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forgery indicators?
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mr-monte-hall
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 5:12 pm

I apologize in advance for my ignorance on the subject. I've just purchased some modules online and am for the most part, happy with my purchase, except that I'm wondering if a few of the books are forgeries.

Inparticular, S3 has a black and white map on the inside of the cover (rather than blue and white) as well a black and white second map insert. The color illustrations were among missing pages from the book (a separate issue) although the cover is full color.

When compared to S4 (which I purchased from the same seller) and the rest of my collection of modules, I notice that S3 is about a centimeter taller than S4, and half a centimeter wider. Perhaps these are just differences in the versions, though. I own another copy of S3 of the correct size but with a variant cover and a copyright of a year later (1981).

Also strange, is the S2 module whose pages are a half a centimeter taller than the cover.

Finally, A1 and A3 are similar dimensions as S3 above (a full centimeter too tall, and half a centimeter too wide), although the covers have blue and white maps instead of the strange black and white map from S3.

Its more of a curiosity to me than anything else, I mean the modules will serve my purpose either way since I plan to use the things rather than collect them. But since I already owned the PDFs, it seems a shame to pay $45 for them if they are forged when I could have printed them out myself for free.

Traveller
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:00 pm

I'm sorry, but I'm afraid your S3, Your A1, and your A3 are all fake. The key indicator is your mention that the pages were a centimeter taller and a half cetimeter wider. The change in dimenions makes the page size 8 1/2" x 11" (approximately), which is a standard paper size.

I was made aware of this in printing out my copy of Orange B3 (Palace Of The Silver Princess) from the freely available PDF on the WotC website. The margins are too large on my printout compared to actual copies of B1, B2, X1, and S3.

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Zenopus
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:12 pm

Some prints of S3 do have black maps:

See: http://www.acaeum.com/DDIndexes/ModPages/S.html

First (1980): .... Maps (on interior covers) in black ink.

According to the above, at least the 1st-5th printings have maps in black ink.

However, I've never heard of a height size difference of 1 cm, so I agree with what Traveller said. The pdf they used for printing out the copy probably was from an S3 with the black maps.

By the way, by all means let folks know who the seller is so no one else buys from the same seller. There's a thread here on the Acaeum for bad sellers.

The Collector's Trove
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:20 pm

Howdy,

The 1st and 2nd Print for S3 both have B&W maps. The booklets and cover - the whole module - are also taller than later printings and modules. I doubt it is a fake - just an early printing.

Does it have a wizard logo or a wizard inside a box logo? If the former, you have a 1st print! Congratulations!

Futures Bright,

Paul

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ExTSR
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 6:22 pm

mr-monte-hall wrote:Also strange, is the S2 module whose pages are a half a centimeter taller than the cover.... A1 and A3 are similar dimensions as S3 above (a full centimeter too tall, and half a centimeter too wide), although the covers have blue and white maps

Ignoring for the moment the well-known taller size of 1st printing modules in the A series, S1 & S2, and others from 1978-81...

I have seen A1, A2, A3, A4, S1, S2, and certain others with variations, cut 'wrong' at the printer's. Some had pages wider or taller than the cover.
Such pieces that I owned came directly from TSR, no chance of forgery.

The blue maps in your A1/A3 seem to indicate authenticity, tho.

mr-monte-hall
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 7:34 pm

The Collector's Trove wrote:Howdy,

The 1st and 2nd Print for S3 both have B&W maps. The booklets and cover - the whole module - are also taller than later printings and modules. I doubt it is a fake - just an early printing.

Does it have a wizard logo or a wizard inside a box logo? If the former, you have a 1st print! Congratulations!

Futures Bright,

Paul

A1 has a wizard logo at the bottom center of the front cover next to TSR's address. A3 (similar size) has no wizard logo or wizard in a box (although, thanks to zhowar1's links, I can see that A3 has a TSR face logo in its 1st-3rd printings, which is what this one has). S3 has a wizard logo in the bottom left corner of the cover (also next to TSR's address).

It doesn't sound like there is a definite way to tell forgeries from originals.
A logo only limits the forgers to copying 1st edition modules and doesn't really guarentee authenticity. Same as coloring; it is about as easy to print blue and white as it is black and white. However, just the facts that older versions existed of A1-4 and S1-4 of larger sizes, and that black and white versions existed as well, is enough for me to dismiss serious notions of forgeries for (relatively) low cost items as these. If anything, I may have been given an older S2 module with a newer S2 cover - but for my purposes, all is fine.

I really appreciate everyone who took the time to reply. If anyone does happen to have more information about which versions of modules have the size difference, I'd be very interested to read it - but it would be just for my curiousity at this point. I don't think the seller intentionally tried to deceive me or anything.

dbartman
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 7:53 pm

Sounds like you are dealing with some cobbled-together-from-miscellaneous-parts modules. One thing that you could look at is the paper weight. Most modules are printed on a slightly thicker paper than you would ordinarily find with a standard 11X17 bond. Also, more recent paper is brighter and has less of a coarse feel too it. Staples can also shed some light on the situation. Do they look new? Are they flat or curved?

Badmike
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 9:34 pm

mr-monte-hall wrote:
The Collector's Trove wrote:Howdy,

The 1st and 2nd Print for S3 both have B&W maps. The booklets and cover - the whole module - are also taller than later printings and modules. I doubt it is a fake - just an early printing.

Does it have a wizard logo or a wizard inside a box logo? If the former, you have a 1st print! Congratulations!

Futures Bright,

Paul

A1 has a wizard logo at the bottom center of the front cover next to TSR's address. A3 (similar size) has no wizard logo or wizard in a box (although, thanks to zhowar1's links, I can see that A3 has a TSR face logo in its 1st-3rd printings, which is what this one has). S3 has a wizard logo in the bottom left corner of the cover (also next to TSR's address).

It doesn't sound like there is a definite way to tell forgeries from originals.
A logo only limits the forgers to copying 1st edition modules and doesn't really guarentee authenticity. Same as coloring; it is about as easy to print blue and white as it is black and white. However, just the facts that older versions existed of A1-4 and S1-4 of larger sizes, and that black and white versions existed as well, is enough for me to dismiss serious notions of forgeries for (relatively) low cost items as these. If anything, I may have been given an older S2 module with a newer S2 cover - but for my purposes, all is fine.

I really appreciate everyone who took the time to reply. If anyone does happen to have more information about which versions of modules have the size difference, I'd be very interested to read it - but it would be just for my curiousity at this point. I don't think the seller intentionally tried to deceive me or anything.

I've had hundreds of the "commons" go through my hands in the last decade, and size differences are not uncommon. As mentioned before, likely the interiors and exteriors were cobbled together from different printings.
Paranoia has it's uses, but in the cases of commons, there is no logical reason to "counterfeit" one. Might as well counterfeit a one dollar bill when your printer can just as easily do $50 bills. It would make no sense.

Mike B.

Traveller
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 9:43 pm

Does it seem normal though for a module to be wider than normal, even if it's slightly taller? We are talking a quarter inch (roughly) wider and that I've not seen. Taller I recall, and stupid me wasn't converting centimeters to inches properly anyway, thus I am very wrong.

So, I retract my earlier assessment that these are fake.

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Badmike
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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 10:59 pm

Traveller wrote:Does it seem normal though for a module to be wider than normal, even if it's slightly taller? We are talking a quarter inch (roughly) wider and that I've not seen. Taller I recall, and stupid me wasn't converting centimeters to inches properly anyway, thus I am very wrong.

So, I retract my earlier assessment that these are fake.

I've had that happen before also. I used to think they were all different printings, but along the lines of what Frank said they are probably just misprintings. I remember at one time having a module cover that was too small for three different interiors I had run across, all slightly different sizes (I want to say it was an A1, but I'm not sure). I think I finally ended up carefully trimming one of the interiors to fit inside the module cover just so I could sell them finally.

Mike B.

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Posted: Tue Jan 10, 2006 11:53 pm

As an aside to all this, we used to track size differences in the printings, but quickly became overwhelmed... most likely because, as mentioned above, many of these were probably variations at the cutting phase rather than truly separate prints.

Slight size differences are normal. Counterfeits are best unmasked using a magnifying lens or a microscope, to examine the actual printing method used (I should probably write up an essay about that).

Foul

RWilson
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Posted: Wed Jan 11, 2006 1:16 am

I have a set of mods that correspond exactly with this guy's stuff.....they are not fake, just some funky printer differences, not a problem at all. A1 in particular, when I compare it to one with the boxed wizard logo, is quite a bit smaller overall.

RW

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Posted: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:30 am

And I have a copy of a Judges Guild module...Book of Treasure Maps...by Paul Jaquays...that is hacked off at a bizarre angle so that the top of the module is a centimeter or so shorter than the bottom. Only Judges Guild could have shipped a downer cow like that one.

A centimeter sounds rather large for varying heights of modules. Are we talking milimeters. (We Americans tend to get confused. Metrics sound suspiciously French to us.) :lol:

Mark

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RWilson
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Posted: Wed Jan 11, 2006 1:06 pm

I'm Canadian so while I don't speak French (I am from the west) I do speak that goofinated le metrique method of measurement....it is in millimeters which as I understand it means his module is several thousand feet larger than normal. Quite run of the mill and nothing to get excited about.

Zenopus
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Posted: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:06 pm

MShipley88 wrote:And I have a copy of a Judges Guild module...Book of Treasure Maps...by Paul Jaquays...that is hacked off at a bizarre angle so that the top of the module is a centimeter or so shorter than the bottom. Only Judges Guild could have shipped a downer cow like that one.

I had a copy of X8 with a very similar defective cut...so TSR also had some quality control issues. Although it was only the booklet, not the cover. I bought it in a bargain bin at BDalton during one of their late 80's purges & I never noticed the bizarre cut until a few years ago.
I was able to sell it successfully on Ebay last fall. With full disclosure of the "bizarre printing defect"... I think I BIN'd it for $9.99.

mr-monte-hall
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Posted: Wed Jan 11, 2006 3:02 pm

Thanks again to all.

Just to answer a couple of quesitons - I'd definitely meant centimeter and not milimeter. It was a guesstimate so I measured. The A3 module I have is 8 milimeters taller than a standard module and 5 milimeters wider.

The staples are straight and are shiny on the outside of the spine with slight rust on the inside. The pages are crisp white with no stains or yellowing and smoother than the course paper used in most modules. (The very good condition was another reason I was suspicious).

Badmike, while I would agree that this is not a forgery, I might argue that forging common modules might not be so illogical since common modules are probably less likely to be scrutinized for authenticity than some of the more expensive modules. If it costs a buck to print a module which could sell for $5-$10 and 5-10 can be sold per week, that might add up after awhile. I'm not saying there aren't (much) better scams out there, but as far as ease of implementation and low risk, well, its not bad...

I suppose an easier scam is to just do what cougarrinard did, which was to buy all of my modules and then lie about the condition when he resold them.

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Posted: Wed Jan 11, 2006 3:17 pm

mr-monte-hall wrote:I suppose an easier scam is to just do what cougarrinard did, which was to buy all of my modules and then lie about the condition when he resold them.

not wanting it to seem like i am defending him all the time, i do agree in a fair argument. i have prb bought more from him than everyone on here combined and i can assure you that at least say 50% of the time, the item is in better condition than what he has quoted. only on one occasion has it been worse, and he refunded me for that without question.

Al

Are we nearly there yet?

mr-monte-hall
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Posted: Wed Jan 11, 2006 3:52 pm

killjoy32 wrote:
mr-monte-hall wrote:I suppose an easier scam is to just do what cougarrinard did, which was to buy all of my modules and then lie about the condition when he resold them.

not wanting it to seem like i am defending him all the time, i do agree in a fair argument. i have prb bought more from him than everyone on here combined and i can assure you that at least say 50% of the time, the item is in better condition than what he has quoted. only on one occasion has it been worse, and he refunded me for that without question.

Al

well, i guess i only have my own experiences to rely on. but in my case he won an auction from me (wrath of the immortals) and in our deal he'd asked if i had any other d&d stuff for sale. i said i did and detailed all flaws with what i had. about half of it was in fine shape, the other half had various defects ranging from writing and/or highlighting, to missing pages, to missing components, tears, and what have you. all books, regardless of condition were then listed in his auctions as VGC+ condition. if I had won an auction for one of the modules i sold him and didn't know about the defects and had to deal with his horrible return policy (pay all shipping both ways and ebay/paypal fees), i would be pretty ticked. plus he harrassed me to use m-bags which didn't make me comfortable since i didn't list that as a shipping option, it is not trackable, and he had already left negative feedback for at least one person after not receiving m-bags.

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