Counterfeit item?

[Idaho11]

I bought a lot of Eldar from someone a little while ago. Just got around to opening a Wraithlord from the lot. The plastic looks great, the cast is near perfect, and the transfer sheet is indistinguishable from other ones I have. Even the box looks legit.

However, the instructions are not the normal type - they're printed out on printer paper and folded over. The date for printing is from 2008.

Did GW ever include instructions like this? Could I have gotten a repack? Or is this definitely a counterfeit? Is there any other way to tell/verify?

Thanks!

[Morgrim]

A repack is possible, especially if the box had clearly been opened before. I once got a kit without instructions and my local GW store just photocopied a set for me. If they had a digital copy instead then printing a new one seems reasonable. If the quality of the model looks to be identical to a GW one I'd assume it's probably genuine. Hopefully someone else can be more help.

[lobster-overlord]

I've never seen a bootleg with a box, they are almost always in plastic. Also, if it's the full sprue intact, it is likely original. most bootlegs are recast off the sprue, as it's normally too expensive to do the whole sprue. places like yoymart are great examples of how they generally look, as they don't bother cleaning them up.

[daboarder]

If your asking these kind of questions then you are going to need to provide us with photos, otherwise we cannot say more beyond "maybe" either way.

[klunc]

I've had that before and with product bought from GW Aus. They must sometimes run out of the printed and bound instruction sets?

[Idaho11]

In a shrink-wrapped box, on the sprue. Sounds like it was either a repack, or something funky went on that day at the factory. The quality is rock-solid (the ridges on the body are just as deep and clear), and it's plastic, so I'm going to go with it being real.

Thanks for the info, everyone! The only thing that seemed fishy was the instructions.

[Skoolstah]

I've experienced the same thing with some tyranids models (older type of warriors). The models were normal quality, but the instructions were like yours. Guess they were trying to save on printing costs for a limited time? :P

[Darren Richardson]

I've brought many boxes direct from Games Workshop, and the instruction sheets range from well printed to rubish photocopied sheets, so no it's nothing to worry about, I think it happened to all the boxes produced at a certain time only judging by what boxes it was.....

[Jason Young]

Got a Dreadnought that was like that, so wouldn't worry too much. I'd be more worried about missing bits instead of crummy instructions that most of us don't even read, lol.

[Krefey]

If the model is in plastic, I'd say it's a good bet it's legit. All the recast stuff etc I've seen around has been resin, not plastic.