User blog:CrashBash/Random Musings 2 - Who should have been drawn against who in Round 2 of S6/7?

''Hello everyone. My name is Crash, and I'm here today to go over some random thingamajig that's stuck in my head and won't come out. And no, this isn't an excuse for me to not finish my latest list. Honest.''

No, but seriously, at this rate somehow I don't think I'll be getting my Top 5 closest multi-bot battles done anytime soon. It's not that I don't know what they are...I know exactly which two battles I want to talk about. It's just trying to decide which one is better than the other. NOTE TO ANY AND ALL LIST MAKERS - Decide things before writing them down.

But that aside, I was reading a blog made by CaliforniaKingSnake, discussing how the second round of Series 7 appeared to give the seeded robot a tougher battle by pitting them against the stronger robot. It's an interesting read, but the way I saw it, I always thought that the way they decided to pair up the Round 1 survivors from Series 7, and Series 6 for that matter, was that they placed the strongest robot from one melee against the "weaker" robot from the other. But then I immediately began to think of exceptions, and I began to wonder, did they really do this? So, me being who I am, I decided to investigate and go over all the second round draws for Series 6 and 7, and figure out if what I thought does indeed hold water.

Series 6

 * Heat A - Followed. Razer and Tetanus 2 were pretty much dominant in their battles.
 * Heat B - Followed. Firestorm and X-Terminator were pretty much the only "good" robots in that heat.
 * Heat C - Followed. Dantomkia was stronger than Crushtacean, and avoided Chaos 2.
 * Heat D - Arguably did not follow. I guess it does depend on how you feel about what happened with Sir Chromalot at the end of its battle, but arguably it had done far more than The Alien, whereas S3 was certainly the strongest robot in its melee.
 * Heat E - Arguably followed. Vader came across as slightly the stronger machine over Wild Thing.
 * Heat F - Arguably followed. Whereas Stinger was seeded, honestly I'd say 13 Black was more dominant. Obviously Fluffy was the best in its melee.
 * Heat G - Followed. Tornado dominated everyone, and I think it's fair to say Anarchy was slightly more potent than Thor.
 * Heat H - Did not follow. There's no two ways about it, Ming 3 and Supernova were the dominant robots in their battles, pretty much immobilising all three of their opponents, and yet they were paired up together.
 * Heat I - Did not follow. Kronic 2 was superior over Panic Attack (and even flipped it), whereas Terrorhurtz had no issues in its melee.
 * Heat J - Followed. Hydra proved more potent than Dominator 2, at least in the melee, and S.M.I.D.S.Y. was the driving force in its own.
 * Heat K - Did not follow. Hypno-Disc and Bulldog Breed were the only robots still mobile in their respective melees, and yet were pitted together.
 * Heat L - Followed. Yeah, I know Behemoth is a great robot and pitting it so soon against Bigger Brother, certainly the strongest in its melee, seems a little unfair, but there's no denying Disc-O-Inferno was the absolute strongest in its melee, killing all three of its opponents.
 * Total - eight kept the strongest robots apart, four did not.

Series 7

 * Heat A - Arguably followed. M2 was the strongest in its melee, no doubt, but I'd honestly argue Roobarb did more than Pussycat in its own, having watched it back recently.
 * Heat B - Arguably followed. All four Round 2 competitors looked about equally strong in their melees, although I do suspect Grim Reaper and Jackson Wallop were slightly stronger overall than Big Nipper and Gyrobot respectively.
 * Heat C - Followed. Dantomkia nearly got King B out of the arena, and IG-88 immobilised Scorpion. Speaks for itself.
 * Heat D - Followed. Lightning pretty much manhandled 13 Black and immobilised it as well. Obviously there's no doubt Gravity was the strongest in its melee.
 * Heat E - Followed. Considering how much damage Tetanus Booster caused, it was certainly the stronger, leaving Leveller 2 to be stuck with Tornado.
 * Heat F - Debatable. It's clear that X-Terminator and Tsunami were leagues above the other competitors, but whilst Killer Carrot was clearly superior over Constrictor, it's honestly hard to tell with the big guns. They made very little contact in the first round and both dispatched of their opponents, pretty much together, very quickly.
 * Heat G - Did not follow. It's clear Atomic and Hellbent were the strongest robots in their melees.
 * Heat H - Followed. Whilst they didn't come in contact much, Ceros and St Agro did more and were more impressive than Scraptosaur and Revolution 3 respectively.
 * Heat I - Arguably did not follow. Whilst Storm 2 is in no doubt, I honestly want to say Trax put up a better performance than Steel Avenger. It certainly proved to be the stronger robot of the two head-to-head.
 * Heat J - Followed. Thermidor and Kronic were certainly the strongest robots in the heat.
 * Heat K - Debatable. I honestly don't have a clue. I want to say Hard did more in its melee than Kat 3, but I'm having a hard enough time trying to decide with Bulldog Breed over Mantis, especially considering Mantis seemed to have control over Bulldog Breed at the end...
 * Heat L - Followed. Behemoth pretty much immobilised everyone, and Judge Shred was more impressive than Mute.
 * Heat M - Did not follow. Panic Attack and Tough As Nails were paired up despite being the strongest robots in their melee.
 * Heat N - Followed. Spawn Again and Raging Knightmare pretty much proved the most effective, even though the latter's flipper wasn't working.
 * Heat O - Did not follow. I want to paraphrase Toast here - Bigger Brother and Iron Awe were the stronger robots, whilst Typhoon 2 and Hammerhead were extremely passive.
 * Heat P - Followed. No debate here.
 * Total - ten kept the strongest robots apart, four did not, and I really don't know about the other two.

Well, it looks like indeed, the second round line-up would often keep the strongest robots, or what seemed like the strongest robots, apart. However, in what is something that frequently bugs me about Robot Wars, it oftentimes just wasn't consistent...although that does pose some other interesting scenarios.....