Collection Rating 8 out of 10
Pros: the minifig of Gandalf is awesome and also a “new designed” horse is included in the set. It is the smallest and cheapest set but you can get two minifigs, a horse and many items such as the magic staff or the spell book.
Cons: maybe the carriage of Gandalf is quite too simple to build. You get Frodo minifig but without the ring. |
9469 Gandalf Arrives (2012)
Calipher and his carriage
This is the carriage used by the wizard to travel all around the lands of the North. It is a very simple wooden carriage with a brown horse in the front. Anyway this carriage is quite quick and has plenty of space in the back to carry the wizard’s servant, his spell books and also fireworks (which are another thing for which the wizard is known in all the cities). A part from the fireworks you know that, each time you see the carriage approaching to a city, something important is about to happen: the wizard never goes in a particular place without a particular reason. Characters Calipher: is the most powerful known wizard of the north and it is told that he lives in the forest located within the peninsula behind the Great Mountains (a very difficult place to reach indeed). Anyway he lives there with his loyal servant Mint (it is told that he found him as a child in the forest and decided to keep him as a companion) but he spent all the time travelling all around the continent trying to follow his plans for the world. There is a huge difference between Calipher and all the others wizards of Altaria, such as Verminaard or Saphirus. The latest are men who learn the arts of magic (dark or not), know about the spells and understand and even dominate in some cases the power of the nature; Calipher is not a common man, he has the aspect of a man but he is an ancient spirit of the old times and therefore the magic is part of him. He was there before the world was created and now he considers himself like a guardian of the world and that his main life task is to preserve the order of the things and the equilibrium of the “thought” between the good and the evil forces. |
Collection Rating 8.5 out of 10
Pros: there are three minifigs (Frodo with the Ring included) plus the two mordwraiths which are wonderful. The curving walls of the tower are well built. The interior part is also well detailed.
Cons: the stair is not totally well fixed and if you push a little it moves while it shouldn’t. |
9472 Attack On Weathertop (2012)
The Wind Tower
Thousands years before this building was a huge tower: it is told that the Wind Tower was the home of one of the sons of the Great Thought Spirit but know it is all ruined and covered by trees and grass and basically only the basement is still in place. Nobody for centuries went there to see the old tower and it was almost forgotten; the main reason for that is fear, fear of what is told to be around the ruins: the dark spirits of the North, creatures (once men or elves) loyal to the evil spirit of the Air, without a face, riding black horses, neither living or dead and able to kill every creature in the land. Anyway in the last years it has become the house of three men: Abido, Tupher and the servant of Tupher. Banned for different reasons from their home cities the found themselves at the bottom of the tower and decided to stay and live there. The basement of the tower became therefore their house: there is an entrance in the back and inside you can find (in addition to rats...) torches to light the interior and stone statues of the spirits of the past. There is place to rest and to collect and repair the weapons as well as to store goods. They decided to keep some defence traps and the black altar that was used in the past to evoke the Spirit of the Air. There is no kitchen and therefore a fire is often burning outside in order to cook the mail. From the outside you can finally find a stone stair that leads to the superior part which is almost totally broken but can be used as a good watch point in case of an attack from the enemies. Characters Tupher: he is a Halfling (half elf and half human) and was a member of one of the richest and respected families of the Halfling community. Unfortunately one day he found by chance in the Wind Tower a magic gold giant ring which was able to transform its holder into an air ghost and make him travel fast in any known location. Tupher came back to his village and make the terrible mistake to tell everybody about his discovery: instead of becoming a hero he was envied by some people and moreover he was accused of theft and of being cursed. His family disinherited him and he was banned; only his loyal servant Hints decided to stay with him and he decided to bring back the ring into the Wind Tower but once there he met Abido and decided to join him and live in the tower. His life objective is now to discover the real nature and origin of the ring and of course to regain his honour. Abido: he is a warrior, skilled in the art of the sword and also in the art of disguise. He is a man but has passed more than half of his life alone hiding within the forests of the North avoiding contact with any other creatures. He was wondering near the Wind Tower when he met Tupher and was impressed by his story and so decided to help him to regain his honour. Abido has a problem with the race of men, his own race because he thinks that, after the War of the Races, this race is guided only by greed and need of power and so prefers to stay alone. Once he met Avalon he recognised in him the blood of the kings and the man who can finally guide his race to peace and honour and therefore he declared himself loyal to the new King of Men. |
Collection Rating 9 out of 10
Pros: it is a big set with parts that can be combined in different ways. The wooden door is well built. In the same set you can get many minifigs: a man, a hobbit, and elf, a dwarf, orcs and even a giant troll.
Cons: too many stickers. Every decorated piece is decorated with a sticker. |
9473 The Mines Of Moria (2012)
The Mines Palace
The Wind Tower was not the only remaining part of the home to the Ancient Spirit of the Air. In addition to the tower thousand of years before there was a great palace which was all built and developed underneath the ground: it is told that it was full of the most beautiful treasures of the North but of course now it is almost completely destroyed. Many men during the centuries tried without success to explore the underground labyrinth and to find the above mentioned treasures but no one succeeded and so slowly the place (like the tower itself) was abandoned and only remembered as the Mines Palace. Like the Wind Tower the Palace is now the remaining part of the ATLAS team: Avalon with his servant Tips, Loth and Sesostri with his friend Bega. Avalon, Tupher, Loth, Abido, and Sesostri, although from different lands, of different races and with different stories, have one thing in common: they are all fighting to regain their honour within the lands of the North and therefore, when they met by chance at the Mines Palace, they decided to join their forces in order to succeed and they formed the ATLAS team. Coming back to the palace what is still remaining is the big wooden entrance door (which can still be locked) with the inscription on the top in the ancient language of the spirits. If you know how to move through the mazes you can reach the old throne room which is now the headquarter of the ATLAS team: you can find and old well (still with water) and an old altar which could be opened and contained an ancient book of the history of the war of the races. In the back part of the room there is the main wall where once there was the throne of the king; this stone decorated wall has a treasure chest in the bottom while in the upper part there are some wooden shelves containing old books and some bottles of wine. The left and the right parts of the wall contain traps for enemies or hidden holes to store goods and any type of weapon. Once there were also entrances to corridors for other rooms of the palace but everything now is destroyed: only the two giant columns in front of the throne wall remain and sustain the roof of the old room. Despite being so huge this room is well hidden and easy to defend from the attacks of any orcs or trolls that sometimes come within the palace. Characters Avalon: in the deep North once upon a time there was a kingdom among the men but then during there was a devastating war of the races; after the end of the war the king family was accused to have betrayed the race of men was banned from all the lands of the North. Thousands of years later Avalon is the heir of that family who came to the North to regain his honour and re-establish the kingdom of the Men. He is a brave knight and has the sword which was once the Royal Sword of the Kings. Once arrived in the North, Avalon met Tupher and the others of the Atlas team and decided to make an alliance and help each other to fulfil their tasks. It is considered like the real leader of the Atlas team and therefore Tupher gave him his second servant Tips to be a loyal servant of the king. Loth: he is a prince dwarf. After the end of the War of the Races, dwarves chose to “disappear” from the lands of the North, preferring to hide underground searching for gold or gems. Loth has royal blood in his veins and is a master in the use of the double axe; he is also very brave and has a high self-esteem. This is why he decided not to live underground and, as soon as the voices of the return of the evil forces in the North spread through the lands, came out to fight in the name of the glory of the races of dwarves. Despite the fact that no other dwarf followed him, he persisted in his task and when he met Avalon decided to fight with him and to restore the kingdom of the men against the evil spirits. Sesostri: he is an elf and the opposite of Loth. After the war elves too disappear from the lands hiding in the forests: if the dwarves went in search for treasures, elves were the only race still believing in the force of the spirits and in the ancient power of the thought; as soon as all these things became legends, the elves preferred to become a legend too and disappeared. Sesostri is a religious man among the elves and, despite his great ability in the use of arc and arrows, he possesses part of the knowledge of the ancients and joined the Atlas team to fight the evil spirits and to guarantee the equilibrium of the races. He is able to talk to almost any living creatures and he respects all the races: that’s why he is always followed by his friend Bega, a giant troll (a race which fought with the evil army in the War of the Races) who was saved by him from a certain death when is was about to be killed by a bunch of men who considered him as an evil creature. |
Collection Rating 7 out of 10
Pros: the lighting piece that simulate the fire of the forge is nice and also the wooden part of the forge is very realistic. The armour and the helms with the white hand are good.
Cons: the mechanism to transfer the metal into the forge is quite simple and not so accurate. There are four minifigs but of the same two types (two orcs and two uruk-hai) |
9476 The Orc Forge (2012)
The Forge of the Red Pond
Since the war of the races was beginning Ia, the evil spirit of the Air, decided to create his own devoted races and his own army. He wanted to create races which do not know fear or pain, which never get tired and able to fight and destroy until they can breathe. His soul was corrupted and was not able any more to create by thinking but he had still his talisman and with that he created the race of the orcs, a mixture between men and dwarves. The orcs were loyal to him and could be charged of many tasks but to win the war of the races Ai needed something more powerful and terrible. He discovered a place near the Fire Mountain where there was a lake of lava and where nobody could live due to the high temperature and the absence of everything: the so called Red Pond was a perfect place to put into action his new plan: he combined the power of his talisman with the lava of the lake and a spell scroll stolen from his brother Ie to create two new races: the Goblin and the Uruk-Ai. The Goblins were dead Orcs transformed by the magic into bigger and stronger creatures: these creatures were big as ten men together and could move heavy war machines or giant stones but in the transformation process they loose all the intelligence. The masterpiece of Ia were instead the Uruk Ai: an elf should be buried alive for a week and “treated” with fire: after a week the creature was called again to life by magic, stronger, faster and ready to kill everything and everyone. The Uruk Ai do not suffer from pain and fear and were clever enough to be trained in combat and in military tactics and were loyal only to their creator: they were Ai’s deadly weapon. In addition to the cave were the elf were buried, machines were built to transfer the lava and the needed iron into a giant forge; this forge (with many orcs dedicated to it) was always in action and designed to produce shields, axes, armours and everything was needed by the evil army. After the end of the war the orcs were disbanded and nobody cared to go to the Red Pond to destroy the forge and so it remained active and now it is rumoured that new weapons with the white hand (symbol of the Evil Spirit of the Air) are being created and a new war is approaching. Characters General Tobiga: he is the latest uruk-hai created and represents the perfection of that race. Like the others of his species he does not suffer from fear or pain but he has a superior intelligence and cruelty and he is even faster. He represents a deadly weapon and therefore was nominated head of the new evil army and has the armour with the white hand mark as well as the typical sword of the uruk-hai (heavier and bigger than a normal sword which does the best damage when used with extreme fury) |
Collection Rating 7 out of 10
Pros: there is Gollum which (a unique minifig) and also the spider is very enjoyable to build and to play (especially for younger kids which are the main target of this set). The magic lamp of Sam is nice.
Cons: the web mechanism of the spider is a little too simple. The mechanism to make Gollum jump from the rocks is badly built. |
9470 Shelob Attacks (2012)
The Web Pond
The Forgotten Road is a small and secret road which passes through the Great Mountains and links the forest of Calipher to the Mines Palace and to the lands of the North without passing into the territories that once were the ones of the enemy. The Forgotten Road has only two disadvantages: it is very small and therefore cannot be used by big chariots and huge armies and it passes through the Web Pond. The Web Pond is a small pond that seems to be a small lake of clear and crystal water, surrounded by grass and beautiful trees. When someone arrives there after a long path through the mountains it is almost impossible to resist and not to go there and taste the fresh water. The only little problem is that everything is magic and the pond turns into what it is really: a web and the house of a giant spider who was waiting for his food. Once you are trapped in the web it is impossible to move and slowly the giant black spider approaches you, hits you and mummify your almost dead body in order to eat you later. Characters Salt & Pepper: they are the other two halflings found by Calipher in the forest when they were just kids. One blonde and the other brown, Calipher decided to call them Salt & Pepper. They are servants of the wizard like Mint (called like that because it is always dressed in green) but they prefer to spend their time in the forest hunting, fishing or exploring new lands. So they were put in charge to protect passengers from the giant spider of the pond and at the same time act like spies of the wizard in case of danger. That’s the reason why the wizard gave them also a magic lamp which can be used when no other light can succeed. Smiger: the first attempt of Ia to create a new race (a mix between a man and an elf) was a total failure and the result was a repelling creature incapable of being used in any battle. It was called Smiger and its only power was an extremely long life. Ia also tried to create other talismans with the power of his brothers but again it was a failure and the results was a ring only able to make the bearer invisible for a small amount of time. Ia got very angry and banned it from his palace: Smiger escaped taking away with him only this fake ring. For centuries after the end of the war of the races Smiger lived totally alone, hiding himself from everything (using the power of the ring) until he was found by Calipher: the wizard treated him like a normal man and not like a monster, tought him how to speak and read and behave and he accepted to be his servant and made friendship with Mint, Salt and Pepper and lived near the Web Pond. |
Collection Rating 9.5 out 10Pros: this is the biggest set and the most interesting to build. The throne room is particularly well built and the new grey and green pieces are used for the walls. The armour and helm of the king are beautiful.
Cons: there are four minifigs of the orc’s army and no one of the army of the king. |
9474 Battle of Helm's Deep (2012)The Helm Fortress
During the War of the Races, the army of the Men thought that it was crucial to block the only wide path between the Great Mountains in order to confine the enemy within the southern territories. Therefore the Helm Fortress was built: it should have been the strongest defence against all the attacks of the army of the Evil spirit of the Air. This fortress is completely different in the architecture from all the other castles in Altaria: while the last ones are built in plain territories (like the Black Monarch Castle) as well as on small hills (like the Fire Breathing Fortress) and have only one defence wall, the Helm Fortress has two separate walls. There is the big outer wall (the first line of defence from the enemies) and the inner wall which protects the apartment of the King. The outer wall is not closed to form a square but it links the two part of the mountains in order to close completely the pass; the wall is equipped also with a moat with a fixed stone bridge and the main entrances is protected with a big wooden door and a some rotating catapults in the top as well as some machines to throw hot oil intothe enemies. All the outer wall, including the two towers near the front gate,is made by the same strong stone (grey and green) of the Great Mountains, a particular type of stone so resistant that cannot be broken even by cannons. The wall near on the left and on the right of the two front tower is little curve in order to perfectly connect the two parts of the pass and no letting free space for the enemy to avoid the guards. At the very left of the wall there is the guard tower: one of the highest tower in the North can provide view of all the valley in front of the fortress and is also equipped with a particular type of corn which is used to alert all the army of any danger, even if it is miles away from the pass. The top of the tower is reachable by a long stair while in the bottom part there is a room to store weapons and goods. In the final part of the wall, just near the first part of the mountain, you can find a small open hole protected by solid iron bars, which is the sewage exit of the all fortress. The inner wall is al tall as the outer one but smaller: it protects the internal apartments of the king. The throne room is a circular one with a big wooden throne in the middle: the throne is decorated also with gold plates and has a wooden table in front in which the king can eat or write important documents. The table is equippedwith two small chairs for the king’s guests. At the sides of the throne there are torches as well as places to expose weapons (swords on the left and spears on the right) to testify that it is a war fortress and not a normal castle. On the top, near the roof (where there is place for the guards of the king) there is finally a giant flag of the house of the king. As anticipated the Helm Fortress is not a castle or the political centre of a kingdom: since the beginning it was built to protect the pass and was put under the command of the House of the White Horses, a noble warrior family of men famous for their tradition in horse riding and fighting with swords. The colour of the family are green and yellow and their official stem is a white horse head on a green field. Characters Ramir: he is the last heir of the House of the White Horses. Even after the end of the War Of the Races, the members of this family remained within the Helm Fortress to protect the Wide Pass. Ramil is the actual king of the fortress: he is old and wise but still strong and trained to fight while riding his loyal brown horse. He lead his men for years in peace and now he has to face the danger of a new war and of a new force rising in the Red Pond but he will defend his fortress with his own life if necessary. Nargul: he is not a common elf. When all his race decided to hide from the other races of Altaria, he preferred to stay at the Helm Fortress with among with the men. He remained there for centuries because he was completely sure that the enemy and the evil spirit of the Air was not completely defeated and was only preparing a come back. Nargul among the elves was a general, expert in war tactics and in the uses of the arc, but is also fond of literature and poetry. |
Collection Rating 7.5 our of 10
Pros: the crossbow catapult is very well built and detailed. Despite the set is smaller than the Battle of Helms Deep, it has six minifigs: four enemies, a guard of the fortress and the prince who is awesome.
Cons: without the set of the Battle of Helms Deep it is quite incomplete, because it is basically a part of the wall. |
9471 Uruk-Hai Army
The outer wall of the fortress
The last section of the outer wall of the Helm Fortress is provided with a big wooden stair that allows the guards to go on top of the wall and defend the fortress. This section of the wall is also equipped with a torch and a rotating catapult. Like the rest of the fortress, the bottom part of the wall is the very rock of the Great Mountains while the remaining parts are made with a special type of rock which is one of the strongest and most resistant of the North and this is particularly helpful to defend the fortress against the crossbow catapult. The crossbow catapult is the typical offense weapon of the orcs and is a variation of the typical catapult, equipped with a giant crossbow in the front. Instead of throwing big rocks, it launches a giant spear able to destroy many walls or to get fixed to the top of the wall in order to let the soldiers climb using the rope attached to the spear. Characters Raslan: he is the prince of the House of the White Horses, the son of King Ramil. He is a warrior and, despite the peace period, he never stopped training for the war. He is an unique warrior because he had the opportunity to be trained by his father and the selected guards of the fortress as well as by Nurgul with the fighting techniques of the elves. He is a master in the use of the sword and also of a particular type of spear which can be launched to the enemies while riding a horse at high speed. |