Concepts: VMC's or Archetype's or Both?

[Molosse]

A simple topic stemming from the previous ones that've been brought up, what do people, as individuals, feel is more effective for creating an effective iteration of a specific concept: VMC's, Archetypes or Both?

For example:

When looking at a Mad Dog Barbarian vs Hunter (VMC Barbarian) upto Level 12 there is demonstrable bonuses to either build with the Hunter gaining the benefits of a weaker and shorter Rage (20+Con Rounds/Day vs 12+Con Round/Day) while also granting his/her AC a much larger focus with, in turn, Animal Focus there to make up for any failings from Rage.

Though of course the common issue is, as always with VMC's, the restriction of feats placed upon the VMC user. To this end what do you prefer? Do you have any examples of a concept that VMC's have opened up for you in an effective medium or do you have any preferences for VMC's replacing or complimenting Archetypes or general character concepts?

[TheIronGolem]

When evaluating these kinds of choices, I go granular. That is to say, I ask myself "Of the many feats/class features/skills/whatever in the game, which ones serve this concept well?". Then I set about prioritizing the items on that list to figure out what's the most important, and that list forms the basis of my build. I then go about finding the most efficient way of getting all (or at least, as many as possible) of those things using however many class levels I have available.

In short, I don't necessarily prefer VMC to archetypes or vice versa - it's too dependent on what particular concept I'm chasing.

[Psyren]

Seconding that it's very concept-dependent. In general I find archetypes to have a higher ceiling (for the good ones) and a lower floor (for the awful ones) than VMC.

VMC tends to have more of an impact on low-tier classes with lots of feats I think.