Call for a ban on wedges

I took my friend to see a live event late last year,he had many comments but I noted that he was less than impressed by the number of roboteers who were using the ford escort of the robot world-THE WEDGE-to be fair some did have powerfull flippers and yes your in with a chance of winning with the tried and tested design,not sure that it totally captivates the audience though.

Cant imagine that robot wars would have survived to the seventh series if so many wedges were involved-they were effectivley frowned upon

Some people dont have time or money to make anything bigger than a wedge or dont have the experience!

There are many heavyweight spinners hideing out there, but they cant spin up in any existing arenas as it is just too danegerous. And wedges combined with flippers are still on of the most effective designs out there.

I think if wedges didnt captivate the audiences, then Roaming Robots and XFM etc wouldnt be putting on sellout shows time after time, so the majority of the audience must not mind them. As Bex says, lack of money can play a major part in making your robot a wedge - if you cant afford to install an effective weapons system into your robot, a wedge is one of the best ways to at least have some control over the outcome of a fight. Sure, theyre not all that visually exciting, but (particularly for newcomers) theyre easy to build and so are the most viable option.

I make it a rule for myself never to have a wedge or pushbot, but I see no reason to ban them.

Yes, I think flippers and spinners and specially axes and hammers are far more exiting, but seeing a storm II slamming a robot in the wall without his lifter or a Bonx doing likewise in the feather department is not my idea of boring either.

Having a wedge or a box is not the problem, how you use it is the major issue.

When Team Storm built Storm II we followed the rules to build something that would win - Storm II was a simple approach designed to do exactly what it said on the tin :o)

We made no apologies for the fact that it didnt look exciting, or have a fancy paint job - our goal was to win.....

Five years on Storm II is still the UK number 2 in whatever competition you want to judge by (robot wars, Roaming Robots....) so we clearly got something right.

...come to think about it, are there any robots out there competing and winning 5 years old or more ?

Not sure - and slightly off topic !

Ed
http://www.teamstorm.comhttp://www.teamstorm.com

Surely its less than 5 years that Storm 2 has been built ? Storm 2 made its first TV appearance August 1 2003, so thats under 4 years, so a robot thats been competing for longer than you and still winning, Kan Opener and THz I think would qualify

PS: Im not big on wedges but as Ed says, if thats whats needed to win, you make it.

Storm II was built in 2002 and first competed in Extreme in 2003

Ask John Reid and Andy Kane if theyre using the same chassis etc as they were when they built their robots ? The only change to Storm II really was the addition of the arm when Mentorn changed the rules which meant we had to move some bits around inside the bot !

Dont think youll find that Kan Opener or THz would even nearly qualify there ;)

Ed
http://www.teamstorm.comhttp://www.teamstorm.com

(Message edited by storm on February 23, 2007)

Tough as nails is also that age. It was made for BNN series 2, that was the same year as UK series 6.

its good to here peoples opinions and im sure everyone has a different one. I personally have been watching robotwars since day one, and i now have a heavyweight and feather of my own. i know personally how expensive a hobby it is but to me nothing beats seeing destruction, and videos etc i have watched from recent events, their are some i have found boring which has never happened to me before. this is only my opinion, and hence why i have a spinner. i loved chaos2 etc when they came on the scene and they are still great to watch even now, but im finding that their are too many flippers and wedges
on the scene. im sure if you asked any viewers from the tv days their favorite fight im sure it would be one that involves damage rather than seeing something sent OOTA (except maybe the more unusal ones such as WBC.