R145 for defense? I mean, it has good weight but you trade off a huge amount of stamina to keep it in the stadium with that shape and RS.

I'm obviously biased towards MF-H Basalt R145RF, so I'd love for it to go on here. I don't have many Flash results though, but from the one I saw they were about evenly matched. It crushes Blitz and VariAres however.

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"In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends. Last night, I experienced something new: an extraordinary meal from a singularly unexpected source. To say that both the meal and its maker have challenged my preconceptions about fine cooking is a gross understatement. They have rocked me to my core. In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau's famous motto, "Anyone can cook." But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist; but a great artist can come from anywhere."

-Anton Ego/Peter O'Toole (1932-2013)

It used to be top-tier and it made Rock Giraffe one of the best uncustomized Beyblades. Now, it is outclassed, but if it has a use, it is in Attack and Defense.

It used to be top-tier and it made Rock Giraffe one of the best uncustomized Beyblades. Now, it is outclassed, but if it has a use, it is in Attack and Defense.

Yeah I agree. I remember before the Maximum Series, people would talk about R145 being the next best option after GB145. I'm not sure if it was a unanimous opinion, but I definitely remember it being decently prominent in Defense.

Pre-Maximum, the next best defense tracks after GB145 are 85 and 90 - heck, they were actually probably better. 230 blew LTDC away just before it would have hit the big time. For Earth, I'd use C145 over R145, Libra, well, yeah you could use R145 there and it'd work better than C145, but GB145 and 85/90 would be safer options. 100 would probably be better too but given the wider release of 85 in BB-96, Lightning 85RF/LRF would be somewhat dangerous even with libras overhang.

The thing with talking about what was said at the time is you lose what was found since then: that R145 has too much recoil to be useful for defense, unless you have grip and a heavy wheel, and even then, 85, 90, BD145, 230, E230, and GB145 all outperform it anyway. (And of course, realising that LTDC was a great option pre-maximum only comes in hindsight).

I don't have an issue with the track section having a fair bit of defensive discussion, because it was considered a defense track on release and is designed to be one, but in a practical sense, it's not a good defense track.

Overall, the article still needs a lot of work in that respect. Honestly, I wouldn't list a defense custom. I'd list an anti-attack custom for sure (namely Ga's Basalt R145RF), but yeah. R145 is an Attack Track.

Did some work on the track section:

The R145 Track is among the heavier Tracks of Metal Fight Beyblade, and is shaped similarly to WD145, but instead of the 'wings' being made of plastic, they are made of hard rubber, and are also even more widely spread. Its composition has two parts to facilitate production and assembly in the factories : a main gray body with three protrusions that have small hooks to grab onto the second piece, which is the three-winged orange rubber part. The concept of this Track is to absorb hits from low Attackers, which does work occasionally, however, as with WD145, Recoil is produced because of the relatively wide gaps between the wings, as well as the contact points. Consequently, R145’s heavy weight does not fully make up for its Recoil. These gaps also affect its shock absorption ability. Because of this, it is slightly outclassed in Defense against low Attackers by GB145, even. Another problem is that its wide shape and low placement cause a massive decrease of Spin Velocity when it scrapes the stadium floor, similar to C145’s and ED145’s flaws. Still, the heavy weight it does have makes it a mildly useful Defensive part against taller Smash Attackers, and if none of the top-tier Defense tracks are available, R145 may be used (though it may be more productive to use a Low Track, such as 85 or 90, if those are available). This said, R145 still finds some use: While it suffers from Recoil, the large gaps and contact points that produce that recoil also produce a good amount of Smash Attack, and the harder rubber bounces opponents off rather than fully absorbing the force of impact. Along with this, its weight distribution matches that of a number of past and present Smash Attack Metal Wheels, the most notable of which are Gravity Perseus and VariAres. Thanks to these attributes, R145 has found a home as one of the staple Attack tracks of Metal Fight Beyblade. Furthermore, it also finds some use in Anti-Attack customizations, where its moderate Defensive ability is used alongside its Smash Attack to defeat opposing Attack types.

A few modifications: The first sentence, though I see what you are getting at, sounds awkward. Secondly, it's still the third heaviest track, IIRC, behind BD145 and E230. While GB145 is the only one lighter in the heavier tracks class, it's not really that notable IMO, that we should be that negative on weight terms. The weight has never been it's issue with R145, recoil has.

Also, I changed the colour of the centrepiece to Gray (we use the american spelling for that right?), because it is, as is rock giraffe's WB.

The biggest change though was the last part, to avoid the connotation of the recoil being positive, because as we know, Recoil moves you backwards, Smash moves the opponent backwards. It also originally made R145 sound too niche, which it certainly isn't, since the discovery of MF Gravity Perseus R145RF, it's consistently been top tier. I also mentioned 85/90 being better alternatives, and seeing as not all of the better defense tracks were mentioned before it said "if the above mentioned tracks are not available", I changed it from that to 'top tier defense tracks', basically.

As for basalt r145rf, I haven't used it against flash all that much but when I did it didn't seem to do that well (though for context, nothing much does that well and it does better than a lot of plain defense types). However, I definitely think it is worth a mention because it still messes up other attack types, particularly Variares and Blitz (and probably even some of the weaker flash ones), and it is definitely one of the more notable R145 combinations (and the only thing close to defense that it is worth using on).


One more thing: I don't know if it's worth mentioning, and it probably isn't, but Giraffe was one of the three CW's that exposed Vulcan's contact points best (the other being Horuseus and Byxis). To be honest, I think it's competitive attributes should be discussed more either way, basically it has a very square shape. This used to have a slight effect on beys movement patterns, making them slightly less perfectly circular, though that time has passed, it is probably worth mentioning that due to its somewhat irregular weight distribution that it isn't recommended for competitive use.

But yeah that overall section needs some work too. While Rock Giraffe was "decent-ish" out of the box, it really wasn't all that special, and wouldn't stand up to even some of the better OOTB attack customs, especially if you count BB-96's Pegasis RF combo (LLD would probably give it some hassle too, as would an aggressive Ray Unicorno).

Here, these are what come to mind as better OOTB just off the top of my head:

Everything from BB-96
Some possible combos from both reshuffle sets
Earth Aquila
Aggro CS'd Ray Unicorno
Grand Ketos T125RS (WD145 might be too, but eh).
LLD

Some of the other more attack-focussed releases that came before would probably be better too, plus I'm sure I forgot a few things (and I didn't think of any of the multi-bey sets other than those I listed, nor RB's or hasbro releases). You might even do better if you weak launched a stock Gravity Perseus lol.

I think what's happened is you're confusing "having a bunch of really good parts" with "good out of the box", Giraffe, Rock, and R145 were all attack parts and WB wasn't aggressive enough to use them or defensive enough to handle them. But, all but rock were top tier pre-maximum (giraffe on vulcan, R145 on gravity, wb shouldn't have been post-CS/RS/RSF but yeah). It was a great purchase but you wouldn't get anywhere with one uncustomized.
Gravity Perseus is similar - all the parts were great but if you used one uncustomized you were going to lose (especially as weak launching hadn't been discovered then).

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

85, 90 and GB145 were all barely available though. GB145 was still only available with Mirage Virgo, or in some expensive sets. R145 was therefore the best and most available option, just at the time.


However, I am fine with what you edited in the Track section. What I would do for the combinations is to include Basalt R145RF inside the text, but give the Attack customizations part its own section, like the way it is now.


Could you add to the Clear Wheel section too then ? Personally, it is not in my memory as a notable or top-tier Clear Wheel ...

When did sonokong and hasbro release Earth Virgo by comparison? And, at the time you mention, was Libra banned? In which case, Earth would have been the best defense wheel and as I said, I'd take C145 over R145 there any day. 100 too.

Yeah, I'll work on that and the overall, but it's getting late here, so it may take til tomorrow.
As for Giraffe being top-tier, I don't think it was listed, but it was one of the three for Vulcan, as I said, though because Vulcan came with horuseus, it wasn't that common. But for Vulcan it's not hard to tell what will/won't work best, just by comparing the exposure of metal, and Giraffe is very well-shaped for it.

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

Hasbro released it over a year later, and SonoKong's was several months later. Libra was almost definitely banned at that time. For some reason, R145 was more popular than C145.

Sorry, several months later than Rock Giraffe, or several months later than RBV4, or both? Either way, I was talking Pre-Maximum, not when R145 was released, haha. And now, it's even worse, given BD145, 230, and E230 can be added to the already lengthy list of parts that outperform it. So yeah, I don't think it deserves a defensive use section.

I recall opinion being very much split (though by the time I came along, hasbro had just begun releasing MFB), but there wasn't really enough testing to base that kind of thing on, especially not with the 10-round standard at the time.

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

She means Hasbro released Earth Virgo a year later than Random Booster Vol. 4, and SonoKong released Earth Virgo several months after Random Booster Vol. 4.

When we look in the past we also have to remember the combos it went against; 85-CH120 Attack was very popular. So, I'm assuming that R145 was more popular than 85, 90, and 100 because low Track Defense would have had to have lost to low Track Attack; and R145 was more popular than C145 because that was the best Defense height against the Attack heights at that time, and C145 had no benefit over R145: the characteristic or C145 to stop lower Attacks was considered minimal, not beneficial enough to warrant a use over R145, and weight wise, C145 was much lighter. People were willing to risk the extra recoil of R145. That I am positive about being the common opinion.

All of that is based on what I can deduce from what we've said in here, in the past, etc., not my current testing.

So, now CH120-145 Attack heights are the hoodlums of the hood. In this scenario, R145 is an obvious better choice, because what in the world will C145 benefit you with? Now GB145 is where opinions were mixed. Really, in my opinion, neither deserve a pure defense combo mention, but their past capabilities need to be mentioned pretty thoroughly. Not to take up the whole section, but it's important for people to know in order to understand the part as much as possible. Obviously now we know, with our current Attack heights, 85 and 90 are better for Defense than both R145 and GB145.

Like I've said though, I think Basalt R145RF is definitely necessary, and in my opinion, it belongs in Defense.

That's all my thoughts at the moment.

Hm, so when was the sonokong release of Earth Virgo w/ respect to Rock Giraffe being released by takara? I guess not many people bought sonokong, but that would've made gb145 much easier to get.

The reason no one used LTDC was because no one knew it could be highly effective, and this was when the metagame was all low tracks, other than them. They did well against Low Track Attack, significantly better than all of the 145 tracks because they prevented attackers hitting them from below, and that was how most of the attackers of the time worked (and those that didn't were all demolished by rubber defense tips anyway). At the time we were all largely focussed on weight for defenders, when the lower centre of gravity and decreased vulnerability to low attackers was more important.
As I said, they were about to break the big time before 230 came out, and it was only after 230 and BD145 forced the metagame onto taller tracks that LTAC stopped being dominant. Both have a similar effect to LTDC, too, all three preventing low-tracked attackers from hitting you underneath (amongst other things).

The benefit of C145 over R145 is quite obvious: not adding unnecessary recoil. Sub-145 attack is still very common. The weight increase may mean r145 is a better option right now, but there are at least four better tracks not counting ltdc, three of which are easily available, so while now it may be a better choice than C145, it's still not a competitive choice. Plus, I'm pretty sure R145's floor scrapes are more dangerous to a combinations stamina than C145's.

Basalt r145rf is anti-attack through and through (it's the combo that caused me to coin the term). It wins predominantly by KO, while Defense generally is considered a passive type (i.e. Wins by OS). Because of all the hassle we had with getting certain people to accept that defenders didn't have to be passive and that RF could be a defense part, which, while ridiculous, isn't worth the time arguing about (if you want to find discussions I'm referencing I think it was mostly the earth 100rf stuff), an alternative term for Attack-Beating-Aggressive-Moving Combinations is a much simpler compromise.

As for the common opinion of the time, surely you've seen by now how often that just isn't accurate? Things get overlooked, overrated, people are taken by new parts and don't see obvious flaws... Hindsight is always more accurate.

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

I just checked : SonoKong had released Earth Virgo as a Starter by February 2010, just two months after TAKARA-TOMY's release, hah.

To be fair, I should ask: Do you recall whether people bought that, then? I mean, either way, by the time R145 was released a superior track (GB145) was readily available, but yeah.

Oh, and just to clear it up, I wasn't suggesting we don't mention its past status as a top tier defense track or discuss it's defensive usage, but we should be clear that it is no longer a competitive defense part (and perhaps that even at the time, a number of parts outperformed it.)

Working on the CW/Overall parts now, today was much busier than I expected, haha. Hope to have it done before I doze off.

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

I think that, to clear the issue, I will just do tests on my own this week, if I can.

That would be a very good idea, haha. Testing is generally a safer option than my crackpot rambling.

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

Hey does anyone think that rock should be one of the heavier wheels instead of heaviest wheels? if its weight is around 31 grams then there are many wheels that weight around 31 grams such as earth mold 2, flame, vulcan and gravity. also Hell and of course the infamous old basalt are both heavier by a pretty large margin.

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Whatcha lookin' at huh?

"One of the heaviest" sounds more grammatically acceptable.

How about then instead of 'to date', say 'was one of the heaviest at that time'?

---

"In many ways, the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little, yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment. We thrive on negative criticism, which is fun to write and to read. But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so. But there are times when a critic truly risks something, and that is in the discovery and defense of the new. The world is often unkind to new talent, new creations. The new needs friends. Last night, I experienced something new: an extraordinary meal from a singularly unexpected source. To say that both the meal and its maker have challenged my preconceptions about fine cooking is a gross understatement. They have rocked me to my core. In the past, I have made no secret of my disdain for Chef Gusteau's famous motto, "Anyone can cook." But I realize, only now do I truly understand what he meant. Not everyone can become a great artist; but a great artist can come from anywhere."

-Anton Ego/Peter O'Toole (1932-2013)

The rock section as a whole needs to be updated to account for how its standing has changed.

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

The rock section as a whole needs to be updated to account for how its standing has changed.

But is the Rock section from the Rock Escolpio draft OK ?

Ah, I knew there was another rock draft we were working on.

It's an improvement but it's very sparse in terms of discussion about it's properties in a battling sense. I will give it a go at some point if no one else gets to it first.

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th!nkBlargh|H-Code Product List

my fone was confiscated so my reply is late. I think I agree with Ga'Hooleone. Altough wat u have written is gramatically correct, it is somewat misleading today.
EDIT:Ga'Hooleone, I think u mean 'at the time of its release', Dont u?

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Whatcha lookin' at huh?

What's the current dealio with this draft? Same questions still? Any testing got done?

We are wondering about R145. With your lack of recent good parts anyway, we would like to know whether it was a good choice back then compared to GB145, and even with Rock Giraffe R145WB uncustomized.

What exactly needs to be known? How it fares in the old meta of Pre-4D/Maximum Series? I can add that on top of my Bakushin testing if you'd like, I just need to know what you think would be best suited to test it against.

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How do I still have 17th most posts here...?

Yep pretty much. It'd be awesome if you could get some tests done.