I'm not an expert but I'll tell you what I read when I was considering a gold crown clone.
If the frame is the same, rediculously overbuilt and solid hardwood and it's all the same hardwood and plywood throughout with no particle board or inferior materials anywhere including finish quality then it's up to you...
It probably won't keep it's value like the real thing, but there are some clone tables that are decent.
Having said this I ended up buying a super abused gold crown 1 that was a good price because it needed complete restoration, it was on the verge of being thrown away it looked so bad. And am currently in the process of restoring it. I've spent a couple weeks just sanding and polishing and have a fair amount of work still to go, but I'm glad I got the real thing.
It's gone from the ugliest gold crown 1 I've ever seen in person to now the best looking, and I haven't even clearcoated it yet, just finishing up staining it.
The brunstone surface didn't make any difference to me except that it's 1.5" thick, I rolled a few balls and it was flat. Many (most)cheap tables are less thick, some much less. 1.5" thick is about as good as it gets brunstone or not. Watch out for any corners cut in the clone table, the thickness of the slate may be one of them. A benefit to brunstone is that should it crack or break it breaks clean rather than in layers like slate and is said to be easier to repair. That's good for me because mine needed slate repair too, there's nothing on my table that didn't need work, but it was cheap. There's something to be said for having the real thing though... Enough to make weeks of my time fixing this old one worth it to me.
Here's a small image of what a gold crown frame should look like, it's very thick and heavy and made of solid wood. The frame under these top pieces is something like 4"x6" solid hardwood. Almost reminds me of railroad ties it's so thick and the whole table is rediculously heavy. Make sure to look at a real one to compare quality to the clone. The clone I looked at looked similar but not as heavily built. My table is 47 years old and now that I'm fixing it up will last another 50 years easy, the same can't be said for something not built as well.
Bigger picture:
http://media.photobucket.com/image/...h/sdbilliards_photo/Gibby GC/GC5/IMG_2579.jpg
