Random set of the day: Training Set
Posted by Huwbot,
Today's random set is 9558 Training Set, released during 2012. It's one of 48 Ninjago sets produced that year. It contains 219 pieces and 1 minifig, and its retail price was US$19.99/£14.99.
It's owned by 2,830 Brickset members. If you want to add it to your collection you should find it for sale at BrickLink, where new ones sell for around $60.00, or eBay.
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13 comments on this article
snek
Such a good assortment of weapons.
Miss the old spinners. The Legacy 2019 ones were also great because they were spiritual successors to the OGs and every ninja got one. Why do they change them every year and only give them to like 3 ninja?
@LegoMKB said:
"Miss the old spinners. The Legacy 2019 ones were also great because they were spiritual successors to the OGs and every ninja got one. Why do they change them every year and only give them to like 3 ninja?"
The only thing I miss about the spinners was that they put a hard cap on how much it cost to acquire a minifig. It didn’t matter if that minifig came in a $300 set and someone wanted to charge $50 for it, as long as you could walk into a store and buy a spinner with the exact same minifig for $10. And that right there should answer your question.
Those spinners were great. I have the kendo zane one (9563), but lost all the cards
This was an interesting one. Unlike the 2011 sets the 2012 sets moved away from builds that interact with the spinners, probably because the spinners themselves were now far more customizable. The show was also no longer a pilot, so it had plenty more things to draw from.
But this, the 9579 starter set and 9456 battle arena (which I had completely forgotten about) still did. This one has the snake statue. Depending on which side the tail is knocked, it will lift either panel next to it. The sides are built in ninja and serpentine style, so out of the panels a weapon falls for either faction. Quite an unusual build.
The box for this set was unusual too. It was a plastic shell with paper backing like the spinners, but wider and with a box-like protrusion for the parts for the build. You can see it in the images on the set's page.
All in all an unusual set that stood out in this absolutely stacked year of the theme.
@LegoMKB said:
"Miss the old spinners. The Legacy 2019 ones were also great because they were spiritual successors to the OGs and every ninja got one. Why do they change them every year and only give them to like 3 ninja?"
Who knows? It’s all the more aggravating because it creates, or used to create, incomplete sets of Ninja variants.
Some of the pieces used give me M-Tron vibes...
"Man, people love our trans neon colours. I'm so glad we introduced those colours, they're just bangers."
"They are! They're so striking! So much *oomph*, they're so in-your-face! We should add them to all of our action-themes, they're great."
"Yeah! And you know what else we should do?"
"No, what?"
"REMOVE THEM FROM THE COLOUR-PALETTE FOREVER AND REPLACE THEM WITH WATERED DOWN VERSIONS!"
"Wait, what?"
@AustinPowers said:
"Some of the pieces used give me M-Tron vibes... "
@Crux said:""Man, people love our trans neon colours. I'm so glad we introduced those colours, they're just bangers."
"They are! They're so striking! So much *oomph*, they're so in-your-face! We should add them to all of our action-themes, they're great."
"Yeah! And you know what else we should do?"
"No, what?"
"REMOVE THEM FROM THE COLOUR-PALETTE FOREVER AND REPLACE THEM WITH WATERED DOWN VERSIONS!""
I love that these posts were in succession.
I was pretty much exactly the right age for the start of Ninjago, I had friends who were into it too, and even still I don't think I had a spinner battle more than once or twice, or ever used them in a build somehow. Mostly, they (and the Chima bikes) just jacked up the price of a relatively cheap source of minifigures. It makes me wonder why I got *any* of them, instead of more CMFs.
This set is pretty lame without another spinner. No one wants to train with Kai...
@Norikins said:
"This set is pretty lame without another spinner. No one wants to train with Kai..."
To be fair, Kai can be a bit of a jerk. Especially in the era this set is from.