That's a really good question. Ultimately, I think a scratch built Falcon would be the holy grail of builds and a dream that I would like to take on some day. My decision to do a toy conversion was mainly based on limited resources and patience. I don't have the resources to buy all the donor kits needed for a scratch built ship or I don't have the patience to slowly collect the kits over years. The convenience of the Hasbro Falcon is nice because the majority of it is already there for you. I reused many of it's parts. Don't get me wrong, when I hold it up next to my master replicas falcon, the MR is still number 1, but I have to admit this build is pretty close. When I compare the scratch built cockpit to the rest of the hull, I notice that layers of the scratch build always have a certain realism when compared to the toy. Anyway, to answer your question. The main difference to me in this build is a lot (I mean A LOT!) of cutting, tearing apart, deconstructing, and reconstructing. There is not as much planning involved in this build, but in order to look right there is still all those hours of looking at photos and getting on here to see how others like Junk Pilot and crackerjazz have done theirs.