Ninjago

Catamaran Sea Battle

Two little warships, four hulls, and more play features than a set this size has any right to pack in.

Brick Rated Score

3.8/5

Set 71748 · 2021

Pieces780

Minifigs6

Year2021

Set number71748

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The verdict

This is one of those Ninjago sets that looks like a throwaway kids' toy in the box and then quietly wins you over on the table.

You get two catamarans, the bigger one splits into three separate boats, and there are spring shooters everywhere. It builds bigger and more interesting than 780 pieces suggests. The catch is the price and the total lack of an exclusive minifigure, so I'd wait for a discount rather than pay full RRP.

Best for: Ninjago kids who want a set that actually does something once it's built

The full review

What it is

I went in expecting a forgettable little boat set and came away genuinely charmed. Catamaran Sea Battle is from the 2021 Island wave of Ninjago, and it hands you two catamarans that do a surprising amount once they are together on the table. The ninjas get a trim little twin-hull that folds down flat into a speed shape and snaps back open for combat. The Keepers get the showpiece, a bigger craft that pulls apart into three separate boats, one of which carries a mini prison to lock up a captured ninja. For a set aimed squarely at kids, the amount of play built into the design is what got me. Nothing here is decoration for its own sake, every section wants to move, launch or split.

The catch

Now for the honest bits, because there are a few. The price is the loudest one. At $69.99 this sat at the top of the Island wave, and plenty of builders felt it asked too much next to other Ninjago sets of the same piece count. The bigger sting is the minifigures. You get six of them, which sounds generous, but not one is exclusive to this box. Island Jay, Kai and Zane and all three Keepers turn up in cheaper sets from the very same wave, so if you are chasing figures there are more efficient ways to spend your money. The fabric sails are the other weak point. They look nice at first but crease, fray and pick up dirt quickly, and the single ninja cockpit is so tight that Kai cannot even sit down with his katana sheathed on his back.

Who it's for

So who should grab this one. If you have a Ninjago-mad kid who cares far more about swooshing boats around and staging battles than about spec sheets, this is close to ideal, and it holds up to rough play better than the delicate sails suggest. If you are a display-focused adult collector or a minifigure completist, I would skip it, since nothing inside is unique and the boats are pure playset rather than shelf piece. And whoever you are, try not to pay full price. It retired at the end of 2022 and now floats around its original RRP secondhand, so patient shoppers can usually do better than $70.

The parts story

What the build is actually like, and the pieces worth knowing about.

The build runs about an hour across two instruction books, an 84-page one for the ninja boat and a chunky 120-page manual for the Keepers' catamaran. It is more involved than you might guess, because both hulls use a fair bit of Technic underneath to make the folding and splitting mechanisms actually work. That means the construction stays engaging rather than turning into the flat stud-laying that some kids' sets fall into, and the payoff of watching a single boat break into three is well earned.

There are no headline new molds here, this is a set that shines on colour and printing rather than rare bricks. The sand green and dark turquoise hull sections give you a genuinely useful island palette that is handy for anyone building water or tropical scenes. The printed sails and the Keeper masks carry a lot of the character, and the six minifigures, especially Chief Mammatus and the two horned Keepers, are the real parts value even though you can find them elsewhere. As a straight parts-per-dollar deal it is only average, so buy this one for what it does, not for the pile it breaks down into.

Fun facts

01The larger Keepers' catamaran splits into three fully separate boats, and one of them carries a small prison cell for locking up a captured ninja.
02The set retired in December 2022 after roughly one year and nine months on shelves, having launched on 1 March 2021.
03Despite including six minifigures, not one is exclusive to this set, every figure also appears in other sets from the 2021 Island wave.