Got it, I think I've got the terminology figured out now. I've made a few other posts. Relaxing the arm, building up power from the hip/chest/shoulder and transferring that into the ball are core fundamentals of all types of loops though.
things are changing, constantly. There definitely was a difference in looping styles between the Far East and Western countries, the lines are now becoming far more blurred especially as westerners can now visit countries like China far more easily than years ago and can train with the Chinese, Korean, Japanese etc players, and take on board the best bits of everyone’s thoughts, philosophies and styles and adapt accordingly.
regarding Ma Long and Timo Boll I feel Ma Longs forehand loop drive is more efficient at producing power, speed of stroke, spin, weight transfer etc, of course Timo Boll is not hitting the ball un-efficiently, all top players have to have great strokes and Timo Bolls is also excellent. Ma long has also had to adapt his game and playing style as his career has progressed, in certain situations he has become more compact as well
the thread had moved onto the speed of the rubbers, whether H3 or D09C was fastest. H3 is a Chinese rubber, in order to release the power and spin capabilities of these rubbers and achieve the highest of its gears you really do need an excellently efficient stroke and be prepared to put in maximum effort, the type of very tacky rubbers used in China has meant, out of necessity, they have had to develop a slightly different technique especially on the forehand side where more power is generally available.
On the backhand side tensor rubbers have been used as the rubber helps produce speed and spin, although some players may be moving back to Chinese rubbers on the backhand side, things change and evolve all the time.