the right, they have all of the blue mist looking area that really stands out in contrast to the heat coming from the left side. The minifigures are all interacting with the Orc Forge as well, instead of just being shown up the side of the box. Plus you have the light brick, which one of the things that made me really want to buy the set. As well, the minifigure picture in the left bottom corner has a “Hard to Find” logo on it. This makes a lot of difference to the set in my eyes. When you say it is hard to find in your listing 2 years from now, you have something obvious to back it up.

Moving on, let's open it up.

Honestly, the Rancor Pit just has a few more pieces than this set and it looks a lot bigger. This was because it had such big pieces in it as well as the rancor itself. The Orc Forge feels a lot smaller for the same number of pieces, but it is $20 dollars cheaper so the value is still there.

First up out of the first bag is one of the Mordor Orcs. I love the Orcs and the other LOTR sets' lack of them really bodes well for this set. His face is really mean and nasty looking and the color of the Orc himself and the outfit is just right. This guy comes with the forge hammer, which is a nice change of pace for a hold item. I like weapons, and while this one can be used as one, I think it adds something for the more non-violent children who play with this set.

The second Mordor Orc is the same, but he comes with a shovel – again a practical piece instead of a weapon. There are plenty of weapons in the set, and with 4 Orcs, I think it gives the set some variety.

Alright – for the blocks part of bag 1. Most of it is pretty simple "ground-up" building. Luckily, we get to the piece I was waiting for pretty quick – the light brick. I wondered how they did it. I was assuming it was just a battery in the brick and that is exactly what it is. There is a button on the back of the brick that, when pressed, lights up the brick. As you can see from the picture below, it is very bright. I think this is an awesome idea in Lego's catalog of special pieces and I think it is really impressive for a single piece. Think of all the things they can do with these in future sets. Excellent for Play-ability.

The rest of the building is fairly simple, just outlining the rocks and building the forge itself. The fire coming out from around the pot is a really nice touch and because they are see-through as well, when you press the light, they really shine. I will say that part of the building was a little difficult. There are some trapezoid and slanted pieces that are only held together by one small 2x1 piece. These are not really secured until you put the top brown pieces on top of the rock-like pieces. This made it a little hard to keep it together. After putting the top pieces on, it still is not particularly stable. Not sure how else they could have done it, but I have a feeling that if it is played with in a rough manner, it may come apart.

I do really like the anvil shown above as well. It is 6 small pieces, but it makes all the difference to the Orc and his hammer. Though it is simple, it really looks pretty good matching up with the color of the forge itself.

The next bag brings us the other two minifigure Orcs. The first one up is Uruk-Hai. He is pretty awesome with the red mean face and the Orc shield and armor. I think the shield, sword, and Orc armor are all really well done. They are very shiny, more than you can really tell in the picture, and you get two full sets as well as two extra swords because of the Forge itself. I think these make it fantastic for Orc battle scenes and army building.

The other is the Orc, Lortz. Honestly, they show him with his long hair and just a sword, but he isn't that much different from the other Orcs – just a little redesign on the body an a brown head instead of green. No one is gonna argue with another Orc. I just wanted to dress him up in the armor like Uruk-Hai though.

The rest of bag 2 is not very much – a small sword cooling place and another base for the rest of the set.

The base piece on the right stays together a little better than the first one, which is good since it holds the majority of the sets weight. I do have to admit, I like the simple touch of the dark grey pieces as rocks and the little green slope pieces.

The last bag of the set is really the most fun, even though it has no minifigures. It includes the windmill-like piece with a string and hook that can carry a basket up to the top with all the metal pieces. The string is a little tough to tie, so I think that some children might have to have help with that. I think the pulley system is really cool looking though, and the basket actually looks wooden:

The rest of the parts include the stand for the metal to be pored on and the metal chute for it to slide down into the melting pot. I enjoyed the bricks that are made to look like wood. They give the set a nice touch and they aren't stickers. I don't have any ability to apply stickers properly so this is always a plus for me. The torches on the top of the set are really nice as well:

I really like the set as a whole. It is obviously not as impressive as Helm's Deep or Mines of Moria because it is smaller, but it is a very detailed small set for the right price. It also only took about 50 minutes to build, which is perfect in my eyes. Because of all the extra pieces and weapons, the set has a ton of play-ability. I really struggled trying to decide exactly how I wanted to display all the different extra little pieces because there is so much here. I decided to have the armor on both orcs and display the weapon cooling area in the middle with the Orc using the anvil on the right:

Here is a close up of the forge itself.

And one with it lit up:

The light brick makes this set. Absolutely excellent.

Investment time: Do my thoughts on it as an investment change? What do we have to compare it to?

Well, we don't have any retired Lord of the Rings sets to really compare it to, but I think the general consensus is that the theme will do really well. They have all sold really well, have not been on the shelves too long, and is from a very popular movie series that is recent. So instead, I decided to compare to it old Target Exclusives that have a comparable piece count and retail price. This chart is shown below:

This is definitely good news. With exclusives there are definitely good things and bad things that arise. On one hand, there are less of them made and less bought during production. On the other, they may not be as well known because no body ever sees them. This could be a problem in bigger themes too like Star Wars because there are close to a billion sets. But we still see here that the Pirate tank and the Republic Fighter Tank both still had some solid growth.

I think the Lord of the Rings theme is more comparable to the Coast Guard Platform and the Agents theme because there was a limited number of sets in the theme. People that liked the theme will definitely want to collect all the sets in the theme and it will be doable.In the Star Wars theme, it is not that doable.

Both the Coast Guard set and the Agents set saw fairly solid growth, with the Coast Guard set tripling in value. Where do we think the Orc Forge fits in? Well, currently it already shows a 37% CAGR which is wonderful. I think this representative of the people who may not have a Target in their area or a Lego store and buy off Ebay.

The build was really pretty good and I think most children could handle it. The play-ability with the set is off the chart and with the light brick and all the cool Orcs and weapons, I think the set's build and play-ability match right up with it's alleged investment potential.

This set has also not really seen a lot of sales, so I don't think there are tons of people out there who have 100s of these stashed away. I think once it finally does EOL, the value will steadily rise to about $80 after a year or so. For the more long term investment, I think it will see gains not quite a good as the Coast Guard set, but close since the theme is so popular. I expect about 25% CAGR after 5 years, which is a very low estimate. Honestly, I think it has the potential to do even better as more and more people find out there is another Lord of the Rings set. And these sets aren't done, so I think there will be more and more interest generated.

At 25% CAGR, the 5 year value would be $122.07 which would be a really nice 200% return over retail. If you do not have this set, don't worry about all the possibility of an extended run. I guarantee that all the mid level sets in the Harry Potter series sold more than this set and I think the current performance has shown how popular this set is.

As well, this set is not sold in every target. I have three in my city and none of them carried this in store. I think it is way too early to worry about how many will be sold. Honestly I don't think they will come back in stock at Lego and all of this will die down. Just don't be caught without one. In my opinion, this set obviously has really solid growth potential, and this could be a 40% or more CAGR set in a couple of years – it just has that type of potential with its exclusivity and the theme's popularity itself. It's not a bad thing it is still in stock – because you have plenty of time to get more of them!

Note: All of the information here are my own opinions and are pulled from my experiences. You may or may not have success with these methods. Thanks for reading!