THE VARIANT DILEMMA - Dent, no Dent? One Scar, Two Scar? Bizarre Logic & Math

Now before I start, just a brief note, I understand that this hobby is about what makes you happy and I fully take into consideration 'each to there own' however, the collecting traits of some people have a tendency to baffle me, as they don't really follow a logically path, and again and again I see the same things pop up on facebook and I can't help but think... Why?? Occasionally I'll throw a comment out there and am almost instantly shot down, so I thought I'd write a little thread to highlight what I'm talking about and to debunk the two usual suspects.

A while back I was scrolling down the endless pages of nonsense on facebook when an image popped up in one of the ten thousand Star Wars pages that confused me at first. It was headed with 'My PBP Boba Fett run' and what was shown was about ten 'Tri-Logo' Boba Fett figures. What I failed to understand initially was why there where so many, several of which appeared to be the same. Now I appreciate that that specific figure has several actual paint variantions, unpainted knee, painted dart etc. I tend to put it at about six notably different variations, but here there where several that looked identical, for exanple, two that both had an unpainted knee and a unpainted dart?
It was only when I read the comments that it dawned on me that the difference was the single scar/double scar.


Now personally I do not class the actual county of origin stamp as a variation within its self but as a basis of a figure variation. For example the different COO stamps largely represent different factories that produced the figures using moulds produced using different techniques resulting in different figures and usually using different paints there by producing 'variants' regardless of the different stamp present, the same pretty much applies when the moulds where altered to have the COO removed.

Now when the COO was removed from the Boba Fett figure, it was done using a filling agent and who ever did the task filled in the word 'Hong' and then 'Kong' and when the process was repeated on the second cavity, the likely scenario is that the gap between the two words was bridged by a small overflow of the filling agent. The filler was not smoothed down which in turn produced the indent on the figure or 'scar' and of course one had one and the other had two.

Skip forward 20 years and that tiny bridge of filler has condemned countless collectors to an illogical collecting practise and subsequently driven up the price and demand for not only the 'Tri-Logo' Fetts but also the Lili Ledy Fett's. I've even seen some people owning two of the LL removable rocket Fett's claiming the single/double scar as a variant.


Simple, what's wrong with the left leg? I've yet to meet a single collector who will gladly own a single scar/double scar version of the same figure who is also interested in the subtle differences on the left leg as well, and to me this makes absolutely no sense what so ever? They will scream VARIANT until they are blue in the face when it comes to the single/double scar but couldn't care less about the other leg?
Is it because it just doesn't roll off the tongue well enough?
"Oh what variants are they?"
"Single scar double scar mate"

"Oh what variants are they"
"Left leg slight off place '9' with the full stop nearer to the '1' and the slightly more even placed '9' with the full stop a fraction more further way from the '1'"

Logic dictates that if you variant on the right leg, then you have to call variant on the left leg and if you do that then again by that logic you have to call variant on on the random assembly of the figures by which each different leg could be paired up with each different opposite leg making four possible combinations of each individual variation.... So you would require four LL RR Fett's, four LL Fett's and four of each 'Tri-Logo Fett's... that's quite a costly task!


Let's look at this from a different angle and a different figure... one I understand a little better.

Now if you where to apply this same practise to Luke Bespin, the numbers are quite unsettling. Two of the three different mould families have the stamp on just one leg and come from a two cavity mould, the third however has the stamp on both legs and comes from a three cavity mould making nine possible leg COO combinations.
The final tally of figures required if including the LL overstock head Luke would be exactly 200 figures. This number would include 17 Poch figures, 54 PBP figures and 45 LL figures!


Above is a picture of three LL Luke's, nine of each! Bare in mind the one in the middle, there are currently only three known examples on Earth and of course there is no guarantee at all that you would get all nine different combinations first time round, in fact the odds of that are even more ridiculous than the practise its self!


The Blue Snag is of course the other usual suspect that has a tendency to follow a similar illogical collecting practise. The dent in the end of the boot was caused by an imperfection in one of the mould cavities, a small knob of metal which created the 'dent' and collectors the world over can't wait to have two blue Snag's stood together with there dent and no dent boots.
My argument here is that by the logic of this practise, why not the same with any other figure? I've yet to meet another collector who has both Blue Snags but who also operates the same practise across the board with all figures?
The definition of the word variation is essentially 'change' or 'difference' this of course puts the 'dent' into the definition of the word 'variant' as in it is different, yet no one seems bothered about similar things on other figures?


Maybe the reason for both these examples is because both Boba Fett and Blue Snag are 'cool figures' they have a notoriety in the hobby, a history, so people crave a reason to own more than one of them, my bet would be that no one would really give a shit if Weequay or Lobot had a dent in there boot end.
And that is exactly the point here, most figures do have some little imperfections between the two or three mould cavities, but no one's bothered because it's not a Blue Snag.


Luke Bespin from the Unitoy Factory, missing the part of the two ridges on his right arm because of an imperfection in one of the cavities, and just to show that this was present the whole time, figures with and figures without....


Now, there's a lot more plastic missing from that imperfection than there is the little dent in the boot, but does anyone even care? Infact did anyone even know until now? Well if you read my earliest work on Luke Bespin is was pointed out so you may have done But what about the Snowtrooper??? Anyone know or care about the belt buckle imperfection??


The point here is that a lot of figures have these imperfections but no one really cares unless the figure is significant which defies the logic of collecting the imperfections on the significant figures and calling variant.


Here's a little bit of random math just to highlight how a variant collector would collect if he considered and collected correctly by the scar and dent logic. Now you have to also bare in mind that the way in which the moulds where produced means that no two pieces from a two cavity mould will be identical, there will be some minor difference even if a looking glass is required, but if the dent matters, then so should this.
So working on the theory of each individual piece been different in some way and subsequently the combinations on which these pieces could be assembled.... to be more accurate, these would be permutations as they have to be assembled in a certain order (a leg in an arm socket wouldn't count of course).

Working again on Luke Bespin, here are the staggering results......


Yep, that's 8281 Luke Bespin to cover all grounds mentioned above, a similar number if not higher will certainly be the case for other figures also, 728 Poch, 2184 PBP 1456 LL etc. etc. you get the picture.

So there you have it, a little food for thought for the next time your looking at those two two blue Snag's and ten 'Tri-Logo' Fett's on your shelf while some other poor collector is staring at his bank balance wondering why the hell he can't afford just the one

Nice post. I am putting together something similar about COO combos, I planned to post soon.

Start with the "Tri-logo" Fetts. I think a lot of the confusion comes from the Light Brown Belt Meccano (Guerre des Etoiles) Tri-logo era Fett

The color of the body/limbs are why people consider to be Tri , You will find on GDE cards:
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It is also found in Meccano baggies:
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Both the CPG and "scarred" areas are different. You will notice on other scarred figures that the left over "bubbles" will change per scarred coo, this does open the many variations numbers you brought up.
They are almost like constellation points
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IMO , I do not think it is a case of more breaking away and is a different figure, made at a different time for a different card.

Fantastic post putting things in perspective, Alex.

Like you explain very well those subtle micro differences in COO typography represent just different mould cavities within the same steel mould. They are in no way markers for differences in manufacturing (used plastics, paintings). So personally I don't care too much about those small COO differences. Or any other of the subtle mould differences.

But off course each collector should decide for his/her own how they like to collect.
There are also stamp collectors who collect the full array of subtle printing differences within a sheet of stamps.

Talking about maths. I remember we did some maths on the Lili Ledy Bikerscout last year in Scarborough while enjoying some beers. I think it was something like:

Different right heel mould numbers: 8
Different left heel mould numbers: 8
Different torso mould cavities: 4


That makes: 8x8x4=256 unique combinations.
Good luck collecting them all!

my mind is literally melting . I have been collecting on and off for the better part of 25++ years and I would never be able to come up with anything this detailed about numbers of variants and mould differences ....

fucking brilliant and well written

Awesome - even more variants to hunt down

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Can you send me a detailed list of the 8281 Bespin Luke variants ?

I need to get started hunting them down now so I will have them all by the time I am 97

Well written Alex.   You must be getting close to having all the 8281 Bespin Luke variants, right?

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No disrespect to your own research about Bubble Fetts, but I think you missed Alex' point.

General! That is a damn amazing write-up and really makes sense to me. I'd honestly never considered mould imperfections as causing these "variants."

The same logic with the scarred COO has also at times being applied to the scarred COO Snowtrooper.

a fantastic write up Alex, and very informative, I never really gave much thought to how deep into the rabbit hole this method of collecting can lead, damn that's a lot of variants!!!

But I do know that this issue has been a bit of a annoyance to you for a while now, and it's great to see how you have explained it clearly and thoughtfully, for others to appreciate

Great info and put in a way that its easy to read. Thanks again!

What??????? You mean I don't need to have 200 of the same figure because of the tiny little differences???? This is blasphemy, I must have each one.....just kidding. I tried to get into coo collecting for a while, but it just wasn't interesting to me (sorry to those who think it is). There are some like the meccano death star droid I have, but most small coo differences don't make the figure look unique when standing next to a counterpart in the cabinet.

Well written and a nice evening read. Thanks for posting.
-Achim-