@MCLegoboy said:
"Does this set count for the theme Huwbot's been on? There's a vehicle with wheels in it."

There's still an awful lot of this that feels like "more trap". An array of tall towers, that siege engine, the thing being shot out of the siege engine...though maybe I'm just hyper paranoid from RPotD.

A wholesome, happy, little castle. Awesome! How could this one get us into trouble?

Hmm. I have that baseplate.

I reckon there’s a new castle coming soon.

I always liked the look of this one. But at the same time it's very juniorized. Yes, as in actually from the era where that was a rampant design philosophy.
I'd say I'd want to get it one day... but it's so big, I doubt I'll ever have the room. An at this point we also have the dreaded castle atermarket inflation... so I'll just stay here to admire the image. But man, what a stunnung image.

Old me wouldn't meddle with the original design, but my new found love for Lego allows me to change and improve the sets anyway I like it. I don't have this set but I would load it up with goodies everywhere. There is so much free space in this set.

Those minifigs were well ahead of their time! Leg printing on most of them

Never felt any particular urge to grab this one the same way I’ve been steadily scooping up other Castle sets. I think it’s the lack of modularity; it’d be hard actually connected this with anything with some fairly hefty rebuilding, whereas lot of the others are designed to snap together with other sets simply with pins

Does anyone know, why Lego felt the urge to give this set two different Set numbers between NA and EU, despite the two being completely identical otherwise?

I once bought it and had plans to use the cloth as a sail for a castle ship, like most of my plan that still has to happen^^
First castle that contained the "pirate coins"
Some other nice parts but not a great castle.

@legodachi said:
"If you're "grown up"…"

We prefer the term “adult”, which doesn’t imply any level of maturity.

"…with a bit of spare money lying around (and you are familiar with Bricklink) and you DON'T improve your standard Lego models, then, I'm afraid, you have, sadly, lost your childhood "

And if you’re an adult with a bit more spare money lying around (or a willingness to subsist entirely on dehydrated ramen packets), you’re not so concerned about tweaking official sets when you can just design your own MOCs. I think my TRON: Legacy lightcycles are maybe 50% stock at this point, and my Shellraiser uses a handful of parts from the official set.

One of the worst lego castles

The raised baseplate!

The decline of the castle theme. So sad.

My favourite set as a kid! I even made a microscale version it for a competition here on brickset a few years ago https://www.flickr.com/photos/legomanijak/39462667185/in/album-72157693607822085/

King Leo: "They said 'You're mad to build a castle in the swamp'..."
Prince Whoever: "So you didn't."
K.L.: "So I DIDN"T!!!...But someday this 'ill be yours, then your childeren, then their childeren...and You and they will build it bigger; the mountain..."
P.W.: "Hill..."
K.L.: "MOUNTAIN TOO!!!"
and hence 10305: Lion Knights' Castle would/will be born...:D

Amazon: Leo’s Room
RSOD: King Leo’s Castle

I liked the minifigure designs of KK1 a lot, as my first 'traditional' knights - the only Castle subtheme I'd encountered before then being Ninja, the rest were before my Lego interest - and. as mentioned above, were definitely some fine examples of leg printing. And the set does have an impressive presence at first, I like the overall shaping of it: and even if the build is very simplistic, it still pokes at the nostalgic part of me.

The minifigures, if anyone wanted the lore™ on them, are as follows. From left to right in the picture:

- Gilbert the Bad, the guy manning the canon. One of Cedric's robbers and the inventive genius who built all of their siege machines. Has an eyepatch, although the story behind his apparent missing eye has never been explained.

- Princess Storm, the lady knight charging Gilbert. Daughter of the king and queen (naturally), she has gone against their wishes to learn how to fight and be a knight in her own right, which usually involves sneaking out of her window to train when her parents think she's working on weaving a tapestry. She apparently has an older brother who has never been seen in person due to being away fighting in the crusades during the whole Knights' Kingdom story.

- John of Mayne, the guy on the drawbridge. Apprentice to Richard and childhood friend of Princess Storm, on whom he has a crush. Misidentified as Richard in Lego World Club magazine.

- King Leo, the guy on the horse. Described as pretty much your average good king, honestly. My personal headcanon is that he's an older version of the king of the Royal Knights, due to sharing the same lion emblem, same crown, similar moustaches... and the fact that he has a red-haired daughter implies that he himself must have been red-haired in his youth too, since his wife is a brunette and Storm's hair colour had to come from somewhere. May not be any truth to the idea, but I quite like it.

- Queen Leonora, the lady on the tower overlooking the gate. A kindly ruler who's more interested in hosting bazaars and caring for her subjects than in all this battle nonsense. Judging by this picture, may be a bird trainer too, like 71037-5, but that skill was never mentioned in canon to my knowledge.

- Richard the Strong, the guy rushing to defend the wall on the right. A legendarily strong knight, and mentor to John of Mayne. Misidentified as John in Lego World Club magazine.

- Benjamin Bones, the skeleton. Lurks around the tower and scares intruders. Generally believed to be a myth.

- Cedric the Bull, leader of the Bulls band of robbers. Youngest of thirteen princes of a distant kingdom (...oh hey, it's Prince Hans from Frozen...?), he was deprived of any part of the land when his father split the kingdom between his sons. Bitter and resentful, he travelled far away in search of a kingdom to claim for his own, and settled on trying to steal Leo's. His hatred is rumoured to give him enough strength to chop wood with his bare hands.

@Atuin said:
"Does anyone know, why Lego felt the urge to give this set two different Set numbers between NA and EU, despite the two being completely identical otherwise?"

I feel like I recall reading somewhere that one version of the set came with... I think it was a printed play mat or something? While the other version didn't... kinda like 6099 with its plastic cave, or the first wave KK2 figures with their game cards, I think?

I can't place what the source for that was, though. I can't find it in any of the places I'd normally go for Lego facts online, so all I can think is that it may have been mentioned in the notes for this set in https://brickset.com/sets/ISBN9783935976527-1. I sold the book a while ago though (I find Brickset a far more practical version of the same resource!), so I can't check that.

...either that or I just imagined it. Even though I do think I read it somewhere, I can't rule out that possibility either xD;

It's not quite the building experience of the castles before it and maybe a touch more "Disney" than I'd like, but KK1 always has a place in my heart--and the minifigs were spectacular, possibly the best LEGO has done.

I don't have this castle, though my younger brother did, and that lack lead me to want and get 10176, which is both better and worse than this set as a build--unlike than the figs, which are straight-up worse.

Also, you can say the brown one is John of Maine and the red-armed one is Richard the Strong--but you'd be wrong. That one LEGO Mania Magazine may have been backward to everything else, but it was MY introduction to them and thus the sacred text!