What do you prefer?

[Snoo]

I had a glance down at my Top 10 while grazing and noticed something, 8 of my top 10 are wooden. Not only are they wooden but they're airtime machines for the most part. The last 2, while not wooden, offer solid airtime throughout their course (Storm Chaser especially).

I've noticed my preferences over the years to begin to move in a specific direction, strong ejector airtime on wooden coasters. Rides that don't follow that trend tend to be lower unless they're truly exceptional (I can think of a few, most notably SkyRush, that would be much higher had I had issues with the ride itself).

Thoughts?

 

[Sandman]

A look down my Top 10 suggests I like a diverse range of ride experiences. I think I'm still a complete lover of forceful/intense coasters. Airtime and speed are always a bonus and often fit under the 'Intense' category depending on the coaster.

 

[ECG]

I choose my Top 25 based on what I like with variety thrown in for good measure, but like Snoo I also prefer wood over steel and airtime over inversions.

 

[Smithy]

Balder - Relentless airtime and fun
Helix - Massive mixture of forces, airtime, inversions
Shambhala - Relentless airtime and speed
Dragon Khan - Inversion, forces
Nemesis - Inversions, forces

Yeah I've not really ridden enough to have a settled sort of specific favourite.

 

[YUNG_CHOPPA]

I'm a steel g-force coaster guy. I like airtime but I really like floater instead of ejector.

 

[LiveForTheLaunch]

A good wooden coaster is better than a good steel coaster for sure. There are more good steel coasters as a whole obviously (because there are more in the world so it makes sense), but my top ten is mostly wood so there ya go.

I prefer airtime over inversions, wood to steel, but I'm also starting to just enjoy the more "fun" coasters if that makes sense (Verbolten, Revenge of the Mummy, etc.).. I don't rank my coasters based on which one has better airtime than the other or which one is more intense, I literally just sit there and think "if these two coasters were next to each other, which would I rather ride?" which has turned out to be a pretty good system.

 

[GuyWithAStick]

^Yeah, pretty much this.

Sent from my VS820 using Tapatalk

 

[BigBad]

Eight of my top-10 are steel; Phoenix and El Toro are the only wood coasters. I see a disturbing trend with wood coasters (not Intamins or RMCs) where they seem to be built without any aspirations to be great, or that get extra credit for being made from wood even if their layouts aren't as good as the steel counterparts. I can hardly blame GCI* for this, as it's fine to have a niche of making fun family coasters, but when the top-ranked steel coasters are mostly hyper-style, maybe that's should be a hint to parks that people like heights, speed, and air! It's a shame, because the massive wooden structure looks awesome, and the ones that aspire to be great (e.g. El Toro) are. The size (so cost) isn't even the critical factor, as Phoenix shows.

As for inversions versus airtime, I definitely prefer airtime, and I prefer ejector air to floater. The way I see it is that when I'm sitting down, the natural feeling is 1G. Feeling 0G is less natural and thus a more interesting sensation, but then negative forces must be even more unnatural and even more interesting. The feeling of a long floater hill like on B&Ms is pretty cool, though, and I think there's no reason that manufacturers should feel they have to choose one or the other as their MO. My desire to feel something unnatural explains my dislike of hang time, I think; if I'm upside down, the expectation is that I would fall into the harness and hang like that. Many inversions have positive forces, but what I found really cool were the inversions on Wicked Cyclone (my only RMC so far) where I was upside down, but floating just like I would expect on Diamondback. The zero-G stall was awesome and should become the standard element on dedicated inversion coasters over the zero-G roll.**

*I only know Hershey's GCIs and am not impressed. What are their other coasters like, force-wise? Do Gold Striker and Prowler (for example) have solid airtime comparable to good steel coasters? (I don't mean Skyrush.)

**I went across the park and rode their Batman floorless coaster. That zero-G roll gave no floater air, as I think the rotation negated the airtime. Had it been a stall rather than rolling the whole time, there would not have have been any rotation to counteract the floater air.

 

[Bat Fastard]

Me personally, I prefer anything that gets my adrenaline pumping really good. Ejector airtime and steep drops do this best for me, but something like Top Thrill Dragster also does this incredibly well, hence why it is in my top 10.

 

[Hutch]

What Taylor said.

That's how I generally rate my Top 10 and beyond. It's really just what I enjoy more.

As for specific elements, I prefer airtime over other elements (most of the rides in my Top 10/20 have or focus on airtime). But then you have stuff like Beast, Nemesis, and Top Thrill Dragster which focus on other things, but are still worthy of their spots.

 

[jayjay]

Ultimately, I surprise myself with what I end up liking and disliking, but two things are likely to push things up: launches and enclosed track. Strong launches start the adrenaline going before I've even got on the ride. On Intamin accelerators, I love standing by the air-gate and watching the last train fly out. But even if it's not anticipated, a quick punch-to-the-gut launch really helps.

Then we have enclosed track. I feel like I'm one of the few that genuinely loved Space Mountain Mission 2, and it's the fact that with scenery flying everywhere, it feels so much faster than it is. I always maintained that the feeling of speed is far more important than the actual speed itself.

 

[Jarrett]

Generally there are two types of coasters I like with strong preferences towards certain aspects of them.

For traditional sitting in a seat on top of the track with no strings attached, I prefer speed, airtime, and aggression/relentlessness/violence. A few inversions in there to augment that (RMC does this well) I like, but I prefer coasters like that over sit down loopers or ones focused on force (I305 I'm looking at you!)

On inverted/wing coasters I prefer a long chain of graceful inversions that flow very well, and for any twisting and turning to interact with something. Banshee, GateKeeper, and Afterburn are examples of rides that do this very well. I don't like these coasters to feature a ton of force or pointless turning (Batman clones and Talon, this means you!)

 

[Coaster Hipster]

Generally I prefer Intamin steel airtime machines over anything else.

So, for me:

Airtime > Inversions
Steel (EGF, Superman SFNE) > Wood (El Toro)
Ejector airtime (EGF) > Floater airtime (Nitro)
Sustained ejector airtime (EGF, Goliath WH) > Bunny hop airtime (Wicked Cyclone)

Drop (EGF, El Toro) > Launch (Kingda Ka, Joker's Jinx)

Flyer (Superman: UF) > Inverted (The Monster, Black Mamba)
Forceful Inverted (The Monster) > "Graceful" Inverted (OzIris)

 

[Hyde]

I think my biggest preference is novelty. I love roller coasters with unique layouts, fascinating locations, or cool design approaches.

 

[mouse]

I generally just go for whatever feels most 'fun', whether the fun is caused by airtime, forces or inversions. I like to feel a bit out of control, so strong positive and negative forces are important. I also place a large emphasis on look and theming - Taron wouldn't be my number 1 if it didn't look so god damn good.

 

[Edward M]

My roller coaster list usually just falls into place I guess. I can just say I enjoyed this more than that for the most part. It seems my preferences lie all over the place. It really just depends on how much I enjoyed each ride or how much of an impact it left on me. Sometimes rides with great theming or a unique environment leave an impact on me, and sometimes they are just great rides without much theming. My top 10 isn't really that much alike for any of the coasters. It is just simply how much I enjoyed each one.

 

[andrus]

Since most of you prefer wood I might be the expception that proves the rule! I genuinely appreciate smoothnes, speed and force in my rides, and hence all but two of my top 10 coasters are steel! I can't say that there's a preference of airtime over positives either. But all of my top rated rides tend to be speedy ones. So if anything, I prefer coasters with a great sensation of speed :--D