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I'm personally fine with the term nubs and know exactly what you mean. In some AFOL circles, they'll jump down your throat for not using the "correct" term "st

I'm personally fine with the term nubs and know exactly what you mean. In some AFOL circles, they'll jump down your throat for not using the "correct" term "stud". The canonical term for the "flat-topped" is tile. My personal gripe is just the explosion of special purpose pieces that Lego vends today. Less is more Lego.

handrous 5y ago
Ah, cool, thanks for the corrections. Yeah, I'm not into online lego fandom enough to know the correct terms—I just played with them for probably low-thousands of hours as a kid. I do like how many bigger modern sets come with a "brick tool". I always wanted one as a kid when, but they were a separate purchase and I never wanted one bad enough for it to make my wishlists, over more sets. Even the $80+ sets (in 80s/90s dollars!) back then didn't come with them. They are handy.
tspike 5y ago
> My personal gripe is just the explosion of special purpose pieces that Lego vends today. Less is more Lego. I've personally been amazed at the possibilities that seemingly single-purpose parts open up in the hands of a skilled builder. One example is the "stud shooter" -- a utensil for minifigures to shoot out 1x1 round plates. Check out what these folks did with it: https://www.newelementary.com/2020/05/stud-shooter-15391%20-lego-building-techniques.html.html https://www.newelementary.com/2020/05/stud-shooter-15391%20-... New Elementary is a gold mine for creative uses for "specialized" parts.
- lostlogin 5y ago
  > I've personally been amazed at the possibilities that seemingly single-purpose parts open up in the hands of a skilled builder. And this is great, but when you have small children who just want to join things together, a lot of the modern sets have a fairly limited ability to customise. It’s frustrating. They sell plenty of simple sets, it’s just so attractive to buy the fancy ones recreating some movie.
- icecap12 5y ago
  Wow - amazing link. Thanks!
- greyhair 5y ago
  My son did exactly that with all his 'specialized' pieces. The way he repurposed those in his own designs used to crack me up, and he was doing that when he was only eight or ten years old. The imagination didn't fixate on what the part was originally used for, he only saw it as a raw shape to serve some purpose.
genocidicbunny 5y ago
> My personal gripe is just the explosion of special purpose pieces that Lego vends today. Less is more Lego. Lego has significantly reduced the number of special purpose pieces it uses since the 90's. Back then, the number of specialized one-off pieces Lego was using helped nearly sink the company. That's partially responsible for the increase in the number of small parts they use now -- it allows them to recreate some of the intricacy you could have with an equivalent larger piece. A lot of the weird/specialized pieces Lego puts out these days are minifigure-related in some way.

handrous 5y ago

Ah, cool, thanks for the corrections. Yeah, I'm not into online lego fandom enough to know the correct terms—I just played with them for probably low-thousands of hours as a kid. I do like how many bigger modern sets come with a "brick tool". I always wanted one as a kid when, but they were a separate purchase and I never wanted one bad enough for it to make my wishlists, over more sets. Even the $80+ sets (in 80s/90s dollars!) back then didn't come with them. They are handy.

tspike 5y ago

> My personal gripe is just the explosion of special purpose pieces that Lego vends today. Less is more Lego. I've personally been amazed at the possibilities that seemingly single-purpose parts open up in the hands of a skilled builder. One example is the "stud shooter" -- a utensil for minifigures to shoot out 1x1 round plates. Check out what these folks did with it: https://www.newelementary.com/2020/05/stud-shooter-15391%20-lego-building-techniques.html.html https://www.newelementary.com/2020/05/stud-shooter-15391%20-... New Elementary is a gold mine for creative uses for "specialized" parts.

lostlogin 5y ago
> I've personally been amazed at the possibilities that seemingly single-purpose parts open up in the hands of a skilled builder. And this is great, but when you have small children who just want to join things together, a lot of the modern sets have a fairly limited ability to customise. It’s frustrating. They sell plenty of simple sets, it’s just so attractive to buy the fancy ones recreating some movie.
icecap12 5y ago
Wow - amazing link. Thanks!
greyhair 5y ago
My son did exactly that with all his 'specialized' pieces. The way he repurposed those in his own designs used to crack me up, and he was doing that when he was only eight or ten years old. The imagination didn't fixate on what the part was originally used for, he only saw it as a raw shape to serve some purpose.

genocidicbunny 5y ago

> My personal gripe is just the explosion of special purpose pieces that Lego vends today. Less is more Lego. Lego has significantly reduced the number of special purpose pieces it uses since the 90's. Back then, the number of specialized one-off pieces Lego was using helped nearly sink the company. That's partially responsible for the increase in the number of small parts they use now -- it allows them to recreate some of the intricacy you could have with an equivalent larger piece. A lot of the weird/specialized pieces Lego puts out these days are minifigure-related in some way.