User blog:RA2/Robot Wars Rankdown: Series 2

It's time for Robot Wars Rankdown Series 2. For those who missed the last blog post, this is a game where all the robots of Series 1 get ranked. Players take turns placing robots, starting at the bottom, and finishing at the top.

In each round, the leader will nominate a pool of robots (2 x # of players not counting him/herself), and then the rest of the players will, in order, choose one to cut. They will write a brief summary on why they're cutting that robot, and they will finish by choosing one robot to save (no need to explain your save decision). The cut robot is ranked at whatever is the lowest vacant position - so the first robot cut ends up in last place, then the next in second-to-last place...etc. The saved robot is safe from elimination, and cannot be nominated next round. After each player has had a turn, the last player nominates a new pool of robots, and the next round begins. This will continue until a pre-determined number of rounds has elapsed. Then, all participants rank the remaining robots (with explanations), and send me their ballots. The averages determine final ranking, up to and including number one. Here's a bullet-list of the game flow, in order. The example has 5 players, our game may have more or fewer.


 * Player 1: Nominates 8 robots that he/she believes should be cut. Does not make a cut or save this round
 * Player 2: Cuts one of the 8 robots, explains why, saves another one of the 8 robots.
 * Player 3: 6 choices remain. Cuts one of the 6 robots, explains why, saves another one of the 6 robots.
 * Player 4: 4 choices remain. Cuts one of the 4 robots, explains why, saves another one of the 4 robots.
 * Player 5: 2 choices remain. Cuts one of the robots, explains why, saves the other.  Nominates 8 new robots, cannot nominate one of the 4 bots saved this round.
 * Round ends. Everybody shifts down one position, and Player 5 becomes Player 1.

We'll carry on like this until there aren't enough robots left to make a pool (some players may be the leader more than once). After the final round of cuts, the aforementioned balloting occurs, where players rank all surviving robots.

I'll be pretty open about the criteria you use to make your cuts, just a few rule & guidelines:
 * Try to insulate it to the series in question - we're strictly ranking the Series 2 incarnations of robots
 * No discussing how it was received by the fandom - you can call a robot overrated or underrated, complain about fanboys, etc, as long as that is not your only reason for cutting
 * No troll-moves. Everyone's entitled to their opinions, but if I see a move that's clearly intended to get a rise out of people or an individual, you will be booted.  Slots are very limited, do not take one unless you plan on taking this seriously.
 * No gaming the system. Do not nominate good robots with the intent of getting them immunity via a save.  Again, everyone's entitled to their opinions of what robots are good, but the list you make should be comprised entirely of robots that you'd like to see at the bottom - don't try to tell me you sincerely think something like a champion should be cut in Round 1.
 * You must have watched & be familiar with all episodes of the series in question, even the obscure ones - it won't do to have a bad robot slip under the radar because people forget to nominate it. The series is on YouTube if you need to refresh your memory, and I will post a spreadsheet in Google Docs, listing all robots in the game, and their status in the rankdown.
 * Please be punctual and check in often. The game only works if each person takes their turn in good order.
 * This will now be enforced, in order to keep the game moving. If a player does not take their turn within 24 hours of the last player, the player will receive a strike, and the turn may be taken by anyone not participating in the rankdown.  If a player gets 3 strikes, a replacement will be sought.  I'm sorry to have to do this, but it is not fair to the other players to keep them waiting an indeterminate amount of time.  If you don't have time to write out a summary, I'll accept just the robots names, and you can post the writeups later.
 * Most importantly, have fun, and don't take it personally if a robot you like gets cut sooner than you want it to.

Signups & size
There will be 7 players - that means 6 open spots plus myself, and 9 rounds of regular play followed by one free-for-all round. This'll be first come first serve, so to keep things fair, signups are only open to people who did not take part in Series 1 Rankdown. If we can't fill this in a reasonable amount of time, I'll open it up to past players.

Please comment if you'd like to play, and your desired spot. When you make your choice, keep in mind that Player 1 should be the most knowledgeable about the obscure robots, Player 7 should be the second-most knowledgeable, then Player 6, etc. All players should be knowledgeable to a degree. I've given myself position 5, as I'm in the middle of the road on Series 2.

1) Harry Stormer

2) ToastUltimatum

3) ThatRedOtter

4) Nweston8

5) RA2

6) Combatwombat555

7) Jimlaad43

Spreadsheet
For your reference, here is a list of all the robots that competed in Series 2. I will try to keep this updated with the cut/saved bots as best I can. https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1VM07WAzqPx9taEJ_GemYbJZb6bVejZzgnLq2kLeNgZo/edit?usp=sharing

Included

 * All Participants in the main competition of Series 2 (except Pain and Parthian Shot), and in the Reserve Rumble

Excluded

 * Pain and Parthian Shot for not making it into the arena.
 * Non-Heavyweights
 * Ramrombit

Rankdown
I declare Series 2 Rankdown... open! Harry Stormer will make the first nomination pool, of what he considers to be the 12 lowest-ranking robots, and then we can get underway.

Harry Stormer's Nominees

 * Malice #75
 * Lateral Thought #74
 * Bumblebot SAFE
 * Forklift #71
 * Rampage #70
 * ROCS SAFE
 * Broot #73
 * Griffon SAFE
 * Phoenix SAFE
 * Angel of Death SAFE
 * Death Trak #72
 * Cruella SAFE

75. Malice (ToastUltimatum)
Erase: Malice - malicious it was not, the robot could not even move.

Save: Cruella - a robot that was of a high enough standard in Series 1 for me to misremember it as a Heat Finalist in my new blog, it was genuinely solid in that series and didn't deserve to fight Robot the Bruce. Despite fluffing the Gauntlet, it looked solid in Series 2 and could've won some combat battles.

74. Lateral Thought (ThatRedOtter)
Taking out: Lateral Thought - It was always going to be a robot from the Reserve Rumble to take the first few positions and in my opinion, this is easily one of the worst in it. Being very light and doing nothing in the rumble apart from simply driving into the PPZ and being immobilized by the house robots, this is the only logical step up from a robot that didn't actually move.

Saving Griffon - A massive step up from a grand finalist team in the first wars, I was genuinely surprised to see this nominated to begin with. As it is, Griffon was fast, had a decently powerful lifter (being able to lift Bash is nothing to sneeze at at this point in time) and only lost the gauntlet due to radio issues. This is obvious when it won the Internet insurrection later on, proving that this robot deserves a higher placement in this rankdown.

73. Broot (NWeston8)
Discard: Broot - Rampage is fragile, R.O.C.S. is illogical, and Forklift is laughable, but I think I can make a case for some of them here and there. Broot on the other hand, I can't. It offers no logical offensive option, and is made of wood.

Save: Phoenix - Uncontrollable, yes, but I still think it's a machine with potential. The machine's failure was due to a badly chosen route - not that the robot itself was bad.

72. Death Trak (RA2)
Cut: Death Trak. "Really?" is all I can say about this robot, whose greatest innovation was that a piece of their bot comes off. For the life of me, I can't figure out how this robot was supposed to win a battle. It had two spikes that didn't look sharp enough to pierce anything, and likely not the driving skill needed to use them efficiently. Add to that that it's just such a boring and uninspired design - a box with spikes whose biggest standout is a pair of casters. And of course they went backwards in the Gauntlet, sabotaging what would've been a safe win.

Saving: ROCS. They were slow, but had a very well-driven run through the ram-rig, ending with over 8 metres.

71. Forklift (Combatwombat555)
Discard: Forklift - It's not an easy decision at this stage, but three of them have a redeeming feature. Angel of Death was slow but may have been alright in combat, having a low ground clearance and being invertible; Rampage was fragile, being killed on one side by an arena spike, but would probably have made a reasonable distance in the gauntlet if it wasn't for that; and Bumblebot had a truly feeble weapon but was actually fairly decently aggressive. Forklift just sort of didn't, having paper-thin armour that didn't seem to be secured, and being 25kg below the weight limit- even that only with a breeze block on board.

Save: Bumblebot - Whilst it had a gravity-powered hammer that did nothing, it did seem pretty well controlled, was aggressive, and would likely have done more in the gauntlet that either of the others here.

70. Rampage (Jimlaad43)
Discard: Rampage. Both of these two remaining robots were pretty much equally as bad in the gauntlet, but the fact that Rampage managed to take damage in its run is just enough of a reason to distinguish them.

Save: Angel of Death. The wedge would have probably been OK in the arena, if it ever got there.

Jimlaad's Nominees

 * Caliban SAFE
 * Jim Struts SAFE
 * Piece de Resistance #69
 * Rottweiler #68
 * Penetrator #64
 * Ron #66
 * Tender Caress #65
 * Elvis #67
 * Wheelosaurus SAFE
 * Talos
 * Mega Hurts SAFE
 * Sting

69. Piece De Resistance (Harry Stormer)
Discard: Piece de Resistance in my opinion the robot should have never gone past the gauntlet and it never worked properly

Save: Jim Struts for Series 2 a walker was really advanced and should have fought in the main competition

68. Rottweiler (ToastUltimatum)
Banish: While I like Rottweiler's name, and statistically it could have been OK, its driving was laughable. After reaching only 3.2m in the Gauntlet, it then fluffed a Joust run where it didn't even need to move, and finished with the worst possible score.

Save: Mega Hurts was well-built, had two active weapons, was a novel design, was sufficiently heavy, completed the Gauntlet in second place, and only fell during the King of the Castle trial despite surviving for 22 seconds. Even then, that was mostly bad driving, not Mega Hurts being a bad robot.

67. Elvis (ThatRedOtter)
Losing: Elvis - When a Robot can't lift its own weight that's saying alot, also considering that it completely failed to push through the brick wall in the gauntlet completely, only getting through because Bodyhammer made a driving error and couldn't free itself, and only proceeded from the soccer thanks to House Robot's leaving Milly-Ann Bug completely unable to move and it even missed an open shot at the goal!

Saving: Caliban - A robot that could have been so much more if Killalot didn't choose them ad his chewtoy.

66. Ron (Nweston8)
Dropping Out: Ron - Its weapons were attached to its drive axle, and it's easy to bully around.

Save: Sting - underwhelming in the trial, but Sting can drive and push competently.

65. Tender Caress (RA2)
Cut: Tender Caress - Why make it circular? I said before that a triangle was a bad shape for pushing, but a circle isn't much better. They covered their sensitive bits in a aluminium foil, which is a great way to get a short circuit. They couldn't hardly drive straight in the Gauntlet, and unsurprisingly finished 5th. They lost the sumo immediately because they couldn't even make their robot point straight at Dead Metal to push back.

Save: Talos - It's not anything special, but it was a decent push-box by Series 2 standards.

64. Penetrator (Combatwombat555)
Exterminate: Penetrator - it's a tough call, and Penetrator looked like it may have been reasonable in the arena with pretty tough armour for the time, but it was very slow, really lacked pushing power, and had fairly feeble weaponry. Plus it got outperformed on every stage by Wheelosaurus, which is saying something. Plus (admittedly a more minor thing), Wheelosaurus had character in bags and had that memorable moment where it beat up Sgt. Bash. I had forgotten Penetrator even existed.

Keep: Wheelosaurus.

CombatWombat555's Nominees

 * Angel of Death #63
 * Bumblebot #60
 * Cruella SAFE
 * Demon #61
 * Flirty Skirty #58
 * Groundhog SAFE
 * Limpet SAFE
 * ORAC SAFE
 * Phoenix SAFE
 * Prometheus SAFE
 * R.O.C.S. #62
 * Wizard #59

63. Angel of Death (Jimlaad43)
Kill: Angel of Death. This robot was the final robot I didn't include in the last list, because it was poor in the gauntlet and didn't seem able to do much at all. The shape was an OK idea, but not pulled off correctly.

Spare: Groundhog. Despite being pretty awful, it was innovative and could have done OK. Plus, it came closest to flipping Killalot over (technically).

62. ROCS (Harry Stormer)
Kill: ROCS it was slow and it didn't have weapon so it wasn't very affective

Save: Limpet a very good machine and most robots that have tracks are better

61. Demon (ToastUltimatum)
Vanquish Demon, 2mph is pathetic and letting it complete the Gauntlet was an act of kindness

Save Cruella which was a completely competent wedge which would've done fine in any stage other than the Gauntlet.

60. Bumblebot (ThatRedOtter)
Stopping the Run of: Bumblebot - I spent a while deciding on this on and I think that, while this is the Reserve Rumble competitor that could have done best in the actual competition, it couldn't have done that well. With a horribly ineffective hammer and poor acceleration, it couldn't have gotten too much farther than here.

Saving: Phoenix -A genuinely good robot that suffered control problems yet still got the highest eliminating score in the gauntlet.

59. Wizard (Nweston8)
Slayed: Wizard - it did nothing in the Trial and broke down under little pressure against Cassius. I nearly got rid of Flirty Skirty, but it at least lifted Havoc a little bit.

Saved: ORAC - A limp breakdown against Killertron was a shame, but its well driven.

58. Flirty Skirty (RA2)
Cut: Flirty Skirty. I give them credit for their innovative design, but now is a reasonable time to start cutting innovations that didn’t work. The skirts had not enough reach to be capable of flipping much, as shown in the tagic irony of Havoc being too high for the skirts. The spike in front was also a major design flaw, it would block most robots from touching the front skirt. It was a very clever idea to put spikes on their skirts and dig into the floor in Sumo, but didn’t really help much in practice; they finished 4th, only above Tender Caress, whose issues I have well-documented.

Saving: Prometheus. It can at least claim to work in theory, and some of its shortcomings can be attributed to the arbitrary house robots in the gauntlet and trial.

RA2’s Nominees

 * Caliban #56
 * Jim Struts #57
 * Rameses II #53
 * Talos SAFE
 * Wheelosaurus SAFE
 * Schumey SAFE
 * Leighviathan #55
 * Panda Monium #54
 * Ivanhoe SAFE
 * Milly Ann Bug SAFE
 * Whirling Dervish SAFE
 * Sting #52

Note: I was short one bot on my original post, sorry about that. Sting is the 12th robot, i Jim or CW would like to change, you may do so.

57. Jim Struts (CombatWombat555)
Being shown the door, but likely to take a while to actually get through it: Jim Struts - Don't think this'll be too popular, but whilst Jim was a great piece of engineering, being the first ever walker in Robot Wars, it just wouldn't be effective in the main competition. It's very unlikely it'd make it through the Gauntlet; any Trial that involved movement would be very tough; and the only thing on its side in combat would be its weight.

Rescued: Whirling Dervish - Again, not sure how popular this'll be, and it did struggle with the Gauntlet, but one of the few machines in the series with a spinning weapon that actually looked dangerous. Very innovative too, with the counter-rotating body shell and some attempt to indicate which direction it was pointing- ok, it didn't really work (which wasn't really their fault), but I like the thinking.

56. Caliban (Jimlaad43)
Jimlaad43 nearly 'sploded Caliban: How Caliban is still in boggles me, but it is, so it falls to me to eliminate it. The two weapons were clever and before their time, but the poorest run int he Gauntlet ever cannot be escaped.

Victory Royale!, Your team placed first Schumey! Schumey was quick and seemed a lot better than it ever showed itself to be.

55. Leighviathan (Harry Stormer)
Remove: Leighviathan a robot that never really improved since Series 1

Keep: Milly-Ann Bug A very good design that never caught on with the articulated design

54. Panda Monium (ToastUltimatum)
Guillotine: Panda Monium - I care not for the fact it was technically the robot's successor which was horrendously unsafe, this was still the lead-up to it, and it lost to Napalm.

Save: Ivanhoe - First place in the Gauntlet, second place in the Trial, combat victory over CrashBash.

53. Rameses II (ThatRedOtter)
Decimating: Rameses the II - you can thank Toon Ganondorf for swaying this vote at the last second, but this robot was one that was very lucky to get through to the Arena and while it is an improvement over Skarab, it's not much.

Saving: Wheelosaurus - I'm saving Gibson's beloved machine here simply for the ingenuity it has, being the first Uk thwackbot and being a damn good first attempt at one.

52. Sting (Nweston8)
Eradicate Sting - with these final two, it has to be Sting. It did nothing in the soccer at all.

Saving: Talos - it did solidly throughout and didn't let itself down. Flawed? Yes. But it got the most out of itself.

Nweston8’s Nominees

 * Tantrum
 * Challenger
 * Technophobic SAFE
 * Dreadnaut SAFE
 * Spin Doctor
 * Nemesis
 * Groundhog #50
 * Mega Hurts
 * Phoenix #51
 * Victor
 * ORAC
 * Prometheus

51. Phoenix (RA2)
Placeholder: Cutting Phoenix, Saving Technophobic. Next person may proceed with their turn; will write summaries later.

50. Groundhog (Combatwombat555)
Being shown the door, but can't exit just yet as Jim Struts is still leaving: Groundhog - Again, very innovative, but it was always going to struggle having to push things, negotiate a ramp, play football and ultimately fight with little pushing power and a greater ground clearance than some aeroplanes (whilst in flight).

Staying: Dreadnaut - Ok, Series 1 Dreadnaut was honestly lucky to get as far as it did, being horribly unreliable, but Series 2 Dreadnaut seemed to have those issues resolved. It was convincing in the Gauntlet, showed good pace in the Joust, and should have had an interesting fight with Oblivion had they not had terrible luck and knocked their own link out before the fight even began.