Numbered bags in sets- yay or nay?

[Lego Otaku]

A few years ago, LEGO introduced an ez-start system by breaking down large set into sections with numbered bags. Supposedly it helps build the set faster by reducing the number of pieces you need to sort through from over a thousand to under a hundred. It may be fine for kids but what about us AFOL?

Do you:

eschew them and mix all parts? The fun is in finding the part, not the actual building

ignore the numbers and sort pieces by either color, size, and/or type

follow the numbers as directed by LEGO manual

Personally I like the old way where all the pieces are not pre-sorted because that's part of the fun. But I do sort by sizes (big pieces one side, etc), then by type (plates, bricks, etc) for really large sets.

[TheRedGuy]

I sort them by bags because it reduces time. And I find it amusing that someone actually enjoys looking for pieces. (No offence)

[-zenn]

well, I'm one of them who enjoys looking for pieces... Anyway, to me searching for parts is part of the whole building process. I don't care about numbered bags and how it may reduce time, I'm not on a time trail or anything...

But I do understand why TLG has numbered bags; it's like Ikea; making it easy for big and complex builds. Especially ones that contain multipable hard to keep apart steps.

[mrklaw]

There is 'looking for pieces' and then there is 'aaargh where is that damn 1x1 round piece!?'

In playsets with modular designs like the police stations etc, which are aimed at a fairly young audience, numbered bags makes sense to focus building on one area at a time

In a simple creator set I don't think you need numbered bags, but as the piece count goes up, the amount of time searching vs building also goes up. By the time you get to things like e super star destroyer or death star, I think numbering makes sense.

I built the Imperial shuttle recently and that was painful. I don't have a huge amount of dedicated build space - I use the dining table in the evening. That had me open nearly all of the 20+ bags within a few pages. There was some logic to the sorting, but that still takes up a lot of space and just gets unwieldy.

So I think it has it's place. And if you don't like it, nothing stopping you from putting everything into a bucket and doing it that way.

[Lyichir]

I typically do them in the order the bags specify. A neat side effect of this is that if I do take sets apart for MOCing (as I would often do while up at college), the later reassembly of these sets takes the form of a more "advanced" build that lessens the tedium of building a set for the second time.

[Mr_Malfoy]

For smaller sets, I say nay (smaller sets don't have enough pieces for that).

For bigger sets, I say yay (Larger sets with lots and lots of pieces need that, or it would be complete disarray when trying to build a set, especially a modular building or Star Wars USC set).

[Brickdoctor]

Depends on the circumstances. If I'm reviewing a set, I take parts photos by numbers, and the numbers make it a lot easier to take photos of groups of parts that make sense. (and make it a lot easier to build the set after I've poured all the parts everywhere and picked through them doing the parts pics)

There are some sets with multiple confusing colors (Dark Green, Dark Brown, Dark Bley, and Black in the instructions for 10194 come to mind) when I do like having the numbered bags to make things a little less confusing. Otherwise, I prefer the challenge of non-numbered bags.

[Ralph_S]

I don't like them. I understand the reason for having them and it does make building the set easier. However, I generally don't build sets. I pretty part them out straight out of the box. For doing that, it's much nicer to know that, say, all of the 1x1 red plates are in just one bag (albeit mixed in with other stuff) rather than having several different bags with completely different contents that can still have 1x1 red plates in them because they're used in multiple sub models.

[TheLegoDr]

When I first got back into Lego in fall of 2010, I had a few sets with the numbered bags and I was not a fan at all. I felt it took away from the "hunt" as others have put it which is a great memory I have from my youth. The more Lego I've purchased since then, the more I like the numbered bags. It makes the builds more streamlined and smooth. I can finish a build a lot quicker with using up a lot less space as before. I don't have a huge space to build things since my toddler wants to get into everything all the time, so buy building a bag at a time, it helps tremendously on time and space. I recently built some large set and it took forever for me to build it without the numbered bags.

[Sir_Basil_Ashton]

Yay on numbered bags. It reduces time searching for pieces and helps those with limited space. And if you like to search for pieces, just dump all the bags together into one big pile. It's a win-win depending on your situation.

[Legoman]

Personally I'm not a fan of the numbered bags.. I just open them all, separate them very roughly into sizes/types and start the building. Or if it's a small set (<500pcs) then I won't even sort at all

[LEGOman273]

I like them. They save time, space, and sanity.

[Clone OPatra]

I do find builds nowadays to be too easy. Not just the numbered bags, but also instructions that have piece callouts and only have you add about one or two pieces per step; it's like having your hand held, and I don't think kids or anybody else needs that. I build plenty of large sets when I was a kid with all of the part dumped out, and it wasn't too much of a problem.

In some cases, numbered bags make sense. When a set has very distinct different parts, then it's fine to have each one in its own bag, or set of bags with the same number. A recent-ish sets that fits this model is the Endor Base, which has a lot of distinct components and it's very helpful to have the entire AT-ST with its own number, etc. Any set smaller than 800ish pieces, though, is just ridiculous for numbered bags. Since a big set will take a long time to build anyway, the numbers do cut down on a little frustration, but with anything smaller numbered bags make the build too quick and easy.

I have to say that with really large sets, numbered bags would be helpful. The MMV was supremely frustrating to build, with no numbers and pieces all over the place. Sure, I got it done, but numbered bags in that case are helpful. That's just a ton of pieces to look through.

[brickmack]

I don't care all that much, I usually open by bag since I have limited building space though. I find it odd however that its the small sets with numbered bags. The Tower Bridge didn't have any, so the majority of the 5 or so days I spent on it was looking for parts. (it was kinda cool seeing that many parts in a pile though)

[Sid Sidious]

I mix everything together just to spite the bags. I've considered adding other pieces to the pile, but decided against it because I wanted to see what the extra pieces were.

[LEGO Guy Bri]

When it comes to sets under 500 pieces, I am indifferent to numbered bags. Larger sets, I prefer numbered bags. My dive into modulars made that apparent. At first I thought the numbered bags where making it too easy until I built my first modular, the GG. I spent so much time searching for parts, I could only stand about an hour or less of building per day over three days

[dr_spock]

I like them for quicker builds as time seems to be a premium in adult family life.

[Andy D]

For sets under about 800 pieces, I don't care if the bags are numbered or not.

For Modulars I like the numbered bags to separate the levels as sorting 2000 plus parts is difficult in my building space.

On the Emerald Night, it was nice to know what parts were for each car.

So for me, it depends on the size.

Andy D

[Vindicare]

I like the numbered bags. My building area isn't that big. It makes it a lot easier to spread out. I dont care much fir the hunt[of pieces]. With Modulars, it doesn't really help though. Take 10224 Town Hall, the bags were numbered, sure(1 & 2), but there was 12+ bags for each?! Why didn't they make it into 3 or 4 sections...

Edited April 20, 2012 by Legocrazy81

[MacK]

I like the numbered bags. I don't use the damned things, but they usually come with more spare parts

[tormentalous]

I like numbered bags. They speed up build time which isn't always a bad thing. I don't have patience to dig through hundreds of bricks to find that one tiny stud piece

[Shadows]

They're fine. If you like them, use them. If you don't like them, dump everything together. Seems fairly simple to me.

[tedbeard]

I love them. It was especially nice when I got Public Transport Station (8404) and could build whatever vehicle/section I wanted and save the other sections for different days as I had limited building time and space available at the time.

[Donut]

I like the numbered bags, you don't have to worry about losing pieces if you can't build the set in one sitting. It looks to be the general consensus. I however wish the instruction manual came together as 1 book.

Edited April 20, 2012 by Donut

[mrklaw]

I don't care all that much, I usually open by bag since I have limited building space though. I find it odd however that its the small sets with numbered bags. The Tower Bridge didn't have any, so the majority of the 5 or so days I spent on it was looking for parts. (it was kinda cool seeing that many parts in a pile though)

Uh-oh, I have that one ready to go but haven't opened it yet :/

I guess when there are so many of a similar part, then sorting bags by part type/colour makes sense too, so hopefully Tower Bridge won't be too bad. Imperial Shuttle got like that after a while - you learn what pieces are in which bags so it isn't a random search. Still takes up lots of space though