silly not to build?

i found one, unwrapped, with Empire markingson the box several years ago at a show.

The dealer told me they were running (without wrapper and smelling of mildew) in the 200 range. I gave him forty and he was happy to take it.  I got the kit home, opned the box, closed the box and sold it on Ebay. 

The shrinkwrap, and the fact that it is from Ep IV '77 vintage makes them more worthwhile to have from a collectors standpoint.  As a kit.....ehh....you wont be much impressed by it.

I'm still waiting for a good astromech droid (bubbletop Rxxx series) to come out so I can make the black imperial version.  I saw a nice one at the Nats this weekend with lights installed, he put a ton of work into it.

David

I would bet they would be worth about $25-30 a piece on eBay. If you are really worried about ruining valuable collectable kits, but want to build them, search eBay and buy later reissues (often going for $10-15) and build those up instead.

IIRC, the main difference between the original Star Wars issues and the Return of the Jedi re-box (and subsequent reissues) was the box artwork and instruction sheet and the original R2-D2 kit used peel-n-stick stickers and subsequent reissues included traditional waterslide decals.

The question for you really is, "Do you WANT to build them?"

While Sci-Fi figures are not my personal genre of choice, if they were, I would probably have already built those models. My personal view is model kits are for building, not for collecting - except with the intent to build them some day. In the past, I have completed several models many people would consider "rare" or "collectible" and would (probably will) build more in the future.