Wow, this thread blew up. Thanks for all the comments and feedback. Much appreciated.
I pulled the pin and bought the Norco Search XR A1 this morning. Was out for five hours this afternoon. So much gravel, old railways and paths to link up (NE). Ended up doing an 85km loop with a friend and finished off at the pub. Pretty Chilled with a few stops for photos and food. Spent about all of five minutes on roads. So nice not to have aggressive drivers and traffic constantly up your rear end.
I’ve now come to the conclusion that I don’t need a dropper on the gravel bike. I rode some rather rough trails at the start and that was harsh compared to my Fuel Ex 9.8. no surprises there! The bike really shines on the gravel, bridal ways, the paths, floaty fast woodland dirt trails. Big grin on my face a few times. It’s a bike that makes tame MTB trails really fun. It also accelerates really well up forest banks. Really relaxed geometry, comfortable and the 38s really grip hard when you want to pin corners. I don’t think I’d want wider tyres as the compromise between speed and comfort seems spot on at the moment.
I think this bike will be ridden more than my MTB and road bike during autumn and winter. As a gravel bike, for exploring and a winter road bike!