Darts Review - Red Dragon Rogue

Product: Darts (Steel Tip) Brand: Red Dragon Model Name: Rogue Variation / Edition: 22g General Summary: Rogue is a superbly built, and finely tuned, addition to the mid-premium range, straight barrelled darts, on the market. The colour scheme and styling ensure that the dart is visible in the board but not glaring / distracting. Brand New for 2019 from on-line specialist Red Dragon darts. For such a heavily machined dart it has a remarkably slim feel and look. The grip is both impressive and original. Rogue will suit most players but especially those with a firm grip and quite powerful throw. Direct throwers will be captured! At less than £45 Rogue are a premium piece of design, production and performance for a mid-range price tag. Testing Process: A.I.M used three different players, one elite, one strong amateur and one social player, and subjected Rogue to a variety of throw styles, conditions and set ups. In total over one hundred legs and close to two thousand darts were thrown. Our testers used Rogue in competitive practice, training drills, over a weekend for social games, a team practise session and even an open knockout. In addition to the supplied set up, Hardcore Flights & Nitro Stems, players were asked to try their own or any other set up they felt might work. The Results:

• First Impressions: All three of our testers were impressed with the general look of the Rogue model. The milled grip intrigued them whilst the subtle black/grey colour was deemed attractive and not “flash like some”. Two of our three players liked the initial feel of the dart in their hand. The words solid and muscular were popular.

• Performance: Our strong amateur tester was most strongly positive about Rogue. He was of the view that the dart performed very well and felt very stable and reliable both in the hand and in the flight. He felt his consistency level improved. This was the case even though the test set was lighter than his usual 23g set. In addition, our more social player liked the grip style as it “seemed less catchy” for their tight hold on the dart. Both these players are quite firm throwers and it seems Rogue compliments this very well.

 

• Downsides: Our elite level player was quite impressed with Rogue overall. However, as he uses a very light grip, he did not find it as easy to get a regular, comfortable feel from Rogue. As the session wore on this became more and more prominent. As always it is difficult to know how much of the impression was actual and how much purely psychological.

 

• The Tech Bit: For such a heavily engineered dart Rogue come in at a slim 5mm wide. The subtle cosmetics and grip pattern combine to create the impression of an even slimmer model. The 50.8mm length is the middle point in recent times and allows many different throw styles to feel comfortable. The slightly rounded ‘nose cone’ area is essential on a dart with pronounced grip. The stem join is superbly engineered, as is the nose area, enabling a collared point to be fitted whilst still allowing the “rested finger” to be consistent. The “Dual Force Machining” results in a square cut grip that acts more like a texture.

 

• Durability: Rogue stood up very well over the 100+ legs that we subjected them to. Our social player barely made a mark on them over a whole weekend. Our strong amateur caused the usual surface marks and our elite player maximised the contact between the arrows. Yet, due to the colour scheme and styling, no difference was noticed to the appearance of the dart in the board. In the hand, the darts simply appeared even more rugged than before. It is possible that a worn set of Rogue may well be even better than a shiny new trio. It should be noted that the milled grips do seem to increase wear and tear on the flights. Two out of three of our testers reported using a few extra flights over an extended period of use.