I much prefer traditional steel & anodized aluminum over synthetics. While you can break just about anything with the right amount of abuse, I've seen far more broken firearms that make use of synthetics than traditional materials. Although rare, you can find examples of cracked AR-180Bs, Carbon-15s on this board and many other similar forums. While not of epidemic proportions by any means, the possibility of failures is there, especially under extreme temperature conditions. For me, I'll stick with the steel & aluminum, but that's a personal choice. There are tons of AR-180Bs floating around and most of their owners are quite happy with them. I guess it all comes down to personal choice/preference.