To buy or not to buy, that is the question...

[gingerwitch.livejournal.com]

From midnight this morning onwards for a week you can get double VIP points at the lego store. (Registering as a VIP is free and gets you a cute keychain, too. 😉 Even if you never use the points, you might, so it's worth a shot either way.) They changed the VIP system a while back making it non-trivially more complicated, but I checked it at the time and calculated the standard VIP rebate for the leading currencies all as upwards of five percent of what you spend now off your next purchase (so double means upwards of 10%), but it can be difficult to follow the base maths so 1) I'll spare you and 2) I'm not revisiting that determination regularly; exchange rates are a pain in my backside. Additionally, these rebate systems are always a little problematic. They're designed to keep you coming back, there's always a minimum amount to get that rebate, the points eventually expire... Yada yada. As systems go, lego's is far from the worst, but a straight forward discount would obviously be better. For someone who used to buy the Creator Modular sets and / or the Winter Village sets every year, it still worked out advantageously for me, and it's certainly proved even more worthwhile since the rekindling of the HP series. 😃 Mileage varies obviously. ( Read more... )

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In other news: Target is offering the Harry and Hermione bundled maxifigure set for half price, and I'm positively green with envy. 😢 If you're in the US and these were on your shopping radar, I'd say get them now.

Still more coming??

[gingerwitch.livejournal.com]

According to Brick Fanatics, the 76391 Hogwarts Icons Collectors' Edition set won't be the last surprise in store for fans as part of the lego Harry Potter 20th anniversary celebration. They report lego will be capping off the anniversary year with "something very special indeed for Harry Potter fans."

How frustratingly vague! 😆 Anyway, speculation is running riot as one might expect... We still haven't seen a golden Draco minifig, which I've always maintained would have made more sense than Hagrid or Professor McGonagall, to say nothing of Quirrell or - if we're fair - Voldemort himself, who hadn't even put in an appearance 20 years ago... 😐 There's some hope that we might eventually see an update to the HP video games (something for the ipad would be lovely, cheers, and more than likely tank my productivity completely lol). Another D2C doesn't seem probable at this date, although it's presumably too late in the year to see another set for sale with retail either... (They have to know what's coming, and when they do, news eventually leaks.) Unfortunately at present no one seems to know anything for sure. I can't help thinking we may discover there's a Draco included with this month's GWP, but I guess we'll have to wait and see...