Minifiure Ratio

The number of minifigures found in a LEGO set in comparison to the set's size is a complicated business, and by extension this also applies to Lego Ideas projects. A crazy amount of minifgures can make a proposal seem bloated and unlikely to be feasible for production. The apparent un-feasability of a project to a potential supporter may turn them away from supporting the project. So the purpose of this article is too address the proper ratio of minifigures to builds in a project, based on size, subject matter, and complexity of production.

A key factor in determining the number of minifgures included in a set is the size of the set. Think about the Lego sets you own, generally the more expensive the set, the more minifigures it includes. For example, let's take a ~200 part and a ~400 part set from City, one of the most popular themes Lego makes.

    The first set is 60148 ATV Race Team which has 239 pieces and retails for $20 and €20. The second set is 60139 Mobile Command Center which has 374 pieces and retails for $50 and €40. Both sets were released in the winter of 2017, making them easily comparable.

    As you can see, the Mobile Command Center has twice the number of minifigures found in the ATV Transport, but neither set feels like it has too few or to many minifigures. The ATV Transport has two ATVs to race, and two minifigures to drive them. The Mobile Command Center, on the other hand, has plenty of work for the two police officers and their dog, especially because one criminal is breaking the other one out. A good rule of thumb for a proposal is: Don't go more than 1 minifigure over a ratio of 1 minifigure for every expected $/€10 of set cost.

    Also, please don't do what the Dark Bucket did. Minifigures are one of the most expensive components in a system set, and their cost has to be offset with cheaper parts. The dark bucket was completely unfeasible, since it consisted solely of minifigures.

The next major factor to address is the subject material of the set/proposal, particularly if the set is licensed. Characters who are essential to a vehicle or other build's appearances in the licensed property are almost guaranteed to be included. Take, for example the Ghostbusters Ideas set.

There was zero chance of set featuring the Ecto-1 being released with the approval of the license holder that did not contain all four Ghostbusters. It's their car! Not Egon spengler's car, not Bill Murray's ambulance, it's the Ghostbusters Ecto-1!

To look at this from another angle, let's use two of Lego's most popular licensed themes: Star Wars and Superheroes (DC and Marvel). The Star Wars theme is very focused on the vehicles as the main selling point for a set, while superheroes is almost entirely focused on the characters represented in the minifigures. For example let's look at two sets of the same approximate part count from 2016.

Both of these sets have around 200 pieces (215 and 179 respectively) but Obi-Wan's Interceptor only contain one regular minifigure and a droid (Which is slightly cheaper to produce) Those two are obviously the right minifigures for the set, but the focus is on the ship. The Hazard heist on the other hand has three regular minifigures, all of which appear in the scene from Civil War upon which this set is based. The truck is nothing fancy, and the main draw of the set is the exclusive falcon and crossbones figures. This 3 minifigures in a 200 piece is a hallmark of the superheroes theme since it's revival in 2012.

Lego Ideas typically requires a strong build to go along with the minifigures (if there are any) in order to be successful in the gathering support phase. If the project's build is essential to a certain character, like the Millennium Falcon is to Han Solo, or the Batmobile is to Batman, then those characters are going to be included.

The final factor to take into consideration is the complexity of producing each minifigure. That is, the number of new colored parts and new prints required for the set. For example, let's look at the Exo-Suit, which contains two brand new minifigures.

The set contains a grand total of five printed parts: 2 heads, 2 torsos, and one printed inverted tile on the underside. The heads were already in production, with Pete's head coming from Ninjago's Zane, and Yve's head being from City. The inverted tile was also reused, previously having appeared in Legends of Chima. This leaves the minifigure torso as the only new print in the set. (Mark Stafford specifies all 5 of the new color elements in this blog post) The torso features only the classic space logo, keeping the load relatively light for Lego's graphic designers. This is in stark contrast to something like The Big Bang Theory where the graphic designers had to translate 7 characters and a large number of accessories to Lego form and style. If the two minifigures proposed for the Exo-Suit had been hyper-detailed, then the project may have faced some difficulties due to the smaller scale of Ideas sets at the time. Lego Ideas sets try to use only prints, so to many details on too many minifigures can make production prohibitively expensive.

These three factors are important to take into consideration when designing the minfigure component of a Lego Ideas Project. Keep these factors in mind when designing your project, and you might increase your chances of success!