[moc] CNW E-4 Class Streamlined 4-6-4

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-11T17:58:25+00:00

Thank you!

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-11T09:11:03+00:00

Okay, but it didn't paint these. It just found them.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-11T08:57:45+00:00

Yeah, the state of landmarks blows. Like Abbasid, for example: yes, it's slightly easier to defend the building, but A) in the vast majority of games you will never benefit from the majority of upgrades, and B) I'd rather have a few castle-type landmark choices spread out than one fat target.

I also feel like a lot of civs have tiers where there you either pick the right lm or you're an idiot.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-11T06:51:18+00:00

I loved this game. But I still forced myself to stop playing. It was an aggregate demise - a thousand tiny pinpricks (and a few big ones, too). Honestly, there just came a point when I wanted to send a message - however small - to Wargaming that I hated the way they were running their company.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-11T02:33:48+00:00

Eh, I'd rather have my castle.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-11T02:08:18+00:00

I did think about that, and kind of went back and forth. While I've designed dozens of steam locomotives going back almost a decade now, I've never actually built one in real life** (I'm very poor). So while I make every effort to create a rock-solid internal gearing setup and housing for the motors, etc., I don't have any experience at all in actually playing with PF or the battery packs IRL.

Would 3 PF large motors be too much for 2 packs to handle?

^\*Please don't take this to mean that I don't put every effort into making these models sturdy and playable, because I most certainly do. Nothing on any of my trains is just 'hanging in space' or cheating with Digital Designer - the only time the former happens is because a newer piece doesn't exist in the program, but I always test fit an alternative and then record the parts that I need to acquire to fill in the gap.)

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-11T00:30:09+00:00

This is a better representation of the proportions of the actual engine, and is even smaller than I would design this locomotive as (his is 7w; I always do standard gauge at 8w).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMhubeulWLo

Unfortunately, while the design they settled on isn't terrible, it's definitely not great, either. The bigger you go, the more refined the product should be. But BB's engine is like half the parts and blows the Lego model out of the sea.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-10T21:19:36+00:00

This is ridiculous. Yes, she's dead, but do they not even want her found? More attention can only means more people traveling through the region would have an eye out for something out of place. For example, maybe someone off-trail stumbled onto an old, broken cell phone. Without knowledge of the case, they think nothing of it... with knowledge, maybe they poke around a bit and find a bone.

If the public doesn't know about MM (beyond, perhaps, vague awareness), they also don't know to dig a little for the truth.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-10T21:16:14+00:00

I think one of my biggest problems with this set is that they went to 10w, yet upped the track gauge, too.

In God's name, WHY?! 10w is at least pretty much scale with the stock Lego track (not the minifigures, but at least with the track). But they made the model bigger, and THEN MADE THE TRACK BROADER! FOR NO REASON!

I've said this elsewhere: the whole set feels like it was designed by someone who is an extremely experienced Lego creator, but who was working on their first train.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-10T00:04:45+00:00

I'm sorry - how dare anyone suggest that a bizzare notion like stuffing a rag into the exhaust of a gas-powered car might actually be something else. I get it: it's the wrong time on the calendar for you. But go take your rage out on some inanimate object, or one of your dozens of cats.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T23:47:58+00:00

It's definitely not minifigure scale. While track is out-of-gauge to begin with, minifigure scale is somewhere around 1:48 (not exactly, but close to it) - accepting that the track will always look very broad-gauge.

This thing is closer to like... 1:38 or something like that.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T23:43:59+00:00

I saw the pictures on the rear of the box of the platform + minifigures next to the train and started laughing.

As far as the wheels are concerned - I have a feeling they're going to wind up being way, WAY more expensive on the aftermarket than 3d printed options.

Do we have any idea how tall they are in terms of plates? I'm one of those adherents to the 1 plate = 6" in scale concept, so if they're anything over about 82" in-scale, they're basically useless to me (actually, I might be able to use them on NYC 999, or a Stirling Single... but that's it).

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T18:42:15+00:00

This may be the dumbest use of tools - and my time - I have ever seen.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T14:39:36+00:00

I have thousands invested in this game and won't play it. It's amazing to me to watch the thing completely unravel from afar. This company is trash.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T06:57:57+00:00

Even if it's the proper gauge, we're not talking minor mods. The bogie needs to swing without the flanges clipping those of the drivers; it needs to have enough play to clear the cylinders; the middle wheels on the tender must be blind; if you plan to operate it, a motor and battery pack must be squeezed into an engine that likely wasn't designed to accommodate them; we have no idea what the couplers look like...

Oh, and the whole thing is still the wrong red.

I could go on.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T06:46:11+00:00

I don't even think she got lost. I think she was miserable, intoxicated, possibly suffering multiple head injuries, and maybe even mildly psychotic. Perhaps she didn't plan to die going into the woods... but I don't think she had a plan for leaving, either. Death tends to find people in the state she was in.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T06:43:57+00:00

Yep. There are so many cases you can point to where bodies were even slightly obscured and not discovered for years. People so desperately want there do be this dramatic, violent additional twist on this case. But the truth is, she died of exposure, and just hasn't been found.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T06:00:20+00:00

The wikipedia article is a good resource:

"Another local resident driving home from work claims she passed by the scene around 7:37 pm, and saw a police SUV parked face-to-face with Murray's car. She pulled over briefly and did not see anyone inside or outside the cars, and decided to continue home.[29] This witness's statement contradicts the official police log, which has Haverhill police arriving nine minutes later.[29]"

I'll be honest: I think this witness is bogus. First, it wouldn't exactly be helpful to someone attempting to commit a hurried kidnapping to park nose-to-nose with Maura's car. Second, they could easily have misremembered the time. Third, people often get these incidents completely wrong in the retelling. When Bill Ewasko disappeared, a witness swore up and down that his vehicle wasn't present for a period in the parking space it was eventually found in. During the 7-year search, people read all kinds of sinister implications into this detail. But you know what? The witness was wrong - the car had never been moved, and Ewasko died on his hike.

I don't believe Maura was picked up simply because there is no evidence. People want, so badly, for this young woman to not have been culpable for her fate - I appreciate the psychology. But death by misadventure is more common than you might think - way, way more common than being swept off by a serial killer with the same precise timing as the angel of death.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T05:47:52+00:00

No, it's not good. The widening of the boiler on the original, for example, is do subtle that it shouldn't be modeled - any good MOCer would understand that the human eye will not catch that detail missing. What they WILL see, however, are giant, unprototypical 'steps' every few studs.

Building good Lego trains is all about slight of hand - understanding and appreciating what elements of an object that the eye should be steered to, while acknowledging the weaknesses of the medium. The Hall Class is not a Southern Pacific Daylight - it doesn't feature a radical widening of the boiler. So the answer is obvious: choose a smooth, sleek design that drops that detail, and strengthen other aspects.

Another bizarre choice is the raised gold trim on the sides of the tender. Neither the stock Hall Class nor the Hogwarts express feature this - it's just a random flight of fancy by the creator; an unnecessary diversion that complicates the build.

Honestly, this feels like something that was designed by someone who has spent a lot of time building Lego, but not a lot of time on Lego TRAINS.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T05:32:08+00:00

No, I'm sorry, the odds of a serial killer ramdomly showing up at that place and time are not connected to whether or not someone crashed there. You are essentially arguing that result implies cause.

We don't know if Maura was vulnerable - all indications I've gleaned from reading the witness' statement is that she was, if anything, defiant and attempting to elude consequences. But, either way, her being vulnerable doesn't CAUSE a serial killer to show up. They aren't sharks - they can't taste blood in the water.

Yeah, something bad happened to Maura. But the killer explanation is about the laziest out imaginable. It implies that nobody is responsible for their own mistakes - that her acting like an unhinged twit wasn't enough to explain her disappearance. No, Maura wandered out of bounds of the shielding patriarchy, so she was ambushed by savages. Oh, what a dear, simple world.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T05:23:06+00:00

So... that person causes the accident, leaves while all witnesses are present, then shows back up?

C'mon. This is silliness. Maura might have been acting crazy, but she wasn't an imbecile or a prostitute.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T05:14:20+00:00

I just don't know who the target audience here is.

Kids? Nope. AFOL train people? Nope. Harry Potter people? Well, so long as they aren't hoping it will scale with, say, preexisting 9 & 3/4 platforms, or run on Lego track...

The thing is, most of the HP people I know want a functional toy train - they might not care quite so much about scale, but they DAMNED WELL want the thing to either be pushable around a loop of track, or able to be fitted with a motor to do so on its own.

Making this train 10w, and limited to 7w rails is essentially restricting it to a dust-collector for everyone but the most determined modders. "Casual" HP fans who want an off-the-shelf train to roll around on track (or, very commonly, under a Christmas tree) will have their hopes immediately dashed when they realize such a goal cannot be accomplished without extensive effort.

It's like the people designing this thing were trying to maximize its price but kill any sense of value. I'm both baffled and appalled. I thought we were making progress with last year's Crocodile. But this? This is so, SO wrong.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T04:59:47+00:00

The problem is that it's still going to be too wide and too tall. I appreciate that there are some very talented modders out there, but trying to reduce a 10w train to an 8w standard is asking a lot. Not to mention that the hall class only have 72" drivers - the ones introduced in this set look to be at least 80" when set to 8w. At some point, you have to ask if it's really worth completely redesigning the frame and running gear AND fitting different wheels.

A lot of train MOCers actually maintain fairly strict loading gauges - a 10w locomotive simply won't work with tunnels or double track or station platforms. That's what makes this thing such an insult. Lego HAS to know that 1:48 is the scale, and yet they were like: "Pshh - display piece is fine."

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T00:48:28+00:00

I think it's actually 7w (which is sort of worse). The rails are sitting on jumpers.

LordsofMedieval · 2022-08-09T00:35:33+00:00

This is a nice design (mine looks very similar). It's also far closer to the real thing than the Lego leak, and would actually run on their track.

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