They won't break off at top if you go over through strong crotch then trace down the back side of the fall to clove on the backside right above the cut. In this way, all the force of the pull isn't just choked at one focus point of stresss like running bowline, but rather braced by increasing diameter of the spar as it traces down the back, also in the most cocked back/leveraged position and finally, the exta leg of line at that angle and friction may give up to ~ 1.4/1 tension at the top of line, that due to the extra bracing can be placed at even more of a higher leverage of pull. This gives best security and pull i think; also as JP points out easier to untie and ulace knot after pull as it ends up on top of the dropped spar near cutter, rather than buried; also easier to change your mind etc.{
http://www.arboristsite.com//showthread.php?s=&postid=32728#post32728}
That coupled with triangle hinge a'la Dent {
http://www.arboristsite.com//showthread.php?s=&postid=40011#post40011}; i think is mechanically most correct, but i am Dent brainwashed and those are his words!
If they are 'springy pines' i like loading that spring and letting that work for me; but i am quite a 'tweaker' at these things, for i learn the most walking that outer edge of power to investigate every nuance to name and segregate, to polish each pieace to build into subsequent gravity powered, line controlled rigging/drops! Or something like that!
If the lay of the hinge flap is diretly into 12o'clock (PM JP!) i would visualize pulling across the face of the hinge but not to 3o'clock; but rather to 1:30-2 o'clock. Looking to still pull forward, but also lay a load directly into the hinge with a balanced set of pulls across it's face. Lean on one side, held in checked restriction on the cross axis by the sum of fibred pulls to balance the lean's pull out. One of these being the line pulls sumnation of pulling(3/1 etc.), running to the bracing/leverage/mechanical advantage sumnation running on the load itself (tree).
The other fibre, still on the cross axis of the lean is the wood hinge fibre. It is very powerful, calculated pull by how far out from the lean's pull it is leveraged across the face, and seperately it's amount of rear most fibre in triangle placing most leveraged stretch pulling over front fibre. This takes good wood no dryness, decay, knots, catfacing etc.; because it doesn't put strain at the top like the line, it requires strength/flexability of fibre at the more inspectable, strongest part of the tree in a drop (trunk at hinge)! To maximize this over the widest range of speed/direction control i use a wide mouth hinge, with perfect, non-intersecting cuts for the widest sweep of all this control, that doesn't jam/tearoff early from any shelf of intersecting cuts in the face disturbing the perfect gracefull flow of the hinge machine. Then wee pull with the most leveraged force to call on the most amount of hinge fibre to start the flex, so that there is more holding fibre available through the hinge sweep's ushering from this challenging of the hinge.
All this applies to rigging, even turning these models sideways. It is exactly the same but diffrent! So i practice and observe them with every cut, finding the most distilled down properties into blox to understand and assemble in diffrent machines with each piece familiar and polished, to watch how far it get's tweaked that time and the sum and lessons of that; that go into the next; checking them each against all present theories...
In my area, i consider pines one of the easiest to manipulate, explore and learn these things!
As the ancients believed, the ability to understand and call these devils out by name grants control over them; though i think that belief is now aimed more at shrinx (bartenders, hairdressors too etc.!!!!); it is quite an empower-meant that serves me well here.