Well I will say I have an Ozark 3 man tent i lugged that thing for miles, it was hell and i will never do it again, i would sooner roll up in a tarp. But what i can say is, first time out i got pounded by rain with it, the rainfly did not work well as we got fairly wet, so I bought some water seal spray and it works fine now, next observation is mine has been durable compared to what everyone else is saying, in North Dakota most camping is car camping and i use it a lot with my buddies on fishing weekends several times a summer, I'd guessential I've spent (90 nights in it and set it up at least 40 times and I have not broke any component on it, my guess is those broken tents you see are people who had no idea how to use a tent or set it up properly, (like most people who buy that gear) I would say it's a solid tent as long as you car camp, put a tarp under it and don't have sideways rain as the rainfly doesn't go all the way down really. But it is a solid tent if you are just setting up Basecamp and doing day hikes.

As far as sleeping bags i would say don't go cheap i slept in a cheap bag and in reality I did not sleep and that is miserable.