I would say to me it was worth the extra money. This was my first large ship build and my first attempt with photo etch, so I left it all unpainted to show how much extra detail it provided from what the kit had. I honestly probably used about half of what came with the Pontos kit. Some was from the kit provided photo etch also. Still alot more of it could have been put into the model, but my time was limited and so were my patients, at times
I believe the Pontos kit # is: 23001F2 ver 2 with wooden deck.