Promotional 7969 Ghost Pirate Set: Germany

Currently a premium set when you order from the direct service department in Germany, this nifty set as scanned to Klickywelt includes an exclusive red three-headed sea serpent, a unique ghost, and several colorful barrels of what we presume is rum. It's a safe bet this is going to be offered in the USA (if it isn't already) but if you haven't seen it, here it is!

The same link also shows a promotional animal set with cheetah cubs (or kitten repaints) plus a baby gorilla in a diaper. Truly, you can't go wrong.

New German Limited Edition Set: Family Van with Boat

While SUVs are going out of style in the USA as of late, in Germany, there's a new LE Playmobil set that's surprisingly cheap and probably gets good mileage too. 4144 Familyvan mit Bootsanhänger (easy for you to say) includes a set of parents, two kids, a motorboat, a van, a dog, a toy sailboat, and a whole mess of stuff.

At press time there is no known release date in the USA-- or rather, we don't know what it is. It's 19.99 Euro, which is pretty preposterous given how much stuff comes in the box. We'll let you know when or if it shows up in the States, but for now you're going to need to call in some favors to get this one, which is also showing up elsewhere in Europe.

German Exclusive: 6103 Maggi Cook!

One of the real downers about collecting Playmobil is that it's really tough to find solid information on the weird stuff. Exclusives, in particular, because bizarre little figures which are given away or sold cheaply at various German retailers simply do not make their way onto US eBay. This is unfortunate.

We discovered that something called "Maggi" has an exclusive branded figure featuring an apron and some sort of food packaging. If my German serves me, and it usually doesn't, the figure is a mail-in premium wherein you can choose the toy or some sort of kitchen scissors.

The bad news? The mail-in offer expired in March 2009. So we're basically out of luck here. But if anyone knows where one can find a supply of these, do let us know.

Image "borrowed" from eBay Germany, which you should totally go bid on stuff if you have the regional capability to do so.