Actually, this thread has to do with using Win10's in-built roll-back mechanism to your previous OS...it has
nothing whatever to do with trying to restore a system image made when running your previous OS.
Many people make an "OS roll-back" impossible for themselves (of the type this thread discusses) because after they've installed to Win10 they use "Disk Cleanup" to remove the files (Windows.old, etc.) that must remain on the disk in order for a roll-back to work. Before deleting those files, however, Windows 10 does pop up a warning about losing the ability to roll-back the OS...
Basically, you aren't happy mainly because you are trying to hammer a square peg into a round hole, and your case is much different...
If you have an 8.1 image that you want to restore, it will no doubt work best when you have reinstalled your basic 8.1 system from which you can then restore your 8.1 image backup. So...
1) Reinstall 8.1
2) Use 8.1 to restore your system from your backed up 8.1 images and whatever repair tools you're talking about (8.1?) should work fine
If you correctly executed an 8.1 system back up then you should be able to restore it from an 8.1 installation. Trying to run Windows 10 to restore an 8.1 image is--square peg in round hole--the tools weren't made to operate in the way that you are trying to use them. If they "worked fine" under 10162 for you to reinstall an 8.1 system image on the same machine/partition, then I'd say you were either very lucky or very unlucky--depending on the number of system errors that were introduced during the process, even though it may have appeared to you that the restore executed properly.
Some people write about running sfc /scannow after an upgrade from 7 or 8.1 and seeing all kinds of errors, but their problem was that they should have run sfc /scannow *before* they attempted the upgrade to Win10, which would have revealed the errors were present before the upgrade to Win10 took place (I've done several 8.1/7 upgrades to Win10 and the process has always completed without any sfc errors detectable after the upgrade--because I had none before the upgrade process was begun.) IMO, 90% of people's computer problems come from misunderstanding the proper procedure for doing various things, and trying to "put square pegs into round holes" and/or from taking bad advice from people who know even less than they do...
A good rule of thumb when trying to solve frustrating computer problems that develop after you have performed what you believe are the proper procedures, is to consider whether or not you have understood the instructions correctly. Many people also make all kinds of assumptions about many things that have to do with their computer environments that are simply *
wrong.* I wish you the best of luck in your endeavors and would like to assure you that no one is trying to pull the wool over your eyes on these issues...
Thinking that you have been "tricked or lied to" is most likely going to be an assumption that will always be wrong--most likely you have simply misunderstood something you've read or heard--it's that simple. Once you learn the ins and outs of making system backups and restoring them (within the correct OS versions!) you will find the problems you complain about here are simply no longer relevant in your experience.