in terms of the influx of asics now and in the near future, what is the difference between vertcoin and an X11 coin like Hirocoin? I know this is a vertcoin thread, but what is the reason behind supporting vertcoin over hirocoin?
Thats simple: community backing and development.
What about vertcoin vs DRK then. DRK is not a pump and dump and will offer complete anonymity via DarkSend. Not bashing VTC as I am holding some, but I also hold DRK. Just trying to figure out what would be better to invest more in and why. And while we're at it, what about VTC vs UTC. UTC has wicked fast confirmation times compared to the 2.5min of VTC, and also offers asic resistance via scrypt-jane.
This has been discussed before. The devs have chosen to go another route because complete anonimity will very likely lead to bans in the future and vtc is meant to be a broadly accepted coin to be used by everyone.
In the end it comes down to what you believe is right. If you think of going with coin A then go with it. Read all the announcement threads and choose wisely (as far as that is possible, all cryptos suffer from the current bitcoin down spiral and who knows if and what crypto will survive).