I've just entered the realm of 1/12 again and purchased a rc12l4. It's pretty dialed, build wasnt that bad either. Almost all of the 1/12's use one of Associated front ends..... so there is no way around that. All of the 1/12's will require work to build correctly, since they are so sensative to everything. The 12l4 is pretty easy to dial in though. Mine was pretty good out of the box, lowered pods and arms arent really a must have.... But they are nice. It does come with the good axle, which is super cool.

-Korey