thats really all i have to say after todays events which have been building up for a while now........
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thats really all i have to say after todays events which have been building up for a while now........
I do not appreciate messages like the one above me because even though you are entitled to have an opinion, this message does not come up with any attempt to rectify this situation or add something constructive to the table.
All in all this is YOUR game, so if you dont like the way it is now, speak up and tell us what YOU want out of it.
Ive heard a lot of now its not fun anymore and the old fights were so much better
The olden days fights to paraphrase David Sheppard were also totally unrealistic.
It is the arcade racer versus Racing sim. One is instant action and putting the pedal down, the other means tweaking your stats to get that leading edge over the other. Both have supporters, both can be a lot of fun. One supporter of the first genre usually does not like the other genre. For one it is too complicated (so he wants Arcade) and the other it is just dumbing down the racing (so he goes for the sim style game).
So what do want? Realism or arcade?
Those that argue that you could have both have never in my opinion ever come up with a good explanation how they would want to do that.
If you (and with that I mean all of you that were there when this thing started) made the decision in the olden days for a base set of rules we would never have this discussion to begin with. I already argued the case for a baseline of rules, but vapourboteers felt that that should be up to the writers. Fair enough, but the writers are not interested in laying the ground rules, let alone get together and creating a foundation for it. They got enough going on as it is writing battles and coming up with tournaments.
What choice do I make?
If I wanted to play arcade than I would have stuck with RA2 or RW arenas of destruction.
Some people find that these rules are too complex, well Im sorry, but building a good robot is not just a matter of piling on parts. And it is not fair towards the people that do try to keep their stats in check if they get knocked out by a robot that even on Pluto would not have made the weight.
This is the last I am going to say on the matter. think it over, my suggestions are out there. Do with them as you will. Once you guys made a decision let me know.
Until then I will just do normal moderator stuff and answer questions if you want me to, but apart from that I will keep out of fanfic. I will not intervene in any decision making with regards to rules.
We did actually try to create a set of base rules a while back, but it was impossible to enforce, meaning everyone who disagreed just went their own merry way making it a pointless excercise. Its not like we have membership like the FRA that can kick people out if they disobery the rules.
Leo, frankly I think you are trying to overstandardise things.
One of the points of vapourbots as an alternative to real robots is that it lets people design stuff without the technical knowledge required to build a real robot, but is infinitely more customisable that a RW game.
Part of the strength of vapourbots is that its not bound by an overall set of rules, if you standardise things then you loose the variety that keeps it interesting. If every tournament is the same itll just end up being Ooh another tournament except this time written by Steve, you are basically trying to tell us that we should remove any personal nuance from tournaments from a system we have all put together over the years and to be honest I find it kind of rude.
Im not against thorough stat writing, and its the job of both writers and designers to try and police good and bad entries, but to be honest the community would be far better served by reference material to help in descisions (like the how I could improve thread or like the table I suggested in the other thread rather than trying to impose some absolute ruleset - getting vapourbotteers to agree is like herding cats.... cats who design vicious robots for a pass time.
Right, heres an idea. How about a collection of sticky threads, one which has motor info ,one which has armour info, one that has battery info, etc.
Basically each thread would have information on the various types of each componant, giving ideas on how much power they give, how long each battery will last, etc.
After that you can leave it up to the writers to decide how much of that info they need from stats.
Okay a couple of points.
1. Some things, such as batteries arent included in stats as i would say most people who do this dont understand it enough for it to work, i know i dont. And since this is something I do for fun in spare time, i dont really want to spend a huge period of time learning about something which isnt going to pay alot if any refrense to my day to day life.
2. People have to be less harsh with new people. Yes they need to show some effort, but it is pointless to attack them over sub-standard stats, you need to give advice and not dictate to them you must do this, you must do that rember your first set of stats, and how far you have come since then, new people probably are not going to start on a very high level. If I was watching this thinking about signing up and saw some of what some people (a few people in a particular) said and do to the new people, i would not bother to sign up.
3. The arguments on this forum are getting beyond a joke, it is ridiculous how people are strugling to get on in places.
4. and finaly, vapours can never be totaly realistic, as otherwise we would have people pitting themselves by accident, or robots where the removable link isnt put in properly so a little tap from the opponent causes it to fall out.
Just to clarify:
quote:
If every tournament is the same itll just end up being Ooh another tournament except this time written by Steve, you are basically trying to tell us that we should remove any personal nuance from tournaments from a system we have all put together over the years and to be honest I find it kind of rude.
I am not talking about the format of tournaments, that is totally up to the writer and on no way shape or form have I ever mentioned or implied that. If a writer wants to create a tournament where the arena is a rotating sphere, they are welcome to do so.
quote:
getting vapourbotteers to agree is like herding catsIve heard that line before, and yet the people that are discussed with that line are also getting more organised by the day.
I truly understand where you are coming from but I dont always agree
1. I will tackle this in a bigger post Im working on.
2. Those who were prone to starting heated arguements, they know who they are, have actually calmed down. The days when some people could expect an all-caps post around every corner are gone. The who could I improve topic is slowly changing for the better imo. And even though some words are a bit more harsh than others, a badly designed robot that clearly weighs 150+ kg just shouldnt be allowed to compete.
3. The arguments are softening up, over the last year we had Joey, Liam, Danny B, Samuel and Ben joining our ranks and they all seem to be getting there.
4. Like I said in point 2, things that are blatantly wrong should never be allowed in, but a robot that might be 105 kg instead of 100 isnt a big problem to me.
The thing is I think that as a rule if you look at a stats, and it sounds plausible then it probably is, I still think that just giving varpourbotteers the tools to work with and letting them get on with it is
Thats not the point - they are getting organised but only in their own way and the second you try and get them to all go on the same way we get things like this happening.
Anyway I would agree with Frank - just sticky the reference material in another thread, Id saw just one personally, and then its there for either vapourbotteers to use or tournament writers to demonstrate why something isnt going to work.
I wrote the beginners guide to help streamline entry into vapourbots, and I think all we really need here is something similar which focuses more thoroughly on the mechanical aspects of design.
What I think we really dont need is rules which only serve to overcomplicate things when you can generally tell if someone has done it or not, and if they havent done it then we refer them to the help thread or this hypothetical Beginners Guide to Vapourbot Mechanics.
Ok, I have give this a thought, the fact that I understand both points of view doesnt make things that much easier for me.
There€™s several reasons we€™re making (and liking) vapours rather than realies. Yeah, time and money are a big issue, but there€™s also the fact that we aren€™t all technical experts. Yeah, we could do research and try to understand it, but at the end of the day making an actual working robot is pure beta science, and not everyone has a knack for that. We all have in common that we LOVED RobotWars and have all kinda creative ideas, we dont have a knack for beta sciences in common, sadly.
This game basically is about the question €œwhat robot would you build if you had the resources to do so?€Â. We USED to be happy with a rough description, things like €œheavy motors€ and €œstrong armour€ were sufficient. When something came along that looked TOTALLY impossible (€œeight heavy motors and very very thick armour€Â), we told each other that, those were simple days.
Now we came as far as EXACTLY describing what our robots can do. LEM-130€™s are existing motors of which we can look up the specifications. 4 Mm. of Hardox is something else we can look up and research. I like it that way. But stating specifically WHAT kind of batteries you have (apart from the voltage) doesnt add ANYTHING to the descriptive powers of your stats. Adding however what amount of WEIGHT the batteries take, DOES.
The fact many people dont add batteries in their stats MAY cause them to neglect them, which means their robot would suddenly be 15 kg overweight. That is something that should never happen. But when you would take Alex H€™s bots as an example, you€™ll see that the stats in itself make for ~90 kg worth of robot, wouldnt that mean that batteries ARE in fact there, especially seeing the motor specifics do mention a voltage.
I once went wrong with batteries myself, Aaron advised me this:
quote:
4 x S28-400 Magmotor isnt actually lighter then 2 x LEM130s. The saving is in the batteries. Your two LEMs on 48v will need 12.8KG of 3600 NiCD batteries, 36v youll need 9.6KG. On 24v the Magmotor makes more power them the LEM130 (1.5Kw) anyway :P You can run 4 x S28-400s on 4.8KG of batteries (24v x 3 Packs).
I now live by those numbers, and I think anyone neglecting batteries in their stats SHOULD. Leo was gonna convert numbers like these into a new battery system but if he€™s not gonna do it I hope someone else might. Like I said, I€™m considering batteries as it is, I€™d be more than happy to write €œ12.8KG of 48v batteries considered€ in my stats, and I think it would help SEVERAL people in making their bots more realistic if they did so too. Realism, even in the simpler days, has ALWAYS been what we wanted, ALWAYS.
Standardised stats vs let every tournament writer decide what he wants.
By far most vapourboteers think it should be up the tournament writer who decides what is needed. Lets see where this discussion got started (or rather, revived), ah, yes, it was in fact in C&B3, a tournament where the writer DOES ask us for providing batteries in the stats. I was surprised at how many people actually entered stats WITHOUT batteries, Kody let them all pass, even though he would check all vapours personally.
If Kody would agree with people saying stuff like €œ12.8KG of 48v batteries considered€Â, than I think we have one helluva solution on our hands, since everyone should be considering battery weight anyway, wetter they understand batteries or not.
quote:
Aaron, your arguement is massively oversimplified, annoyingly patronising and verging on being willfully elitist as per usual.
The point with batteries is that unlike armour or motors which have a direct and easily quantifiable effect upon a design, the fact that these fights are written makes a battery stat just a vague and unecessary complication. How long is a written fight? The writer may say its 3 minutes but as you yourself profess vapour fights frequently dont even resemble actual fights anyway and are by no means half as busy as them most of the time, so how can we expect writers to have an accurate guage of time, if anything what we need to devise is a way of standardising how writers percieve time, but of course as there is no way that could ever be done, its just asking for bad writing to enact something which depends on time as a factor, its not like Im saying dont ever include batteries, or even dont allow for batteries in the weight, which Im in fact for.
You always kick off with the personal attacks dont you Alex...
You reckon that batteries dont bring any effect to the battle like armor or motors. The big deal is, motors are dependant on batteries for their performance! You can get away with a LEM130 @ 24v on two packs of nicds, but you will easily degrade the motor down to 50% of its possible performance.
Robot A runs 2 LEM130s with 4packs, sacrifices some armor to get the full power of the motors. Robot B runs 2 LEM130s, with 2 packs and runs heavier armour. The writer just blindly looks at the LEM130 in the stats, goes off a figure that they will both product the same push, but Bot A loses cause it has thinner armor... Makes a big difference. Another can of worms is gearing, gearing can make a big difference in performance.
In the end, we all need to come to a comprimisation, I feel we could work towards something like a chart that shows batteries, voltage, weight and capacities. A similar chart for motors, stating voltage, power input, power output and weight. Simply select your motors from the motor chart, look at the power rating and then select some batteries from the battery charge that match those requirements.
In the end, I believe with some accurate stats across the board, the writer can look at stats and go This bot will be able to out push that bot, since in the stats I can see this one is geared a more for torque instead of speed, This bots weapon has more power then that ones and then throw in an unpredictable element called luck and produce a nice battle, were everyone started off on a level playing field. This also gives the writer an accurate backing behind their battles, weve had disputes with battles before, and rewrites because of it.
As a conceptualist, your too caught up in the glossy picture you drew, instead of thinking about if it will actually work.
ok, before this goes too far:
We are all rational persons here, lets try to keep a sensible tone in the discussion and not assume the worst in each other. I am sure neither of you meant any disrespect.
quote:
2. People have to be less harsh with new people. Yes they need to show some effort, but it is pointless to attack them over sub-standard stats, you need to give advice and not dictate to them you must do this, you must do that rember your first set of stats, and how far you have come since then, new people probably are not going to start on a very high level. If I was watching this thinking about signing up and saw some of what some people (a few people in a particular) said and do to the new people, i would not bother to sign up.Hopefully, that is where I would come in. I usually try to stay reasonable, specially to newcomers because I know they are new to the game (and I know I dont have a perfect track record on this but I never resorted to name calling ever, but nothing human is foreign to me). When newcomers present their first stats we a are not going to slash into them, and anyone that tries will deal with me. But respect is a 2 way street, the newcomer needs to be willing to learn the ropes.
Sall good Leo, just a Zidane of egos :lame:
quiet or I headbutt you Aaron! :proud:
-2>ok, everyone knows that was a joke, dont hit me please
*Hits Martijn* :proud:
I wont deny Im a conceptualist and that I deal in should work in theories against your considerably greater direct technical experience but I do try to work on whether things will work or not, and if they dont I fix them, simple as that. However, when you come out with arguements phrased in the same vein as the weight bonus for red robots arguement it just cheeses me off because it just tends to come off as you stating your oppinions as fact in a rather condescending tone. Thats not to say there is no merit to any of your arguements, but rather annoyance at the way you phrase them as absolutes.
Anyway, to the actual discussion at hand:
The point being that with armour or drive its easy to see the direct effect upon a design.
Weapon a will piece armour X but not armour y in a direct hit.
Motor q and motor p are both run at 24 v, p produces mroe power but q is considerably lighter.
The thing with batteries is that the effect is considerably more subtle, takes a lot more knowledge to get right, is as Ive said before is an invitation to writing not backed up by reality in any kind of damage state which will effect the draw, and as damage in vapours is often massively overinflated compared to reality (another issue which I think needs to be addressed perhaps) is just going to be got wrong and negatively effect the realism of fights as a result.
And at the end of the day, this isnt real robots - we cant experiment with things in a real robot and have visible measurable effects of things to compare to one another to see what works best, so for all intents and purposes unless you are going to be meticulous about it (as you are, being the only major vaporbotteer to have sufficient experience to do so) a robot design is a hypothesis.
My main concern is that I think we are currently about perfectly balanced between the scissors/paper/stone state of affairs and all of vapours being just a series of tedious technical chores, and personally I suspect that detailled battery stats are the first step in tipping it over into the tedious technical chore side.
Vapourbots is about a bit of fun, not about becoming engineering experts.
Alex, Thats a fair enough assessment I think.
How about when all the hard stuff is done on a website like this one:
http://architeuthis-dux.org/torquecalc.asphttp://architeuthis-dux.org/torquecalc.asp
Would that be of more help?
(Message edited by leorcc on August 15, 2008)
Ah, I totally forgot about the Tentacle calculator! Good post there Leo.
Alex, it doesnt have to be a chore, it might be the first time, but once some simple knowledge is formed, it becomes easy. You could get to a point that, when you put two LEM130s into a design @ 36v, you know to put 3 x 36v packs in with it to get the full potential of the motors. If we can form some cheat sheets (Like a bus time table, pick the day and the time, and you get the number of the bus you have to catch), so you can just select a motor and a voltage and it will tell you what you need, you can easily knock up accurate info about a design.
^What Aaron just said^
If we can form some cheat sheets (Like a bus time table, pick the day and the time, and you get the number of the bus you have to catch), so you can just select a motor and a voltage and it will tell you what you need, you can easily knock up accurate info about a design.
I agree! That sounds like a really good idea tov me :)
so, we do what we always do, take 1 minute of our time to look up what batteries we need in Aarons chart, and everything proceeds as normal?
... I can live with that...
btw, remember the days of NSBFL when Frank actually asked for kJ output of all spinning weapons and provided us a teamcosmos link for us to calculate this for those who cant do so themselves...
providing a link to a battery chart each tournament wont be THAT much different than that...
Okay folks, Im putting my money where my mouth is, Ive knocked up a rough calculator for batteries.
http://vapourbots.crystalnode.net/files/battery_calc.xlshttp://vapourbots.crystalnode.net/fi...ttery_calc.xls
its an excel file, but Im going to look at making a web page version. The figures for the batteries might not be 100% in regards to weight and amperage rating (just running it off the top of my head at midnight, errors expected, will update with correct figures soon)
If you dont have Office or the brilliant replacement Open Office, here is a print screen of what your missing out on ;-)
http://vapourbots.crystalnode.net/images/technical/battery_calc.png Battery Calc
Simple enough? Thoughts and comments appreciated!
bug 1 fix... weight of several packs not calculating.. now fixed and uploaded.
That looks useful, but right now it needs some kind of reference against motors to mean something, unless you mean for that part of it to come from the other site Leo linked to?
Cheers Aaron. It is a start.
To be honest, I would just only do the A123s because:
1: They have the best power to weight ratio.
2: In vapourbots we dont have to pay for them. :)
@Alex: This is just the first part, Im looking at doing a similar one for motors in the sheet.. The Tentacle calc will work with it, but provides some good information that I cannot calculate (amperage to wheel spin etc etc).
This is just a rough way of getting people past the excuse of its too hard to put batteries into stats and onto a providing more accurate stats to benefit all involved :)
@Leo: I put NiCD because people are still a little confused on the new technology. People are use to voltages in stages of 12v, while the A123s are not. Also, most people who play with the lithium batteries speak in terms of cells per pack instead of voltage, as yourself would know, but a vapourboteer (new or old) might not. The idea is to accommodate all, and move this community forward, minimising arguements and providing results :wink:
Good point, never mind me then. :)
http://www.hyperdynamic.co.uk/Mark%27s%20Robot%20Calculator2.htmhttp://www.hyperdynamic.co.uk/Marks%...alculator2.htm
Just select the type of cell and type the number of cells and it will give you the maximum total power output, the weight and the volume occupied.
You can even type in custom figures for other cells. Ive not added A123 cells yet nor the latest LiPos.
You can also select combinations of motors and it will show you the maximum amount of power they can consume before blowing up.
I think this table makes it easy to check if a robot is overweight or got insufficient batteries, even for poeple who know nothing about either.
Any suggestions for improvements, let me know.
Aarons spreadsheet there works for me :)
Really simple and effective (I hope:uhoh:)
Leo, can you please change the title of the thread? I really dont like it.
Only if Martyn agrees, he started the thread.
No i dont agree to changing the title, i gave it this title because it is my opinion and i still stand by it, that this isnt really fun anymore.
Then you can retire from it. We cant force people to stay, or change their mind; we really dont want people to leave vapourbots, but if thats your opinion, then go with it.
Simple as that.
*awaits insults*
Kody, you arent helping, and your statment shows you have completly missed the whole point of me saying that this isnt fun anymore. I say im not having fun anymore, you dont make any suggestions you just say oh retire then. Reacting as if i have insulted something you created.
(Message edited by martyn on August 15, 2008)
Its because I dont have any other suggestions to give; if vapourbots isnt fun for you anymore, then fine. Im not going to go out of my way to keep you around. :P
(Message edited by kodster on August 15, 2008)
Right. After a very brief MSN argument with Martyn...well, Ill repeat it...
Martyn said to me:
i wont sugercoat this, you go around acting like you started vapours and it is something you control, something where you permit who can play and who cant, and like you decie when a major change has to happen when you want it to and try and force it on anyone and if people dont play by your rules you dont want them to play the game.
im not the only person who thinks like this either
For Martyn and anyone who is thinking the exact same thing he is, I will repeat what I said:
I dont base what I say to newbies on opinion, I base it on FACT. When I say put that in your stats Im not saying it because I want it to be that way, Im saying it because its the right thing to do in the Fanfic section.
I started nothing, I control nothing, and I certainly dont go around acting like I do. :P
And I stand by what I said. I honestly dont want control. Control has to be split among the vapourbot community rather equally, or, as its been said, it just wont be appealing enough for any newcomers.
As for advice, I only tell newbies to the community these things because its the right thing to do. Although some of you may argue what the right thing is...
Respond to this whatever way you want Martyn. I dont care. I honestly dont. I have had a lot of respect for you, especially after you welcomed me back to the community in 2006, but its getting slim.
If this is the way its going to be, I wont be on FanFic as much either. This is just god damn ridiculous.
Thank you.
Ok, Im new and all, and havent even posted my first vapor yet, but come ON. This is stupid!
Seriously, guys, if it isnt fun anymore, offer up suggestions to make it fun again. Because sitting there and complaining about it without taking action to remedy the problem is not helping.
Its a thread.... You click the link, you read it, and you get on with your life... Who cares what its called..
...I think I am beginning to realize the severity of my idiocy in that post earlier...
*epic facepalm of fail*
Meh, you guys are right...maybe Im going a little too far; I shall stop here for today. I really dont want the forum split up over this nonsense and I hope Aarons right that it wont.
Damnit Aaron, whenever I need a slap in the face, Im coming to you. :P