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Stacking 200 frames vs going all in on one lucky shot

I've been shooting planets with my 8 inch Dob and a cheap planetary cam for about a year now. Last week I spent 4 hours capturing Jupiter and stacked 200 frames in AS!3, then compared it to a single sharp frame I grabbed on a freak clear night back in March. The stacked one was cleaner but honestly looked like a soft orange ball, the single frame had way more detail in the bands and even caught the Great Red Spot. My buddy swears stacking is always better because it cuts noise, but I'm starting to think the atmosphere stability matters way more than frame count. I tested both on Saturn too and the single exposure from that March night beat everything I've stacked since. Am I missing something in my processing workflow, or has anyone else found that one lucky frame can outdo 200 mediocre ones? Curious if I should just keep shooting until I hit another perfect night instead of grinding through hours of captures.
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