I just mean there are two different ways to ask the question... it was just like with the STs.

With STs (and I'm using STs b'cos everyone can pretty much agree there)

I could ask the absolute: "Is the T4 durable?" and get answers like "Yes it is", "not it isn't", "it's durable enough", etc. It doesn't really make much sense, b'cos there is no point of reference, ultimately the answer is based more on opinion than fact. I could debate someone else all day about this and neither one of us could demonstrate the other was right or wrong.

But if I asked the comparitive: "Is the T4 more or less durable than the Rustler?", pretty much everyone could agree what the answer was.

Sure reputation is also coming into it, since Traxxas has built primarily bashers in the several years leading up to the slash, while associated has built exclusively racers. And there are always sacrifices made or tradeoffs with vehicle designs. But you also have to look at it statistically, and there being a whole lot more slashes out there, they are going to break the most often. For instance if you have 10 slashes, 3 SC10's, and 1 Blitz at your track... and in a day of racing, two of the slashes, one of the SC10's and none of the Blitzes weren't running at the end of the day, that would mean the Slashes are winning in durability, the SC10's are losing, and the Blitzes, we'll, you just don't know enough since the sample size is just too low. The only difference between these things and STs is that no one would really seriously race the Rustler, while there's a lot of slashes out there being raced.