Congratulations Typhoon

[fluppet]

Eh? Typhoon *was* pushed around for the entire fight (except for the odd bit of running away). Full credit to them for surviving it, but they were most certainly pushed!

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Fluppet

[blazerbotics]

having seen the fight live, i must say that i think the editing favored Storm 2. At the time i agreed with the judges, but if you just saw the edited version then i would say that Storm 2 had it. either way it was very close and well done to both robots.

[razerdave]

Nice one typhoon.

I think Eds comments about Typhoon and X-terminator before the final were unwarrented

[fluppet]

Thanks for that, Alan. Ive disagreed with the judges on fights in the past when its been down to more than just editing, but there have been times when the editing has done a competitor a major disservice too. With so much footage Id presumed that wasnt the case here, but only because I had no evidence to the contrary.

Ill proceed on the understanding that the footage wasnt entirely representative!

And in keeping with this thread, and since I seem to be being very negative elsewhere, Ill add another well done, Gary to the list. :-)

--
Fluppet

[jamesb]

I was there on the day, and although I am a bigger fan of Typhoon than Storm 2, I have to say in my eyes, Storm had it, but what do I know?

As a bit of a giggle, Ill repeat some of the funnier conspiricy theories Ive heard about this final. None of these are my opinions, just stuff people have said within earshot of me.

1:
RAF base, cadets staying on base, RAF/cadet team didnt qualify but were allowed in anyway, RAF/cadet team win, it was fixed from the start. (please note, this is the most obserd of the theories Ive heard!)

2:
BAEsystems factory team (typhoon being built by BAE systems)used cadets as a means of promoting british military technology, now that robotwars is being aired in potential sales markets. The proof that this link exists is the governments recent commitment to promoting engineering, the MOD, doing the same, and team Typhoon being the same. lol.

3:
The deliberate time-out (I like this one)
with Typhoons weapon not working properly in the first part of the fight, it was a very clever decision of the driver to take out the wall, as it would stop the fight, as it did the day before. Knowing the continue as you left off policy, if the weapon failed to start (not hard to fake) then repairs could be justified. Like this one, more realistic of the thoeries, and hints that Gary is a tactical genius. Hes denied this though.

4:
Personal agenda. (again, I can see this one working)
Ed Hoppitt owned storm 2. Last year it had no weapon, and seemed to be such a focused machine weaponary would be almost impossible to integrate. The rule of compulsary active weapons arrived, and hit nobody harder than Storm. Why was this rule introduced? hummm.... maybe mentorn dont like Ed.
Then the final, it was clear that storm won, but mentorn pay the judges, so as they dont like Ed Hoppitt........
like that one, really smacks of US style corruption.

5:
Ed shot JFK

[kaideejee]

No the real secret is that Ed IS Elvis, and Gary IS Richie from the Manic Street Preachers. The judges just werent into the old blue suede.

-- Kev

[fluppet]

ROTFL. Now *thats* what this debate needed.

First fight judged from a grassy knoll?

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Fluppet

[steve_c]

As a conspriacy theorist myself, heres my views:

If its true that Typhoon failed to qualify and were let in anyway, then it probably is because they were RAF/cadets, but that wouldve been done purely to have them representing in the arena, rather than to have them win it. (so 1 could be partially true, but not fully)

I cant see 2 working because the government made defence cutbacks recently. But of course it would be promoting big business if they were true (a goverment policy). However they couldnt rig all 7 fights as the other teams would refuse to play ball (and the house robots never tried to throw the fights either like theyve done in the past), but the closeness of the final provided an opportunity if they wanted it. But still an unlikely scenario though, as I bet hardly anyone knew about the BAE connection.

3 suggests a clever and tactical usage of the rules - not the first time its been used to win a final of course.

4 - I thought that the reason for the active weapon rule was because Mentorn didnt like Tornado for beating their beloved Razer (first reaching the final by using no active weapons on Hypnodisc/Dominator/Firestorm then adding defensive weaponry to win the war), hence trying to get them banned (but of course the Tornado guys are far too inventive for that to happen). And as Storm is a Tornado clone, it comes under the umbrella too (even though they fitted an effective weapon that didnt actually compromise the armour - maybe that pissed Mentorn off).

But if Mentorn did influence the judges it wouldve been more likely that they just wanted a spinner to win (which was also thought of as a reason for the active weapon rule).

5 - heh.

[julian]

Typhoon were rather lucky, as indeed are any of the series winners. To get so far needs a little good fortune. There were certain robots which Typhoon would have had more trouble with but the draw meant that they didnt have to face them (Bigger Brothers flipper would have proved a problem). Storm would have won if titanium wasnt such a pig to weld (if they had weight to spare they could have perhaps used enough stainless steel instead).

Typhoon is very good at what it does but it is a one trick pony and that must be borne in mind. Having fought the middle Typhoon and hoping to do so again, I can see that there are ways to combat it. The easiest of these are spikes that will hit just above the cutters plus there are designs of flippers that have lips that can get under the cutters before the cutters hit the slope of the flipper.

Congrats to the Typhoon team, anyway, and hopefully I can have my revenge on them this time around with a new machine.