Been thinking, 2011 Hellbents in 189 or 2011 EP Pros? I now have two seasons on my Prophet 130s and enjoy skiing them, but to get the most out of them they need to be ridden hard, especially in the crud, but they're still fun. I am 5"11 and 160lbs and do alot of backcountry and technical lines, like steep trees and as many cliffs as I can find (Vail, Jackson Hole and the like). I also do a little bit of skinning, both with my Prophets and my skinny skis ('10 ObSeths) and will probably skin with either of these. I did demo 2011 Hellbents in 179 at Vail in late December and found fresh crud on piste and a little powder in the trees. I did find them to be super playfull in crud and powder and can even be skied a little lazy because of all the rocker (they just kind of float over everything), but also kept going over the tips when landing +10ft. I'm starting to ride switch more and am wondering if these will be better than the Hellbents, especially dropping off cliffs and natural features?

that is an interesting question, The Hellbents are reverse camber and the Ep's are rockered in more tail tip from what i know. The Hellbents as you know are the bigger ski at 132 mm underfoot vs. the EP's 127 mm underfoot. The Hellbent skis a little more a water ski but they absolutely dominate the Powder and they are made can drop big cliffs if thats your thing but they are at home with the back country freestyle, big spins and landing switch, a big percentage of the top backcountry freestyle kings ski the hellbent, Pep F, Andy Mahre, Charley Ager, and the legendary Sean Pettit. All those guys are at the top of their games and they ski the Hellbent and they all land switch the majority of the time. The Ep pro is a great ski though, as i said before its the smaller of the two, but they still ski like water skis because of the early rise tip and tail, but because of that they will be easier to manage on the hard pack. They like the Hb's are made to stomp big switch hits in the Backcountry The Ep's are a little easier to manuver in the narrow steeps because of they are smaller underfoot so it does not take as much to muscle them. Both skis are good in the slush and corn days, fun to butter with and smear and just have all around fun. So remember though that both of these skis are made in the same factory, and that yes they are different companys but they along with Volkl are all owned by the same company (jarden inc), so they operate as different companys but they share technology and construction etc. So in my opinion the Hellbents are the better skis, and next years are really fun skis to ski, (skied them last week) in chest deep pow. so hope this helped