LEGO Dungeons & Dragons minifigures, before and after

05/09/202405/09/2024 Chris Wharfe 246 Views 0 Comments

71047 Dungeons & Dragons delivers official LEGO versions of classic D&D characters – but tabletop gamers have been building their own customs for years. Let’s see how they compare…

LEGO and Dungeons & Dragons are such natural bedfellows that it’s no surprise there’s an entire community devoted to colliding the two worlds. The legodnd subreddit was around long before the LEGO Group conjured up the notion of official sets, and dedicated tabletop roleplaying enthusiasts have spent years crafting their own LEGO Dungeons & Dragons minifigures.

And given they were working from a limited selection of official elements, some of those customs are genuinely impressive – but how do they stack up next to the LEGO Group’s takes on the same classes, races and named characters, and the Collectible Minifigures’ budget for new prints and parts? In short: better than you might expect. Dive into just a few examples below.

Githyanki

The LEGO Group’s Gith is paired with the warlock class, but redditor ASortaOkayBuilder gave their Githyanki an Eldritch Knight twist using a Black Falcon knight’s legs and wizard’s torso. The real point of comparison here though is in the head and hairpiece: the former comes from a rare LEGO Star Wars: The Old Republic minifigure (and is an effective way to include the Gith’s face markings), while the wig is borrowed wholesale from a Lord of the Rings orc. It makes for a convincing aesthetic that leans towards the ‘green’ of the Gith’s greenish-yellow skin.

By contrast, the official LEGO version swings for classic minifigure yellow at the behest of Wizards of the Coast (they picked it from a bunch of different suggestions from the LEGO designers). The 71047 Dungeons & Dragons minifigure also benefits from a hairpiece introduced in 21348 Dungeons & Dragons: Red Dragon’s Tale, here recoloured yellow to match the headpiece. It’s a different take for sure, but it’s tricky to say one is necessarily better than the other.

Tiefling

Dungeons & Dragons customisers have had to get pretty creative with their parts usage until now, and one fine example is this now-three-year-old Tiefling from reddit user Nunyabiz8107. The horned headpiece comes from a demon minifigure in 80015 Monkie Kid’s Cloud Roadster, and does a great job of selling the idea of a LEGO Tiefling. This particular minifigure is a paladin.

71047 Dungeons & Dragons‘ Tiefling, meanwhile, is a sorcerer – a mystical class that inspired its very different colour scheme of purple and orange, according to the designers. But the key part here is the new headpiece with horns, which – as a dedicated and specifically-designed element – obviously feels more fitting for a Tiefling. The short hair also gives it more versatility in combination with shoulder accessories from across this series.

Szass Tam

This early take on the Red Wizard of Thay (or Szass Tam) by tiagocf on the legodnd subreddit comes pretty close in form to the official LEGO minifigure, combining red robes and a cape with a pale head. It’s five years old at this point too, so the designer had to do the best they could with an even more limited selection of parts, and on the whole it’s a credible attempt at an iconic D&D character.

It doesn’t feel unfair to say though that the official LEGO version is just a cut above, from the bare rib cage on his torso to the high-collared dark red cape and frowning, red-eyed face print. It’s one of the simpler minifigures in 71047 Dungeons & Dragons, including no new moulded elements – its printed trans-red skull accessory is just a regular minifigure head – but like the custom version here, simplicity is key.

Strahd von Zarovich

ASortaOkayBuilder is back again here with two different takes on Strahd von Zarovich, and thanks to the wealth of vampiric LEGO elements released over the years, both are arguably on a par with the official LEGO minifigure. They borrow the vampire head from the Scooby-Doo range (so there’s a goofy old man face on the other side, ripe for adventurers to reveal the villain’s true identity), while the legs and torso elements are pulled from Hobbit and Lord of the Rings sets.

The official Strahd minifigure is almost a little tamer by comparison, but also far more colourful, incorporating reds, blues, browns and silver across his outfit. His neck furs are printed to accommodate the villain’s longer hair – a problem the custom builder encountered, hence the two versions – while his cape features no jagged edges. His skin is also light grey rather than white. All told, it adds up to a very different Strahd, but it’s tough to say one is more successful than the other.

Mindflayer and Intellect Devourer

Given the very specific elements used for the official LEGO Mindflayer and Intellect Devourer, you’d be forgiven for thinking they’d be impossible to pull off from pre-existing pieces. But legodnd user Kevin_Yuu managed it nearly two years ago with some shrewd piece usage, plucking the Mindflayer’s head from a previous Collectible Minifigures alien character and the Intellect Devourer from 2013’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles set 79100 Kraang Lab Escape. They’re both intelligent choices that went down well with the D&D community in 2023.

Pointing out how much more appropriate the new LEGO pieces are feels a little redundant given the designers had the scope to freely create new elements for 71047 Dungeons & Dragons, but it’s still neat to see how the official take on this character and his companion compares to that early custom effort. And that’s arguably true for all the minifigures we’ve featured here: none are necessarily better or worse; they’re just different.

The good news is that 71047 Dungeons & Dragons has unlocked this fantasy tabletop universe for even those not inclined to piece together custom characters, and offers a shortcut to some of the very best LEGO D&D minifigures around – while not forgetting about customisation, because this is a series built around the concept of combining parts from its various heroes and villains.

Head here to check out all the different combos possible with 71047 Dungeons & Dragons, and don’t forget to download Brick Search before you go out hunting for your own blind-boxed characters. The app’s minifigure scanner can help you find exactly the ones you’re after by revealing the contents of each of the mystery boxes. It’s available to download on iOS and Android now.

Featured image (left): ASortaOkayBuilder

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Chris Wharfe

I like to think of myself as a journalist first, LEGO fan second, but we all know that’s not really the case. Journalism does run through my veins, though, like some kind of weird literary blood – the sort that will no doubt one day lead to a stress-induced heart malfunction. It’s like smoking, only worse. Thankfully, I get to write about LEGO until then.