Mike, I understand about the problems with full pound wt breaks w/ high HP cars, which is why my suggestion was full pound for *some*. It's not .5-lb breaks top to bottom even now. I have one of "those" combos... 200lb heavy for its natural class, over 500lb light for the next class. The upper and lower ends of the spectrum can't be moved, understandably, but the wt breaks can be spread more as you move down the list. They just went wacky when they did the FWD breaks.
Sticks and autos: compare indexes, wt break if necessary. If class breaks are equal, no reason to not combine them. Wouldn't hurt my feelings if sticks ended up w/ a tiny advantage... incentive to see more built.
RE: "everyone will only race 'the' killer combo" -- 1) Combos are still subject to factoring, 2) Most people build cars they LIKE and/or can afford, period. Otherwise, you'd already have 128 new Cobra Jets in the field. (And if you had 128 CJ's, refer to point #1.)
PS - typing on a Blackberry sucks. This is how much I love you guys.
LOL