Hooligan

The Veritas is a "30 ton" graphite. Graphite rating is pretty ambiguous, at best. It really doesn't mean much until you have a finite grasp of what the implications are, as well as what the resins and process entail. When it comes down to it, blank thickness, wall thickness, strain rate, and compression strength, as well as lateral stability are all important factors. One company can achieve the same in all of those categories using a higher modulus graphite than company B uses to make what is essentially the same finished product. Case in point, the new Crucial is an IM10 graphite, the Cumara is IM10 graphite. The two are completely different in terms of weight, sensitivity, and feel. The resins used in the finishing process are entirely different and build an entirely different rod.

I don't disagree at all, hence my statement that the design is a great premise, it just needs to be refined.

Good reel for pitching and flipping, one of the best, really. They're a no-nonsense, no frills reel, albeit a bit heavy. The design is a great premise, for sure, and if it could be refined there'd be quite a few more folks owning one.

It's very much a preference thing for some baits. I fish jerkbaits, blades, and jigs year round. Those are constants for me. Everything else depends on the water, the temps, and where I am. I may fish a Wart in 52 degree water on some lakes, and I may fish other cranks when it's far below the temperature that conventional wisdom says. It comes down to experience and time on the water, really. You can read, and read, and read about patterns and get an idea, but ultimately it's on the water experience that is going to lead you to be able to identify the times that you should be throwing specific baits.

Don't bother with the dropshot, learn to use a jig to maximum potential. Then, and only then, should you move on to another tactic.

Dropshot line will always be fluorocarbon for me, I dislike braid for the purpose. I used to use it a lot, but figured out that I was missing fish on a lift bite; with fluoro, I'd be willing to say that I catch 30% more fish with the technique on the whole.

Not in my book, it isn't. The Veritas is lighter by a hair, and I like the handles better. The AG rods feel better to me, as well, in terms of overall balance. They're pretty level as far as sensitivity goes, both being in that mid-range of "value" rods. In terms of that, however, the Veritas blows the Duckett out of the water. The biggest thing that you have to watch with the Veritas is spline of the rod, I've seen a few with a pretty goofy guide set, the rod always wants to bend to the side on a straight line pull.

ASR has Alconites versus Aluminum Oxides on the Extreme. Other than that they're very similar. It comes, very much, to a point of preference.

Baby bluegill, beyond the shadow of a doubt.

Excellent, db, excellent. Brutally honest take on life as we know it.

Wow man, I just got back and I'm stocked on three colors of Rage Craws and Baby Craws for the next five years. They had them all @ $1.49 with the 50% off clearance price I paid $.75 each. I ended up spending about $140 on everything they had left, including any back-stock. It was funny, because the guys were trying to get me to take a lot of other baits, too.

Dependant upon the applications for which you’re searching out line, I would make different recommendations. Point of reference, if you’re looking for a very good cranking fluoro, the Berkley 100% is a great line in 12lb, but I’ve not had as good of luck with it in ten pound; by diameter, the 12 is more than adequate. As a dropsht rod, for instance, InvizX is a great line. It’s very good on spinning gear, as well. As a general line on casting gear, you’d be fine with 14lb from basically any of the major manufacturers like Toray, XPS, Seaguar, Trilene, or similar. While you’re going to find that there are users of one brand that will swear by it, you’ll find more from users of other brands. I’m a pretty hardcore advocate of Seaguar, having been fishing it since the early 90’s. Seaguar is also the only company out there that has no outside involvement in making their lines, they’re the only company that actually produces their own resins; no other line company can say that. For what it's worth...

It's horribly underpowered and lacks a lot of what a good crankbait rod should be. The guides are notorious for breaking and are not covered under the warranty.

My "restocking" storage is much like RoadWarrior; I have a stall of the garage that is dedicated space to storage of tackle and gear. Any reels that I have are shelved, rods are hung on Pirahna rod racks without reels. All of my bulk plastics are hung on two 4x8 sheets of pegboard, all of my hardbaits in original packaging are stored on another 4x8 sheet. I have three sets of shelving that are dedicated to holding 3700 size boxes sorted by bait, depth, color, and brand. All of my jigs and/or wire baits are in 3750 size boxes with all jigs sorted by color and weight. It's a pretty straight forward system to keep everything organized and together. I can also keep an accurate inventory of what I have along with what's in the boat.

The Z( baits are actually a decent bait, I've had pretty reasonable success with them.

Whoa, whoa, whoa. A new gill color and this is the first I'm hearing of it? Wow man. Just... wow.

Ok, so... I'll play nice here. Invizx is no less dense than Abrazx, Shooter, Sniper, Tatsu, or XPS. They all have the same relative specific gravity. Such is the nature of fluorocarbon, regardless of the resin used, they are all relative in density; the changes in sectional density are so minor amongst lines of the same diameter that it's almost not worth talking about. Density has absolutely nothing to do with the stretch of the line, nothing. Zero. Zilch. Point of reference for you so that you might understand it: Hard Nylon monofilament is actually one of the lowest stretch lines available to anglers. The problems, however, outweigh the benefits. What's interesting, though, is that hard nylon isn't very dense at all, as a matter of fact, it has lower density, and mass, per section than traditional monofilament roughly half its diameter. Stretch, rather more appropriately, elasticity, comes from the way the line is finished and the intended purpose. Those lines that are meant to be easier handling and have less memory are more elastic than their counterparts, IE: they stretch more. Regardless, nearly all PVDF lines are the same in terms of density. Have I fished Invizx? Not really, I just ordered it in 3,000 yard spools to look neat on the shelf. It's actually ALL that I fished for a period of time. I've been fishing USDM release Seaguar since 1992, which is when it became available. Prior to that, I fished what I could get my hands on internationally, which was very limited.

I really dislike the Nanofil, having fished it pretty extensively. I think, as do many of the pros on the walleye trail, that it's a far more niche line than Berkley had planned on. Many pros are using it only when pitching jigs; they're not using it for anything else, it's simply their jig line. I talked to two pros this past week specifically about their thoughts on the line, one of whom is a Berkely pro, and he said much the same as I posted above, only that he's not even using it because of the color. I'm not fond of the line's behaviour in terms of casting, and in terms of on the spool, nor do I like the fact that it has near zero abrasion resistance, even less than other forms of super-lines. The knot issues don't bother me, I tie good knots anyhow. I also dislike that you have to match leader sizes closely and tie a true blood-knot to keep it from slipping on you, we've tested it under too many conditions to dispute that fact; almost every knot that you tie with it is going to slip, even double palomar. The two that slipped the least are the Sadiego Jam and the Pitzen. The final thing that I dislike about the line is that it has very, very close breaking strength to the rating, most of the time the rating is very true. I don't understand the attraction of having a line cost that much money that I'm really not gaining annything over going to braid. At least with braid I can straighten my hook or break a leader off, whereas with the Nano, I'm breaking the line.

In short, it's not a bad idea on lower value rods. But on rods like and NRX, as someone alluded to, no chance. I have broken, personally, four rods in my entire career, of those, three have been defects. One was a spanking new custom that literally blew up on the cast the very first time I cast it; sounded like a shotgun went off. The others have been reel seat issues within the first three to five days of fishing the rods. If I ran into something like that and it wasn't covered on a rod like the NRX or GLX, I'd be torked for sure.

Fluorocarbon is typically less than ideal for jerkbaits, in many instances the density of fluorocarbon lines add enough weight that your bait won't suspend, it will sink. Invizx is "normal" fluorocarbon, it's pure resin the same as any other pure fluorocarbon. It has slightly more stretch than some other lines in the same class, which is what aids it's longer term manageability and reduced memory. There are pure fluorocarbons that have a lot more stretch than Invizx and a lot less, I question your definition of what a "normal" fluorocarbon is. When it comes to jerkbaits I much prefer a copoly line like CXX or C21 in an appropriate diameter. I'm not worried as much about the pound test of the line, but the actual diameter; that's what really defines the lines behaviour in terms of lure depth. If I want to hold a Vision 110 in the 18" depth range, I may fish it on a larger diameter line, if I want to gain some depth with a Pointer 78DD, I'll go smaller. I rarely, rarely use fluoro for jerkbaits; most of the pros, and many anglers here, will tell you the exact same thing.

Huh, every Smoke I've handled has been rough, I mean ROUGH. I've not handled a single reel that I would have considered owning in that series. Particularly not for the $220 price tag; there are a lot of reels that you can spend that money on that have a better reputation and a better initial feel. I'm also not terribly impressed with the longevity of Quantum's newer reels. The Tour reels are quite nice by comparison, however. I've got a couple of the Tour reels on crank sticks and they're pretty reliable.

BB makes a good point, the Supreme is a very different reel than the older Presidents, the new ones, too, for that matter. The drag is much better and the new MG has a solid body that will help to keep things in line. While I still do not like the way the have the spool shaft placed, it's probably far better than the older reels.

They've all been out and available for a while, somewhere in the neighborhood of a month or more. I don't know who told you that it would be in the next week or two. Pretty sure that all of the major retailers, BPS, TW, and the like, have had them for going on three months. I've fished the silent square bill pretty extensively and it's a decent bait. It's got a much wider wobble and roll than I really like, but it'll be an ok bait for over rock or in grass.

Mono- I don't fish traditional monofilament nylon at all anymore; that said it would be either Seaguar or Supernatural that I'd be fishing if I did. Fluorocarbon- My preference, and what I have on 99% of the rods I have fluorocarbon on, is Seaguar Tatsu. It's simply the best there is. Braid- sucks. I only grudgingly fish Seaguar Kanzen as a point of necessity in certain situations.

I have, under normal freshwater circumstances, shredded the gears in lower priced reels, usually it's the worm gear that drives spool oscillation that ends up being the culprit. While there are those that say it can't happen, it can and does. In that $100 range, the Shimano Symetre or Daiwa Exceller are two very good reels. I'm partial to the Exceller at that range, preferring that over the Pflooger reels for the sake of a much better drag, higher quality components and not some foolish notion that because it has ten bearings it's a better reel.