Tips to start building a Castle army?

[Lego David]

I want to start building a Fantasy Castle army (preferably a skeleton or troll army) but it seems rather hard to find sellers on Bricklink that sell mutiple skeletons/trolls at a reasonable price. 

From those people out there thay have exprerince with army building, what advice could you give on how to create a Castle army on a modest budget? From what I have seen so far, it seems like buying the individual parts to make the minifigures is the cheapest way to do so.

Edited December 18, 2020 by Lego David

[John Cromwell]

3 minutes ago, Lego David said:

I want to start building a Fantasy Castle army (preferably a skeleton

If you want skeletons, you were correct, it is cheaper to by the individual skeleton parts and assemble them. I recently bought 18 (I think) loose armed skeletons off of Bricklink by buying the arms and torsos from one seller, and the legs and heads from another, and it was much cheaper to buy the individual pieces.

[MAB]

Go back in time and buy them when they were cheap, or wait until the future when there are new sets and the minifigures are cheap again. Or pick and choose from current released or not too old figure parts. For example, the CMF series 15 frightening knight is not so expensive right now and quite a good army builder. Just replace the heads and maybe vary the helmets.

[LettuceBrick]

Patience is key. Shop around and live with having 1/2 or 3/4 skeletons for a while.

[zoth33]

The skeleton parts on bricks and pieces aren't that bad right now and the season 13 Ninjago sets have that nice black skeleton head.  

[yokozuna]

I been thinking about this too. When is a figure (or set) cheapest to buy on bricklink? 

Right after the release of a set? Or at the end of the cycle (when stores like Amazon and Lego.com sell the sets at discounted prices) or is it even cheaper a few months after that? 

[MAB]

It depends on the figure. They reach low prices often about half way through the retail shelf life, when the set has been available at a discount for a while, and many people have parted them out, and they will stay reasonably constant towards the end of the retail life. Once the sets retire the figs will either increase in value if popular or decrease if unpopular.  Like anything, it is all about supply and demand.

Edited December 20, 2020 by MAB

[Wardancer]

I don‘t have much to add, but One thing that worked for me a bit was buying from local private sellers. In Germany we have a subbranch of Ebay (Ebay Kleinanzeigen), which is more local and works without fees. If you combine that with reselling unwanted bits you can maybe make good deals. For example I wanted two green Dragons, so I bought two cheap Viking Ships and sold the figs and the ship. So I got the dragons almost for free. I wanted four green horse bardings, so I bought 4 castle sets from private sellers and resold them without the bardings. I wanted Smaug, so I bought the set and sold the Rest of the figs. Maybe you can find cheap sets with Skeletons and resell everything but the skeletons. This method takes time and it is risky though.