Whitepaper used to be highly important in the past but this days i think a strong team is a better benchmark for a good project..Majority of the projects i have researched recently with top notch whitepaper have done terribly in the crypto market with some even exit scamming.
Strong team with no whitepaper? I'd never give into something like that. And how on earth would you know about strong teams anyway? Anyone these days can splash out a nice CV with blockchain expert and CSS wizard skills etc. But end of the day, no leadership and no real motivation to build product is going to lead to a project with no progress.