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Studios are lining up to bid....

I Ain't buying SSS******TTT!!!! With all the aggregate negative events from Lego, coupled with Over-saturation of Sellers, I'm bottling up my Greedy-Ass impulse for once. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying this is a Dust Collector, I have 10. This game has taking a turn or its at the fork, so I'm not going to sink anymore capital until i see greener Pastures ahead. Good Luck and may the force be with you.

At this point, at least with me, I feel more confident with 50% off City than any of the large exclusives.

For some time, every time that I have heard the Legend of Chima mentioned, it's been half joke, half cautionary tale. The conventional wisdom says stay away, stay far away. There's a few people that are wild enough, dangerous enough or wily enough to have made some money on Chima. They say buy cheap enough and you can make money on anything. I began to wonder about the non-licensed LEGO Intellectual Properties. What is it that makes Chima such poison? Why are these LEGO sets reviled? I felt like I had to know more. I felt like I had to understand what makes one series less desirable than another. I decided to start with what I know of Chima. In the early days, LEGO was giving out Speedorz for free with purchases. I know because I got some. I was able to sell those eventually making about $5 each. As far as I was concerned, I made money, though not much, and notably less than LEGO was trying to sell the same thing for. My buy in was good, free with purchase. That doesn't tell me much though. I didn't keep the Speedorz because I was uninterested in LEGO sets that weren't really building sets. Now that those sets were long gone. I needed something else. I had to go further. Maybe the denizens of the land of Chima could help. Half forgotten memories of something that I sold off as an afterthought weren't going to do it. I had to look deeper. I had to follow the trail. I unearthed a handful of minifigures that came in a bulk lot, and a couple that were part of Target cubes that I had purchased. Nature's mistakes some might call these poor twisted creatures. That is, if there was anything natural about them in the first place. Anthropomorphic animals that wear animal head helmets. Are the helmets supposed to be part of them, or some representation of the animals that they once were? How could I know? I took off the helmets and was happy to see the dual sided heads, until I realized that they were worse than useless. The Chima helmets cover the entire head. No face is visible when they are wearing the helmets, but when you take them off, these freaks become some kind of grotesquerie with two faces. Every single Chima is like Professor Quirrel and Voldemort. It doesn't really matter how good or bad the figures are when something fundamental like creating dual faces without a reason slips by. Sure, you can turn the head around so they'll be angry, but the angry face will be just as hidden by the helmet as the happy face. This is worse than Batman's sweatband. I fled the tiny freaks with their shoulder armor and wings (fire wings are awesome by the way) and their transparent limbs and zombie-ish body damage. Is this why people didn't travel down into the dark heart of Chima? Is this what stops most people? My journey almost ended there, but I had to push on. I had to get to the heart of it. I had to observe. I had to see what the children saw, so I unleashed the torments of the cartoon upon myself. I thought that I knew what I was getting into. I've watched more than my fair share of licensed toy cartoons. I've seen the LEGO Movie and the LEGO Super Heroes videos. I thought that I knew what to expect. I thought I was prepared. I was wrong. The cartoon is dreadful. It's poorly executed nonsense. The main "hero" (Laval) is an idiot and the main antagonist (Cragger) is an easily manipulated fool. As far as I can tell, the "Chi" is some kind of naturally occurring steroid with hideously addictive properties. The Lions are the kingpins and the Crocodiles are the meth addicts that live in the swamp trailer park, constantly jonesing for their fix. The rhinos are dumber than a bag of hammers and the gorillas are too stoned to be effective at anything. The wolves are thug, the eagles are the lion's enforcers and the ravens are some kind of group of mercenary scavengers, easily distracted by shiny things. There's a collection of animals that just said no at some point hundreds or thousands of years before. Somehow, not taking the drugged water made them stronger and longer lived. I have to stop there. I can't relive the unspeakable horrors of this cartoon anymore. I lost days in there to madness. Was it a symptom of that madness to continue this foolhardy quest? It probably was, but I had come this far. I had to see it through. I needed to get a feel for these monstrosities myself. I had to build them to see if there was beauty buried within. I couldn't believe that they were all terrible. The underlying parts were the same as sets and themes that I enjoy. I found 2 sets on my shelves, but that wouldn't do. I couldn't do it with just a couple sets that I had found on clearance. I needed to dive deeper. I put out the call for sets that were cheap, expecting people to be thrilled to get their money back out of these beasts. Strangely, no one stepped forward. The only offers that I received were full retail offerings of used sets through Facebook and a few scattered offerings of new sets at a markup. People who spoke ill of Chima, still seemed to believe that there was something there of value. Was conventional wisdom just a blind that people hid behind, believing that there was still money to be made down the road? Was money back worth less than the effort of digging out the hated sets in order to convenience a stranger? Probably the latter. But, I found a few more sets on clearance, and found someone dumping his collection on ebay and dove in to the murky depths. I had to build, the fever of madness was upon me. It would be either glory or grotesquerie, but my journey would be over soon. Soon I would know the truth. . . The brightly colored packaging was appealing. Warm orange and cool blue mutually highlighted each other. The packaging though, only hid what was inside. I had to open the packaging to see what lay within. I started small with a battle pack and a legendary beast. Strangely, the legendary beast was enjoyable for such a small set, better than many other $9.99-$12.99 sets that I have built. The small ones were harmless and easily dismissed. I was hunting bigger game. Surely as I worked my way up the ladder, I would be exposed to the depravity of this theme. As I built the sets, I looked for simplicity of design including large elements that made them easier to put together. I looked for play elements that were more important than functionality. I immersed myself into the ideas of this theme. I went native, thinking of how the ability to change a vehicle from one form to another might make sense. A large boat that could actually float made less sense to me than vehicles that looked like birds that would never fly. I pulled ripcords and launched Speedorz at targets, at each other, at my cats before succumbing to the darkness inside. I awoke, surrounded by animal head helmets and dual sided heads placed in a row before the greatest darkness. My eyes wouldn't focus upon it for the longest time. I forced myself to look. There I beheld something that I wish I could forget, even here at home, long after my ordeal. My eyes rested upon Worriz' Fire Bike, and I knew fear. I am told that I spoke two words only, but I lost some time there. They say that I said "The horror." When I came back to myself, I was clutching my Star Wars minifigures to my chest tightly. Someone knew how to restore my sanity. Brief glimpses of the dark heart of Chima still haunt me at night. The truth is, there's nothing inherently wrong with Chima. The same pieces were used by the same designers to create a theme aimed at children. The builds run the gamut from clever to uninspired. The minifigures are highly repetitive, I'm not entirely sure I can tell a main character from one of the faceless hordes. I enjoyed the build aesthetic where everything looked to some degree like the animals that used them. As an adult, we had no anchor or inroad. We could jump in to the deep end, as I did and find something to enjoy about them, but it's like candy. You can enjoy it while you're building it, but it's easily forgotten. As far as a future, children (especially modern children) have a very short memory. Very few children will return to the world of Chima to recover their youth as they graduate up through the themes. Adults weren't the original market and inherently knew it, so they didn't really get behind it. There's nothing wrong with Chima, but there's nothing really right about it. When you look at the whole line, the problem suddenly crystalizes. This theme was supposed to take the reigns from Ninjago. Ninjago was supposed to fade away and allow for Chima's Pre-eminence. Something happened that allowed Ninjago to continue. Ninjago outlasted Legends of Chima. I've watched Ninjago with my kids and seen the sets that they've built, and I realized that while they are both juvenile, it seems that Ninjago was treated with more respect by the company. Fans, young and old can tell when they are being respected and when they are just being given a new product for the sake of change. I can look at the sets that I have built and appreciate them for some things. I'll try to ignore the problems with the minifiures. I'll play with them with my kids and try to forget the terrible cartoon. I'll try to forget how incredibly stupid the characters are. I may not try too hard to reassemble things if my kids smash them. It's time to move on and forget the confusion, the fear and yes even the beauty. I'll try to forget that somewhere out there, Worriz waits with his fire bike. EDIT: (I never intended for this to be a typical dog whistle where I jump on and make fun of Chima. I was actually fairly curious about the theme and decided to try it out. My final feelings are mixed because it serves its purpose, but it doesn't really excel. Nothing that I built was terrible or truly worthy of disdain,just not worthy of praise either.)

Not saying what Lego Store I seen the new Death Star 75159, as the manager said no pictures and don't post what store you seen this in. So I got at the Lego store at 10 this morning, head manager was there and first thing i asked him is whats the story on the new DS he said hold on, he went in the back and came out with one, he said they had 10 so far, he scanned it and it says $499.99 and it looks just like the leaked photos. same size Box, so he you go its coming mid September, he said thats not confirmed but he said thats most likely the exclusive along with the Holiday Train. so as I posted the other day, I sold 20 so far, $262 from B&N and Toys R US buy 2 get one free. plus the other ones are from Amazon, Etc $300-320 so selling 20 and making the most from craigslist and even Ebay did pretty good. Enough for me to spend another $1200 or so today. So am I mad Lego Screwed up yes, but in my situation I am still making money, its like me having money in the bank and taking it out and loading up on Sandcrawlers, Fairground Mixer, etc. "Now me and Ed Mack starting that the 10188 DS would be $1000-1500 and growing months ago and if Lego would have not screwed us the 10188 would have been gold. But the way I see it now I doubt if it will ever be a big money maker, so I will sell about 20 more around the Holidays if I can still make $100 and up. and just hold on to the other 20 for a while to see what happens. The Guys that really got screwed are the ones that paid retail and up $425 -$500 on these and I am pretty sure alot did. Ed

Back to business

If you don't want to be called an ass, don't be an ass.

They didn't make another one.

Temple of Airjitzu from smyths For those who don’t know, Smyths keep the high end sets on the top shelf, so you have to ask a member of staff to get them. Asking for high end Lego in smyths always reminds me of asking for other top shelf products. Anyway, after handing me the set, the guy said, “Would you like to check the box condition, you look like a collector”. May as well have said, there you go reseller scum.

Nah.. they are a business, and don't have to operate with any sort of compassion for resellers. ----------- Regardless, I don't see exclusives as the be-all end-all anymore. In fact, when you start to just look at it as a dollar for dollar investment, and let the glitter and glitz of the set itself not make an influence, these "blue chips" are not as good as they are cracked up to be. I know I differer from the "buy 50 of ANY exclusive, and you won't regret it" crowd, but i'm not playing in that band.. I still think those that took advantage of the walmart clearance event this july (or buy low on amazon, target, TRU etc), that had many decent Star Wars sets on clearance, that dollar for dollar, those sets will more than likely make one more money than buying a sandcrawler around RRP right now through walmart. So, I refuse to get caught up in to the cult of buying, when I think this through. I know that last year, for every 2 AT-AT's I purchased at a discount around 90.00 (some I got less), they are doing better than every Red 5 that I purchased around RRP. I dont even want to talk about the death star, which also retired. Let's toss that one out.. The mid to large size sets like AT-AT's, ISD's, and Cantinas were the better deal than any exclusive. Already the AT-AT's can be sold for almost 2.5x what one could have bought in at during those clearance events. The Red5 is not even at 1.5x. So, let's say someone bought 10 or more AT-AT's last year around 90.00, and also bought 5 Red 5's. An almost equal investment in dollar for dollar amount. Well, already, it might take until next year, before the Red5 might finally hit the 2x mark. But by then, if that person played the game right, they already cashed out on all the at-ats at 2.5x of the original investment, reinvested it in IST's (or other sets of that size), and cashed out on those at 2.5x too next season when the Red5 finally starts to go around 2x. In the end, they can turn a 1000.00 investment in 10 AT-AT's into 1500.00 straight profit within a year, and if one reinvests that straight into this year's clearance of IST's (at 49), Kylo's ship (49), FO Transporter (40.00), Resistence Transporter (35), and sells that stock out around 2.5x (which it should be around next year at those buy-in prices), they will be sitting on 3750.00 profit (granted, i'm not counting fees, and shipping into this) within a 2 year cycle. By then, theyll finally see the red5 at 2x (if we are lucky), and be sitting at 1000.00 profit if they were to blow out all 5 of theirs. So, in my opinion the sweet spot is no longer exclusives. It's other sets. So, last year, if someone strictly bought 2 at-at's to 1 red 5, they would be doing better off. And if they reinvest it wisely the next year, they could hit it again. While, I don't think the Sandcrawler will have any problem eventually selling at 750, I think it will take some time to get there. While I always hear the "buy 50 of these and you won't regret it". I still think the better bet will be the mid to large size sets that people only occasionally think about, but could be purchased at clearance, or at much cheaper costs. I've decided to pass on any more crawlers. It is a GREAT set. By far the best freaking star wars build i've done. But, I think the better bets are other star wars sets that one could have landed at a clearance discount, when I detach myself from the AFOL crazed builder and look at it strictly in terms of investment.

That is the beauty of having resellers around. You do not have to wait. An MISB 10228 Haunted House is only a few clicks away.

That's one of the nerdiest comments yet, damn I wasted my nerd meme too early today

Looks like there is still hope in the LEGO investing/reselling world. Funny how things change so rapidly. The 75159 could have destroyed the LEGO investing world and the 75059 might save it.

At a BN store near you

And an island! As a professional geographer, I'm happy to see maps.

Got these today, and with all the Vip Points I had I got 2 of the Sandcrawlers for $200 each.

My son took a video of some of our SW Legos that he proudly displays in the basement. We haven't added the Death Star, Kylo's Shuttle, Jabba's Palace, the Rancor Pit, or the Spider Droid to the display yet bc they are still in his room, but I'm sure he'll bring them down and add them eventually.

If this is the only lesson I teach my children, I've been a successful parent.

You guys are pushovers. I didn't need a video to convince me to open up both of those.

If Trump wins the next Creator Landmark set will be the America/Mexico Wall... screw the Great Wall of China.

This guy but he may not wanna share.

I would argue that 2004-2014 seems to be the Golden Age. From my perspective there have been several milestones for us as Lego Investors, that have caused the rise, and now extremely slow fall of Lego investing. 1. The acquisition of the Star Wars License in 1999. I will never forget my excitement the first time I saw a Star Wars Lego set in Walmart for the first time prior to the release of one of the biggest disappointments of my life, Episode I. 2. The creation of the UCS Star Wars line in 2000 with the Tie Interceptor and X-Wing. Saw these in KB toys, and will never forget the initial awe inspiring feeling when I saw these on the end caps. This was the start of Lego realizing that their was an AFOL market. However, not many AFOLs were interested or took note. I remember seeing these on clearance at 50% off at times. 3. The creation of the ISD in 2002. This was their first true large scale model, that truly was aimed at AFOLs. There were other large scale sets before then, like the Statue of Liberty, but nothing that really caught peoples eye. This is where it all started for the AFOLS. Years later Cafe Corner, Taj Mahal, and large Creator sets followed. But it all started with the ISD for the AFOLs, as this was massive, impressive, and accurate. 4. The rise of 10179. I do not state the release, as really not much happened when it was released. It was universally mocked from an resale standpoint (no one used the term for investment regarding Lego's then) due to the high buy-in, and large amount of space for storage. Once this set started to command multi-thousand dollar prices is when the average joe started paying attention to Lego as an investment/resell avenue. Before then, Lego reselling was only a limited niche market. 5. The creation of Brickpicker. This brought Lego investing to the forefront, and caused it to make national news, and also legitimized Lego investing/resales as a form of income. This combined with 10179 was what truly has caused Lego investing to not be nearly as lucrative as it used to be. The creation of an entire website and community devoted to Lego resale has only cause an increasing number of resellers. 6. The release of 75159. While the release of WTS was shocking, it did will not impact the secondary market nearly as much as 75159. With this release, the likelihood of people being willing to spend large multi thousand dollar sums of money on older sets goes down significantly. Most people will not want to risk the loss of their investment due to a remake. People are willing to spend large amounts of money on collectibles, typically, because they feel it will always be worth something. With 75159, people are now weary that the $5,000 10179 they just purchased could drop $4500 over night if there was a remake. I am already feeling antsy with the $1,000 dollar SSD I bought thinking a remake could bottom it out to $400, and that's only $600 dollars. Lego is a unique toy, in that it commands high resale values, primarily not due to rarity, but due to displayability. Had 75159 been a superior playset, then while 10188 would not have tanked in value like it has no, it would never have reached the heights that it could have had 75159 been a display model. Other collectible items on the market command value because they are much more closely tied to just how RARE they are. While some rare Lego's are worth a lot, it is not typically rarity that sells Legos. It's the fact that they are awesome to display. Because of this, older AND rarer Lego's will not always command higher values than newer Lego's if the newer Lego model is notably superior in build and display quality. There will always be completionists out there, but in the case of Lego, completionists are not what drive the market. AFOLs typically do not have to "Catch 'em All." It is obvious that with the lengthening of retirement/partial retirement of sets, that Lego is no longer willing to leave money on the table. They will sell a set till the market is nearly saturated, and there is a lack of consumer interest, and then retire the set then. If there is even an inkling that there is interest in the set, they are clearly willing to reissue the set. There will be cases of random retirements of sets that are selling well just to keep us guessing, like the Tumbler, but ultimately, if a set is selling well, there is zero reason for Lego to retire it at this point. As resellers we are likely only exacerbating the problem somewhat by increasing sales at times on sets that could be slow sellers, as they near EOL, causing Lego to extend the life of that set.

I'd never buy anything from someone with such disregard for punctuation.

I hear ya - I had to explain to my kids (after the recent DS events), that even though private college is no longer a viable option - Community college is really just as good.

Sold my last 76005 Daily Bugle Showdown for $83 (FBA). Buy in was $39 last fall. Also been selling some of my 60057 Camper Vans for $47 (FBA). Buy in averaged about $19 back in January.

Ah bollix, just realised this was my 1,000th post, thought it would be something profound and interesting, instead it's a throwaway meme. Dammit

I can say, definitively, yes.

Wow, When it rains it pours............. Another killer find. 40 lb tote of mixed lego themes (Harry potter, SW, City, Indy etc.), including a ton of instructions. As well as 4 built and complete modular w/instructions...........Town Hall, Grand Emporium, Palace Cinema and Pet Shop. Total caost $400.............

You use own one of these when you go to the LEGO store to make things easier on your back.

I didn't know some Lego stores still carried 10221

College is all what you make of it. You can excel in any school and do well in life. As for the 75159, it might be effective in weeding out the dilettantes.

The sands of time have run out it....Maybe...LOL

I will be putting my sandcrawlers away for 4 or 5 years and see how they go. Should make for a nice little pay day in 2020 in the USA and that is about when Slave 1 should be retiring. Too perfect.

Hate to be the bringer of bad news but availability is always the same for all countries outside of the US.

This is me in my Super Hero costume:

First "Sold out" this year for a big set ?

I wish I hadn't watched the Jang video. I have one on the way, will probably open it now.

It slipped by you because it's not in the list. He's making it up as he goes.

I missed everything - I step away for a bit, and all that's left to see when I return are a bunch of popcorn references.

Well... at least this wall will be produced in Mexico!

Yeah, the turnout was actually pretty good. Thanks for signing my balloon dog!