FYI folks, I purchased a copy of Gygax's Victorious German arms off of Spartacus Collectibles on Amazon, which turned out to be photocopied.  The copy exhibited the usual symptoms:

- cover stock is the same paper weight as the interior pages
- cover graphics/bounding box are not centered on the cover stock
- solid black ink areas on cover and interior appear partially washed out/not fully solid
- stray photocopy marks/telltales on the cover and interior pages (from the copier glass that wasn't clean and/or from marks on the original)
- book pages not trimmed properly to be flush (the center pages stick out further than the beginning/end pages)
- single copyright line runs crookely on the verso of the title page
- original page edges are evident along the edges of the paper when flipping through the photocopy book's pages
- staples are saddles-stitched off-center (not in the fold of the spine)
- three saddle-stitched staples are present rather than two
- pages in very new, crisp, snow-white condition and staples look brand new too

While summarizing the above info, I realized that similar telltales (and probably others that I haven't encountered here) could broadly be applied to help distinguish photocopies/fakes.  Do we have a Research page on fakes/photocopies in the research forum of the site?  It would be good to have a resource describing various ways to ID a photocopy vs. an original somewhere.  The only info I saw on the main site (ignoring the forums for the nonce) was the section entitled Fakes / Phantom Items on the Ins & Outs page at Ins & Outs

Some other distinguishing attributes I've seen with other copies (not this VGA one) have included:

- different color paper stock
- different cover weights
- on old photocopies from the 1970s and '80s, they're generally not very good, and sometimes used slick paper, different color inks, etc.

Here are some pics of the VGA booklets side-by-side and closeups of the for reference:

Victorious German Arms, by Gary Gygax and Terry Stafford. Original on right, fake/photocopy on left:




Spines of the two books. The original is on right/too. You can see the original staples/holes on the photocopied one, if you look closely:



Fake/photocopy cover: note the washing out of the arms of the eagle:



Fake/photocopy cover: note the additional marks on the page above and to the left and the right of "available":



Fake/photocopy cover: note the washing out of the arms of the swastika:



Fake/photocopy cover: the washing out of the arms of the swastika is easier to see comparing to the original:



Michael Huntingon, the seller, responded very well and offered a full refund including shipping and return shipping for the photocopy.  He also commented that he had received some Tractics booklets from the same seller that were in a similar condition to the VGA pages (i.e., probably photocopies, in retrospect).  So, other fakes/copies like these are likely out there.

Here's a quick survey of the threads that we've had covering various fakes and photocopies over the years:  fake photocopy site:acaeum.com inurl:forum - Google Search  I can't link to the threads directly, since google's links are bad, but it at least provides a quick listing if anyone else wants to link to them/compile them for future research.

Allan, do you remember the bogus Gamelords items "Phantasmagorical Montie Hall Dungeon" and "The Tavern" we purchased from Noble Knight years ago?  

One of the same attributes was the photocopying of the staple marks, obvious on the reprints/fakes, but in that case it did have the same cover stock as the original.

Did we ever determine if they were out and out forgeries or just later printings?  Seems like a long way to go for just a $20 fake, when you could be churning out Fazzlewoods or fake tournament modules.

Mike B.

This thread may help out:

Palace of the Vampire Queen print sequence • Page 6 • Collecting General •  The Acaeum

Basically, the difference between a professionally-printed (offset) product and a photocopied one can only be discerned for certain under a microscope.  Photocopiers use toner, which is a plastic powder that very much looks like powder under a microscope.  Offset printing is flat and uniform.

Otherwise, without a microscope, the points you all mention above are good tips to spot a fake.

Foul

I should have said, "flat and uniform under the microscope".  

Foul

I think its worth adding here that there are a few fakes of Dungeon of Dr Demento floating around.

And seller Wargames East sold a bunch of Hess Games, Sage Lore Games, Wyrmworks fakes.

On the fake I have, the cover is a little bit too bright white and the staples are too thin - my original has heavy duty staples than the standard staple used today (even though the book doesn't need it).

Also, it looks like the fake was print with "fit to page size" so the image is slightly bigger than the original.

From the left edge of the "m" in Massconfusion to the right of "0" in the price (on the top line of the cover):
* Original is 8 inches bang on.
* Fake is 8 3/16

If others could check and verify that would be great!

bclarkie wrote in photocopied Victorious German Arms and copies/fakes research:

Badmike wrote in photocopied Victorious German Arms and copies/fakes research:Allan, do you remember the bogus Gamelords items "Phantasmagorical Montie Hall Dungeon" and "The Tavern" we purchased from Noble Knight years ago?  

One of the same attributes was the photocopying of the staple marks, obvious on the reprints/fakes, but in that case it did have the same cover stock as the original.

Did we ever determine if they were out and out forgeries or just later printings?  Seems like a long way to go for just a $20 fake, when you could be churning out Fazzlewoods or fake tournament modules.

Mike B.

I got fake Gamelords stuff, both "The Tavern" and Montie Hall's Dungeon" off of Ebay, from dumbass called dndplayer or some such.  Same crap with the staple marks visable in the copies and what not.  We discussed it pretty in depth in the Non-TSR forum. I'll try to dig up that thread.

Here it is:

Game Lords Fakes :/

I updated the first post to fix the bad Facebook image links, which are working now.