LEGO Star Wars 75225 Elite Praetorian Guard Battle Pack [Review]

Battle packs are known for being sets with simple builds and greater emphasis on the number of minifigures. The 75225 Elite Praetorian Guard Battle Pack comes with three Praetorian Guards, a First Order stormtrooper, and a plethora of weapons. You can’t really go wrong with battle packs if you’re out to build an army, but this Elite Praetorian Guard Battle Pack 109 piece set is more than meets the eye. Since minifigures are the primary attraction when it comes to battle packs, the emphasis of this review will be on them.

Packaging & instructions

Box artwork portrays the Elite Praetorian Guards in what appears to be a training room.  The set consists of two numberless bags and a set of instructions


To get a quick sense of parts, we divided the elements into two groups. Elements on the left show the parts used in the build, while the elements on the right showcase the minifigure parts and the elements their weapons are comprised of.

The Build

The first portion of the build consists of a raised platform with two rotating discs. Assembling the platform is extremely simple and should not take more than a minute or two.

Two sub-assemblies finish off the build, including a weapons rack on the left and a training droid wielding a blaster and lightsaber. Neither of these existed in the movies or official material, so we do make an assumption it is a behind-the-scenes look at the training exercises of elite guards.

The weapons rack is built to store each and every assembled weapon, even if its not explicitly shown on the box.

This set comes with four minifigures, including three Elite Praetorian Guards and a single First Order stormtrooper. Let’s take a closer look at the guards and how to tell them apart.

How to identify Elite Praetorian Guards

Visually, the guards look very similar, but a key way to distinguish them from one another is via their helmets. There isn’t any formal naming for these different variations, so let’s describe them based on their appearance. The first helmet is reminiscent of a Death Star gunner helmet, in that it is somewhat pointed. The next one is a fairly straight and standard-looking helmet piece. The final and most unique-looking headpiece is the helmet with a curved visor. This particular helmet is also easiest to identify in scenes from The Last Jedi.

Helmet Reference: Star Wars: The Last Jedi The Visual Dictionary

To date, LEGO has only released two of these three helmets. Yes, we’re missing one of them! The second helmet seen in the image above has yet to be produced. We will go into more detail on the included helmets later. For now, let’s take take a closer look at the minifigures and different types of weapons.

The Minifigures

This is not the first time Elite Pretorian Guards have been featured in a set. Two guards were issued with the set, Snoke’s Throne Room (75216). While they look similar to the minifigures in the set being reviewed, the fundamental difference is that the guards from Snoke’s Throne Room were issued with the lower body skirt instead of the standard legs found in this battle pack. We assume this was to enhance the set’s playability. While the skirt looks cool, it isn’t exactly conducive in creating fighting poses.

The Weapons

Let’s familiarize ourselves weapons used by the Elite Pretorian Guards. If you’re familiar with Star Wars: The Last Jedi, you might recall there were eight Elite Praetorian Guards in the throne room battle scene. The guards were split into four pairs with three identifiable types of helmets. Four different styles of weapons were used, one for each pair of guards. Let’s take a closer look at the various types of weapons.

Electro Bisento – The LEGO version consists of a 4L bar, two lightsaber hilts, and a machete

Bilari Electro-Chain Whip – This weapon is made up of a 5-link chain, red lightsaber hilt, and harpoon

Twin Vibro Arbir Blades – The blades are comprised of a lightsaber hilt, two claw elements, and two round 1×1 plates with Open stud.

Vibro Voulge – This fourth and final weapon consists of a 4L bar, two lightsaber hilts, and a weapon sword, blade with bar.

Having watched the movie and read Star Wars: The Last Jedi The Visual Dictionary, I’ve identified that guards wearing specific helmets wield specific weapons. Admittedly, it seems a little strange and confusing as to why there are only three helmets while their are four sets of weapons. The guards wearing helmets with curved visors were perhaps the most prominent in the movie, as they were the only ones to wield the Twin Vibro Abrir Blades. Below is a table derived from the helmet/weapon combinations found in official references.

Helmet Design
Weapon 1
Weapon 2
Curved
Twin Vibro Abrir Blades
N/A
Pointed
Vibro-Voulge
Bilari Electro Chain Whip
Straight
Electro Bisento
Bilari Electro Chain Whip

Right off the bat, we can see that the box visuals used for this set do not align with the combinations outlined above. Let’s set aside our knowledge of the film and assume that, during training, Elite Praetorian Guards train with all weapons regardless of class.

As mentioned earlier, LEGO has only released two of the three helmet designs so far. The pointed helmet was released in Snoke’s Throne Room, thus making the helmet with curved visor a design we’re seeing for the first time. In lieu of the skirt element, the guards in this set have regular legs with printed lines representing their robes.

Without the helmets, it’s hard hard to tell the difference between the guards. They share the same parts for torsos, legs, arms, and shoulder pads.

The reverse sides of the helmets are just as detailed as the front, with each helmet possessing unique detailing.

All three guards use red heads, which are void of any printed faces. The figures’ shoulder pads place some limitations on movement, such as with the arms and helmeted heads.

The First Order stormtrooper

The stormtrooper comes with the less popular stud shooter instead of a blaster, which were included with stormtroopers in this year’s Star Wars original trilogy sets.

The printing on the face, legs, and front & back sides of the torso are not new, having first appeared in First Order stormtrooper minifgures back in 2015.

While the helmet may look familiar at first, it is in fact ever so slightly different and has been a point of discussion since before the movie was released. For good or bad, it seems LEGO has made this very tiny detail incorporated into their prints. On the left are the First Order stormtroopers that have been issued since 2015, and on the right is the stormtrooper with the new helmet that comes in this set.
A side profile view makes the differences more pronounced. See if you can spot the differences below:

If you haven’t guessed it, the three key differences are:
1. The portion of the visor between the eyes is thinner.
2. In the mouthpiece area, the air vents have been thinned out with a more pointed look.
3. On the sides, the slanted stripes (Dymak Exhaust Filters) have been lowered.

Unless you take a closer look, the changes are minimal enough to avoid causing much distraction. However, this slight change might be a thorn in the side for folks who collect stormtroopers for army building. Sticklers for details are more likely to view the change as an eyesore.

Summary

At the end of the day, this is a battle pack filled with unique and desirable minifigures coupled with builds you probably won’t need or want. Disappointingly, this set does not complete the Elite Praetorian Guard minifig team. It looks like we will have to wait a little longer before LEGO hopefully decides to release the third guard. The First Order stormtrooper has a new helmet, which might please or annoy collectors intent on building an army.


75225 Elite Praetorian Guard Battle Pack includes 109 pieces and 4 minifigs. The set is available now via the LEGO Shop (USD 14.99 CDN 19.99 | GBP 12.99), AmazonBricklink, and elsewhere.


2 comments on “LEGO Star Wars 75225 Elite Praetorian Guard Battle Pack [Review]

  1. Dylan cloud

    You may have said but how many of each type guard are in the movie, and how many of each type are in the sets?

  2. Edwinder Post author

    @Dylan,

    LEGO boxes typically display all the figures in the sets, and as can be seen from the photos in this review, it comes with two curved helmet elite guards and one pointed helmet elite guard. Hope that helps

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