I think my reasoning was that I expected the box art on model kits to be a guide to what they were supposed to look like. I saw them as instructions to be followed as much as the booklets on the inside.
I never had that much luck with model kits. I remember doing a decent job with a C-3PO kit and a Darth Vader TIE Fighter kit years later, but otherwise not so much. I got kits of the
Enterprise-A and -D and of the
War of the Worlds Martian War Machine with the expectation that my best friend would help me assemble them, but he turned out to be kind of a flake and never got around to helping, so they just sat unassembled in my closet for years until I finally got rid of them. I did get that snap-together 3-ship set and applied the decals rather crudely, but I left them unpainted, and they didn't hold up very well.