darkSpyro

I've just realised that the expansion packs are based on the following elements: earth (Pirates), undead (crypt), fire (Dragon Peak) and water (Empire of Ice).

My first world problem was that I had this fantastic plan which will now no longer bear fruit. I am getting 5 tower cases (2 delivered so far, 3 to go) and had intended to dedicate 4 of them to the 8 elements (i.e. 2 elements per case) and the final case for the Legendary/Dark/etc variants.

Hence, the intention was to store the portal in the odd, fifth case and the expansion items in the appropriate element case.

I really wanted the two elements in each case to complement:

Fire <-> Water
Earth <-> Air
Tech <-> Magic
Life <-> Undead

The trouble is that this is not possible given the expansion element selection. Sure, Life and Undead can co-exist in a case (as can Earth to Air) but I now have to arbitrarily choose a "complementary" element for the others as fire and water both have expansions.

What makes more sense?

Fire <-> Tech and Water <-> Magic
or
Fire <-> Magic and Water <-> Tech

I think I am vying more towards the latter but what do the populace think?

i would go with the latter...

Maybe there will be enough room to store the expansion items in the fifth case? That's what I would do because they would be crowding the other character if you put them in with there respecting elements. I actually store all of my characters in a small plastic Tupperware container and keep my magic items and portal separately.

Not forgetting that I need room in the 5th case for the Legendaries and Dark Spyro. Also the magic items may go in there, depending on space?

The intention is to put each expansion item in the portal space of the case. I don't think there would be room in a case for all 4 expansion items?

^ Oh your right, I'm not sure then. Maybe they will have to be kept in a separate container all together, such as a Tupperware container or in a cabinet on your T.V. stand (if you have one). That's kind of a shame though...

I would like to have storage that ensures that the figurines (including expansion thingies) do not rub against each other to avoid paint removal, chipping, etc.

I could just put them in the tv cabinet but really want them to be transportable in a case and all together.

you could use a shoe box to store your figures

As I mentioned before, I don't want them rubbing against each other or having parts get caught together as some of them have thin appendages which may get broken with kids rushing to grab them.

You can make separate compartments for them out of cardboard in a large Tupperware or shoe box container. Tissue paper or cotton can also be placed in between the pieces but I'm not sure if you'll like the looks of that. If you need help making dividers out of cardboard, I might be able to help but I'm not the best at describing things and it's better if you experiment with different ideas.

Water is believed to be magical by the Chinese. Fire is heavily associated with industry (Like "the fires of industry) and technology, as a power source.

Fire <-> Tech
Water <-> Magic

Makes sense.

^ Fire is also associated by the Japanese as healing and purifying, it might be the same for the Chinese or the rest of Asia but I'm not sure.

you could use a wooden box and put in some wooden dividers to make a square space for each one of you skylanders.

I was originally trying to find some kind of case with foam in it that people use for either Games Workshop type of gaming or for expensive power tools, etc.

The trouble is that cases large enough to store a large number of figs were super expensive.

^ yeah that's what I also had in mind with my last post but I think plastic is a better idea than wood unless it's polished because wood can scrape the figures. You could also put something inside to cushion the perimeter to protect them even better like felt.

The last time I wanted something sort of like this was for the limited set of figurines for a board game called Talisman. I ended up getting a couple of pistol cases as they have the rippled foam inside.

Alright, put figurines in the cases on the weekend, getting ready for Christmas.

More things I noticed:

1/. The height allocated for the bottom row is a fair amount more then the height allocated for the second row. This means that certain fig's simply won't fit on the second row, meaning that my OCD plan to put chars in element and then alphabetical order is not feasible. Miserable b#$$%$^s - why didn't they simply make the case a bit taller to allow for any char on any row? How much money did they save in stooging us that little bit of extra plastic?

2/. They only provide 8 stickers for the char spots, not all 32 meaning that they are not worth putting on for most chars, unless you wish to put, say, a Drill Sargeant on a Spyro sticker.

^ That sucks...What a bummer, it seemed like a very good idea too. Those cases sound very poorly designed or they weren't thinking.

I think that they simply took the cheapest path to save, probably, $1-2 of manufacturing effort, tops.