[Hasbro]  Testing Dragoon-F Combinations

After reading through BWQ's thread "The Dragoon LAD Testing Marathon!", I decided to try some Hasbro Dragoon-F combinations. Hasbro has far fewer good drivers for the combo, but there could still be some that are either viable for play or too powerful to stay legal.

I could not emulate BWQ's testing setup exactly, so this was the best I could do.

Testing Setup
-Testing Opponent is Acid Anubis Gravity Orbit
-A2.G.O launched with Sparking R Longwinder
-Dragoon-F combos launched with Hasbro QuadDrive String Launcher
-Acid Anubis launched first every round, both beys light launched purely for LAD
-Burst Finishes and KOs are skipped, only counting OS or Draw
-10 Rounds per test
-All matches performed in the Hasbro Pro Series Stadium.






Dragoon-F Yell Drift-SP vs. Acid Anubis Gravity Orbit
Yell Drift-SP: 8 Wins, 2 Draws
Polish Drift-SP: 8 Wins, 1 Draw, 1 Loss
Drift-SP win percentage: 80%


I mainly tested Drift-SP as the benchmark to see what other parts are competing against, and after twenty rounds it managed a whopping 16 wins. Yell seems like the more consistent disc because Polish never made contact with the stadium even on a draw, and because Polish lost once while Yell only ever Drew. With results like this, it makes sense how this combination can worry some players.


Dragoon-F Polish Bearing vs. Acid Anubis Gravity Orbit
HasBearing: 4 Wins, 2 Draw, 4 Loss
Win Percentage: 40%

BWQ tested Bearing' in her thread, and it performed... okay. It managed to eek out a 60% Win Rate, but she didn't feel confident in its performance. I wanted to see how the Hasbro Alternative combo performed, and shockingly it performed even worse. With a 40% Win Rate, it's far from amazing, and is generally unreliable in this context.


Dragoon-F Yell Assault-Q+Wv vs. Acid Anubis Gravity Orbit
Assault-Q+Wv: 4 Wins, 2 Draws, 4 Losses
Win Percentage: 40%

An attempt to make a Hasbro Alternative to High Wave', the Takara Tomy version of this combo earned itself an 80% winrate. However, this is not the TT version. This version only managed a 40% winrate, I suppose the flattening of Wave's tip in the transition from Wave to +Wv cost it a lot of stamina, as its LAD capabilities were destroyed. Unlike it's TT counterpart, this bey cannot use its height to it's advantage.



Dragoon-F Yell Universe-SPM vs. Acid Anubis Gravity Orbit
Universe-SPM: 5 Wins, 1 Draw, 4 Losses
Win Percentage: 50%

A marked improvement over HasBearing and Assault-Q+Wave, Universe-SPM still didn't perform nearly as well as Drift-SP did. TT's Metal Universe allowed the combo to reach a 60% winrate with 3 wins, 2 draws, and 0 losses. Having a winrate above 50% seemed promising, and inspired me to try the Hasbro Alternative. Seeing that High Wave' liked using Yell because of its height and that Metal Universe performed basically equally between the two discs, I elected to try DgF.Y.Un-SPM over DgF.P.Un-SPM. This didn't really mean much as it managed more losses than draws this time around. I believe it's not the height that hampered this driver, more so the Free-Spinning capabilities. Universe-SPM has much worse free-spin compared to Universe and Metal Universe. Even after lots of use, it still has poor free-spin, which likely hampered the LAD of the combo.



So looking at the current results, Hasbro still doesn't have very competitive Drivers for Dragoon combos. I plan to try more in the future, but these weren't that promising. Pre-Ban we can rely on Drift-SP and the +Dr Attachment, but if those things get banned in the near future Hasbro players can only really rely on Absorb-S.
Yeah, so far it seems that Drift-SP and +Drift seem to be the best Hasbro option, especially from the weak slope issues that I've heard of with Hasbro Dragoon F. I'm sure there's more that could work, but I wonder if any of them would come remotely close to the TT options.

Thank you for taking the time to test and posting it in this well-formatted post! Appreciate the credits too <3
Addition:


I did a few more testings, and there are some more results I'd like to share.

Dragoon-F Yell Atomic-S vs. Acid Anubis Gravity Orbit
Yell Atomic-S: 3 Wins, 2 Draws, 5 Losses
Polish Atomic-S: 1 Win, 2 Draws, 7 Losses
Atomic-S win percentage: 20%

In a lot of older posts and videos, I read that Atomic had great LAD. Turns out, that LAD was marginal at best and not actually a centerpoint. Case in point, the results of this combo were terrible. With only four wins out of twenty, this barely eeked out a 20% winrate. Yell was much more consistent than Polish, but even then it's still only a 30% winrate. Even when compared to relatively poor drivers like Universe-SPM, Atomic-S still performs significantly worse. At-S is much better suited to Stamina and KO-Defense, and should not be considered for Dragoon LAD combos.


Dragoon-F Yell Zephyr-Q+Kick vs. Acid Anubis Gravity Orbit
Yell Zephyr+Kick: 2 Wins, 3 Draws, 5 Losses
Polish Zephyr+Kick: 1 Win, 1 Draw, 8 Losses
Zephyr+Kick win percentage: 15%%

Now, I'm not sure how to interpret this data because, off-the-record, this combo managed to beat A2.G.O 5 Rounds in a row. A primarily Same-Spin driver going 5-0 against the benchmark made me want to see just how consistent this was. Unfortunately, this turned out to be a fluke. The moment I took out my spreadsheet, Z+Kc just kept losing round after round. I assumed it could use its height to its advantage and could use that large dish on the bottom to get a few more rotations in. Nope, it just kept losing. At the very least, I could tell that Yell was a far superior disc; it allowed the combo to win one more round and draw two more. Still, when it comes to QuadDrive Attachments, +Drift is the best option for LAD, and if it gets banned then there's no need to use the rest.



So yeah, the more tests I do, the more I see that Hasbro isn't really well-equipped when it comes to reliable LAD drivers. It has at least a few, but thanks to the reputation of their TT counterparts, they are now at risk of getting banned and leaving the Hasbro beys at a massive disadvantage.
You should try Dragoon-F jerk Xtend-s I was able to use it in a classic tournament and it did well with equalization and went toe to toe with a Dragoon-s? Polish drift. The Xtend-s driver works surprisingly well for me with its decent LAD and the jerk disk being lower to the stadium helped keep it upright during its battles. I hope this combo helps you like it helped me😉