LEGO Star Wars 75345 501st Clone Troopers Battle Pack’s box art is pretty misleading

The box art for 75345 501st Clone Troopers Battle Pack taunts us with a reality that doesn’t exist, chalking up another misleading error in LEGO Star Wars packaging.

Revealed alongside 75344 Boba Fett’s Starship Microfighter and 75347 TIE Bomber earlier today, January 2023’s brand new battle pack acts as a sort-of-sequel to 75280 501st Legion Clone Troopers, expanding the blue-tinted squad with new classes. Among those is a 501st Officer, who looks pretty similar to the standard soldier, save for a printed kama, a blue belt and a rangefinder attached to his helmet.

It’s the position of that rangefinder, however, that’s causing consternation. In summer this year, the LEGO Group updated its Clone Trooper helmet mould to add an extra hole for attachments, such as the visor worn by Commander Cody in 75337 AT-TE Walker. This hole sits above the filled-in notch that already exists on the helmet, and that works fine for the visor – but it means the rangefinder sits a little too high.

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But you wouldn’t know it from looking at the box art for 75345 501st Clone Troopers Battle Pack, because it mysteriously shows the rangefinder attached to the lower of the two notches, which – save for an updated element – wouldn’t be possible. Thanks to early YouTube reviews of the sets, we already know that the minifigures in the box use the same helmet style as the Clone Troopers in 75337 AT-TE Walker, and the rangefinder therefore attaches to the other hole.

That’s pretty misleading from the LEGO Group, especially given this is the first time a rangefinder has specifically been advertised as attaching to one of these new helmet designs. (Orange rangefinders were included in 75337 AT-TE Walker, but only as part of the wider selection of helmet accessories, which are always bundled together in the one bag.)

Box art errors are nothing new for Star Wars, but issues relating specifically to misleading minifigures are relatively recent, beginning with this summer’s 75337 AT-TE Walker. The printing on the 212th Clone Troopers on the box is pretty different to the finished product (the orange print comes to a point, rather than disappearing behind the brow as per the actual minifigures), leading to complaints from some corners of the LEGO Star Wars community.

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Perhaps just as problematic for 75345 501st Clone Troopers Battle Pack are its lifestyle images, though. Given these are photographs of physical models, the LEGO Group couldn’t insert the rangefinder into the wrong hole (whether intentionally or not), as with the product renders. But only one of the four images clearly depicts the accessory attached in the correct position on the helmet – the others all show the minifigure from the opposite side, masking exactly where it’s attached.

We’re certainly not saying that was done deliberately, but across all the official imagery for 75345 501st Clone Troopers Battle Pack, only one shot shows the correct alignment for the 501st Officer’s rangefinder, and you have to zoom in pretty far to figure it out. The real issue here isn’t with the positioning of the rangefinder, just as it wasn’t really with the printing of the 212th Clone Troopers in 75337 AT-TE Walker.

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The problem there was that the box art portrayed printing that didn’t match up to the real-life minifigures, and it’s the same issue for 75345 501st Clone Troopers Battle Pack: what we’re seeing on the packaging differs from what we’re actually going to find inside that box come January 1.

We’ve reached out to the LEGO Group for comment. You can check out more images of all three new LEGO Star Wars 2023 sets by clicking here, or see the table below for more details.

LEGO set	Price	Pieces	Release date
75344 Boba Fett’s Starship Microfighter	£8.99 / $9.99 / €9.99	85	January 1, 2023
75345 501st Clone Troopers Battle Pack	£17.99 / $19.99 / €19.99	119	January 1, 2023
75347 TIE Bomber	£59.99 / $64.99 / €64.99	625	January 1, 2023

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