Yo-Ho-Ho-Ho and a Collection of Off-Brand Pirates
By JimmiWazEre
Opinionated tabletop gaming chap who’s been exceptionally busy this month.
TL;DR:
LEGO sets are pricey and out of print, but LEGO-compatible pirate ships from AliExpress scratched my itch for Pirate Borg minis at a fraction of the cost. The legality’s murky, the quality’s decent, and they’re undeniably cool.
Disclaimer:
This post discusses unlicensed, third-party brick sets purchased on AliExpress. LEGO® is a trademark of the LEGO Group, which does not sponsor, authorise, or endorse this product.
Consequently, no affiliate links or monitisation is present on this post as it just don't feel right.
Who’s a Pretty Boy Then?
Alrighty then, apologies for not keeping up with my usual output, I've been burning the candle at both ends this month by dedicating all my free time to helping out a mate.
I'm so tired that it's not exactly left me with enough beans to be creative, and I know that my commitment to the blog this month has suffered because of it.
So, bearing that in mind, today's post is gonna be a quick one, but hopefully you'll agree it's cool and worthwhile.
As you know, I like pirates, pirates are cool - and I have a Pirate Borg game that I'm building up to running. Well, it occurred to me a few weeks ago that it might be fun to grab some pirate LEGO sets, and maybe even find a use for them in game?
Well, three problems there straight away. LEGO don't do their pirate line currently, even if they did it'd be crazy expensive, and consequently the 2nd hand market is more expensive than many of these sets were new.
Take this one for example - the Renegade Runner is close to my heart because I had it as a kid. Sure, it was easily the worst ship available at the time but at about £30 (approx £65 adjusting for inflation - wowzers!) in 1993 it's probably less than what my mum could afford for a Christmas present, so I'm grateful.
Well today that same ship is going secondhand without a box for over £100 on eBay. Madness! Boxed and sealed, you're looking at north of £600. Not a cats chance in hell that I'm paying that, no way.
So what's a boy to do? Well, a boy could dip his toe in the murky shark infested waters of AliExpress, and this boy is glad he did, because this boy picked up several not-lego pirate ships for a fraction of the cost. Check these little badgers out:
Shiver me timbers, indeed.
You see, LEGO lost their brick patent a few years back, meaning that anyone could make LEGO compatible bricks and sell them to the public. So they did. The end? Not quite. LEGO didn't lose their trademark, and they retain control of copyrighted builds and things like their mini figures.
So now there's a murky bit, some of these kits look very much like their LEGO counterparts, and I suspect they're either just different enough to not infringe copyright, or that where they appear very similar to older LEGO sets, they fall into grey areas of copyright law depending on jurisdiction. Hence manufacturers selling on AliExpress which is based in China. That's something to consider before you get too excited anyway.
And whilst we're at it, here's another thing to think about: Are there quality defects? The answer is 'Yes', but from the sets I have, I've only experienced very minor ones such as the occasional very tight fitting brick, miss-print in the instructions, or brick bags labelled with the wrong number... Nothing someone with two or more braincells can't work around, and certainly nothing that isn't compensated for by the exceptionally low price.
So, all that said and done, I now have some cool pirate sets, and I reckon that if I 3d print some of these LEGO compatible round bases, I can effectively have LEGO compatible pirate minis ready for Pirate Borg.
And yes, I'm aware I usually advocate against using minis in TTRPGs... But COME ON, they're so cool!!!
Conclusion
Thanks for sticking with me on this one, what do you think about using LEGO or similar in TTRPGs? Crazy idea or genius?
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Catch you laters, alligators.
As you know, I like pirates, pirates are cool - and I have a Pirate Borg game that I'm building up to running. Well, it occurred to me a few weeks ago that it might be fun to grab some pirate LEGO sets, and maybe even find a use for them in game?