I've owned a mount vision of some description since 97 and never had a mischief in the ouch department!
A bollock,stem interface wouldn't be pleasant either
Til I took the photo of them together I hadn't noticed the different swing arms. A bit of digging shows that the blue is 99 and the raw 2000.
Re:
If you're worried about chips maybe some helitape is needed. A seat post mounted guard will be no use .However I've used a Zefal No Mud and placed it well back of where it should be. That would work and then the Crud guard keeps the muck off my back.
The blue swing arm takes a 165mm shock , has 2 sets of bottle mounts and an integrated disc mount.
The raw one has a 190 mm ,only one set of mounts and a bolt on disc mount.