Actually a pretty cool set, a landing craft made out of useful castle bricks, some cool flags, extra weapons and a very clever use of pieces to form a lantern.

somebody better stop that red knight from jumping off the boat!

That lantern build has shown up in a few places. I always adore it!

An interesting little fact about this set: check the instructions and you'll notice that instead of the parts list being at the end, it's on the second page, before the build even begins! Interesting indeed...

The Normans storming Normandy. :P

A floating castle is certainly a novel idea, though I question its buoyancy.

I love the colours of this wave of knights kingdom! Alternate builds make this set even better

@Lego_mini_fan said:
"somebody better stop that red knight from jumping off the boat!"
What about the green dude? He's looking to go overboard, too!

Today's random part of the day is in this set. First time since starting the RPOTD.

Those flags make terrible sails. And I don't see any oars. Rascus and Santis are going to have some issues sailing this "boat".

Has some useful black parts on the bottom for making your badass Blacktron ship. All that grey is better suited for other, less interesting themes.

@Lego_mini_fan:
Factoring for the ground speed of a fully armored knight vs the trajectory of a...whatever that is, I’m pretty sure he’s about to get conked on the back of the head in an early case of “friendly fire”.

@Mr__Thrawn:
Never heard of the engineering challenge of making concrete canoes and racing them against each other?

It is both an offensive vessel and a goods transport. Way to diversify your fleet, O king.

A rare modern war LEGO set based off of the June 6th invasion of Normand—oh wait. Never mind, it’s a castle set.

Saving Private Rascus

A cool set and nice to see different types of builds in a medieval setting.

Funny how much it resembles a Higgins boat, including the colour scheme. Technically this should have been brown for wood.

Some NPU and a very interesting catapult design too!

"It's one of 30 Castle sets produced that year" booyeah

Woah, what is this? WW2?

The closest LEGO ever came to a D-Day set I guess. Quite a cool little set actually imho.

Companion set of 8802. The two were sold together from Shop at Home at "Attack from the Sea" and I believe they were available as a value pack in stores.

There's some similarity to what they did the previous year with 8799 and 8800.

@AustinPowers said:
"The closest LEGO ever came to a D-Day set I guess. Quite a cool little set actually imho. "

"Random Set of the D-day"

@ComfySofa:
If you’ve ever seen what the US Vietnam War Memorial looks like, it’s a long stretch of polished black granite with all the names of US troops who died in the war etched into it in order that they were confirmed killed. There’s a tapered section on each end, and a long section in the middle where the top and bottom edges run parallel. My dad served as a USAF mechanic in Anchorage, working on the planes that would carry fresh troops over to fight, and return with coffins stacked like lumber. If you exclude the tapered sections, he said everyone on that wall returned through his airbase during the short time he was stationed there. His brother was in-country during that time, so there was the added stress of never knowing if one of those planes would bring his body back (fortunately, he flew back commercial through the civilian airport when he was discharged, and my dad actually got to meet him coming off the plane). And as family Vietnam War tales go, that’s pretty tame. So, yeah, most people I know wouldn't joke about that.

Ooh, no-one else got in before me with the Lore™? Here we go, then!

In the fantasy Kingdom of Morcia, the wise but aged King Mathias vanished shortly before he could announce that he had decided to postpone his retirement for several years. Royal advisor Vladek claimed to be doing everything in his power to find the missing king; but in reality, Vladek was the Dark Knight, responsible for Mathias' disappearance in the first place. After months of reporting no success in the search, Vladek announced a grand tournament to decide who would be the new king - a tournament that he planned to rig with the help of the powerful, magical Book of Morcia.

Four knights - the above-mentioned jelly beans - broke into Vladek's dungeons and rescued Mathias. The old king warned them that they couldn't hope to resist Vladek in their own strength while he was so empowered by the Book - their only home was to journey deep into the desolate moorlands to find the equally magical Heart of the Shield of Ages, the only thing capable of empowering a user to fight Vladek on equal footing. The four knights braved many perils to find the Heart of the Shield and returned it just as the rigged tournament was drawing to a close. Jayko the Swift (blue knight, hawk emblem, rookie of the bunch) stepped up as Vladek's last challenger and used the power of the Heart to beat him. Jayko then returned the crown to Mathias, and Vladek was locked away.

However, Vladek didn't remain there for long. Escaping mysteriously one night, leaving only his old helmet behind, he established his new Dark Fortress in the neighbouring Lost Kingdom of Ankoria, from which he commanded an army of elite Shadow Knights and intended to conquer Morcia by force. King Mathias determined that his kingdom's only hope was a pre-emptive strike; and he dispatched the hero knights ahead of his army to infiltrate the Dark Fortress and lower its defences in preparation for his attack, equipping them with more powerful armour that enhanced their natural skills still further.

Over the course of this journey, Danju the Wise (purple, wolf emblem, group mentor) was captured by Vladek's forces. While Jayko detoured from the mission to rescue him, the remaining two knights sailed the Dark Fortress' moat undetected, brute-forced their way into the fortress, and barely managed to lower the drawbridge in time for the King's attack. As the battle raged, Jayko returned from his rescue mission, defeated Vladek again by destroying his giant Vlad-Mask (his new object of unspecified magical power), and by way of reward for his efforts was crowned Mathias' successor.

This set... was not actually canon. Much like the 8799 / 8800 pairing that Phi13 mentioned, these sets were a retailer exclusive (to Woolworths in the UK; not sure about overseas) that depicted a scene that simply didn't fit into the main story's narrative. However, this one comes much closer to a canon scene that its predecessor; it's no great stretch to imagine that this could be the boat that Santis and Rascus used to cross the moat to the Dark Fortress - it's companion set, in fact, is even called Dark Fortress Landing so, between that and the minifigure selection here, seems intended to invoke that scene - in their mission to lower its drawbridge for the attacking forces.

Though flying giant banners proclaiming your opposing allegiance and flinging rocks ahead of you is, perhaps, not the most subtle was of approaching a stealthy infiltration...

The minifigures included are the final two of the hero knights: Santis the Strong (red, bear emblem) was a gruff, no-nonsense fighter; while Rascue the Joker (green, monkey emblem) was a prankster who took nothing seriously. The two were juxtaposed briefly in one online comic in the first year, and another brief - and presumably non-canon, due to not being referenced anywhere else - comic in Lego Magazine; but while the second year's story, here, paired them up for much of the adventure, it really didn't take advantage of the potential to bounce the characters opposing personalities off one another. The first year's online comics had included several little character-building moments, and would certainly have done something with this; but by the second year, the comics had lost most of their energy and seemed to eschew characterisation in favour of getting the story out in as few words as possible.