User blog:Hogwild94/My very first redone Series 5s

This past year has been a hard one for me. It’s also been a nostalgic one as well. You see, last summer was ten years since I left primary school for secondary school. Ten years since the long, hard summer of 2006. Ten years since I acquired a copy of the Robot Wars Guide from the library. You know, that one with the error-packed guides to the first five wars and the first Extreme.

Almost the entire year was spent filling all the empty gaps in my Robot Wars knowledge. Specifically, by using that book and proof reading against what websites I could find, such as Oliver Steeples’ excellent site and a site the name of which sadly escapes me, which had written summaries of every heat of the last three main series. (It wouldn’t be until a year later when Robot Wars on YouTube really took off)

My redone series became a lot more professional as well. I had done a few in the years beforehand, but with little information at my disposal at the time, they weren’t exactly very accurate, to say the least.

I used to focus on Series 5, as that was where my memory became a little patchy; I had recorded (over) most of Series 3, and I had the magazine summaries for Series 4 to keep me right. For Series 5, however, all I had was that pull-out tournament tree from the magazine, and a few features on newcomers/updated veterans, and a few episodes of Extreme 1.

The results, as a result, were… interesting.

Here is a good example of one of my very early redone Series 5s. I can’t remember all the details, but have included what I can. The format is the same as Series 4: twelve heats of six with two three-way melees. Seeds the same.

HEAT A: Chaos 2 wins as usual, with S.M.I.D.S.Y. and the two semi-finalists the same, albeit swapped so Chaos 2 beats 8645T and S.M.I.D.S.Y. pitting Steel Avenger. As 8645T and Cronos looked about the same, I credited them to the same team. In the end, I ended up replacing 8645T with Cronos, repainted red, which would beat S.M.I.D.S.Y., before miraculously nearly beating Chaos 2 after getting a lucky crush on the gas canister, only to them break down a la Fluffy! (I was fond of heat finals like that)

HEAT B: Not much change here. Hypno-Disc and Bulldog Breed defeat Juggernot 2 and Atomic and Lambsy beat Kan-Opener in first round. Rest of heat progresses the same.

HEAT C: For starters, I hated S3 for beating Stinger, so it was booted altogether! I can’t remember a great deal about the rest, except two of the non-seeds were Plunderbird and Raizer Blade, now rebuilt and repainted yellow with a spinning disc of its own. Stinger won.

HEAT D: Again, Reactor 2 was booted because I didn’t like it beating Gemini. I instead opted to eliminate the twins in the second round to Firestorm (I took that as being acceptable given it actually happened in Series 5) Don’t remember a great deal else, but Sir Chromalot was also present, and Firestorm won.

HEAT E: Check this: Wild Thing and Aggrobot 3 beat Velocirippa, Napalm and Arnold A. Terminegger beat Thermidor! Wild Thing gets revenge on Arnold for the Mayhem defeat, Napalm beats Aggrobot after it breaks down, before Wild Thing beats it in heat final.

HEAT F: Again, I don’t remember much about this heat except the seeds and King B remained the same. I did do a few where King B beats Dominator with a Panic Attack style pick and and pit manoeuvre!

HEAT G: Same pretty much same as actual heat, with Tornado and Evolution beating Gravedigger in first round, while Spawn Again and Diotoir beat V-Max 2, repaired and repainted orange with purple V and green MAX and with added claw at back. I think Dome might have featured in a different heat.

HEAT H: Major change here. Wheely Big Cheese and Robochicken beat another veteran (Evil Weevil and Little Fly I can remember were that veteran at some point), while Behemoth and Killertron (from Extreme) beat Crushtacean/Predator 2 (a Firestorm-esque flipper wedge built by the Crippler/Predator team). Killertron then gets revenge on Wheely Big Cheese after the seed breaks down, and Behemoth destroys Robochicken, before it gets revenge on Killertron for Series 2!

HEAT I: The seeds stayed put, along with Bigger Brother and Onslaught, and I remember Cerberus being present in at least one permutation. Bigger Brother makes it through first round and beats both seeds, same as.

HEAT J: Now, I actually had the actual Heat J on video (was away in caravan), so it stayed pretty much the same. Kat 3 and Tiberius beat Mini Morg, Panic Attack and Major Tom beat a robot that, for some reason, wasn’t one of the newbies from that heat. I think in at least one version, that robot was Weld-Dor, a green Tiberius 1 lookalike.

HEAT K: Razer and Sumpthing beat Comengetorix, Destruct-A-Bubble and Eric beat Suicidal Tendencies (somehow!). Razer then beats Destruct-A-Bubble, Eric beats Sumpthing. Then in heat final, Razer breaks down, again, giving Eric a shock victory!

HEAT L: Pussycat and Terrorhurtz beat (Executioner, Milly-Ann Bug, Disc-O-Inferno occupied this slot at some point), Ming 3 and Fluffy destroy 101 (Mike Franklin announces plans to build walker for Series 6 in post-match interview). Pussycat then immobilises Ming, and final two battles play out same.

I can’t remember how the semis and final went due to the many permutations muddling.

But anyway, those are the typical heats of my very early Redone Series 5. Any thoughts welcome; feel free to call my ten year old self out on how unrealistic some of the results are!