Sparkeys "new" bots

**Sparkey98** · 10th January 2011, 22:05

I returned with a few things

1. One (1) brain
2. One (1) ability to shut up

Name: Cosmic ReVoLution
Type: Full Body Sit And Spinner
Shape: round disk
Dimensions 2 ft diamater, 1/2 tall
Colors: Blue, with dark blue flames
Propulsion: Two Whyachi TWM3M gear boxes
Wheels: Two Colson Wheels 3 x 1-1/2
Weaponry: Four Custom Machined Teeth that line the edge of the robot

**joey_picus** · 11th January 2011, 13:33

Right!

Name: Cosmic ReVoLution

Sounds alright to me...to be honest I think quite a few tournament writers will ignore the extra capitals, but amny of the same tournament writers consistently refer to robots like 'N3', 'Sheer Drunk Attack', and 'Psycloniser' that don't even exist, so I'd let that slide :P

Type: Full Body Sit And Spinner

Type: isn't a field we normally use here - generally you should write the statistics in such a manner that it is obvious what sort of robot you're dealing with, and also if you use some terms (I know you come from a RA2 background, which a great many FRA fanfic competitors don't) like 'popup' or 'sit and spinner' you do run the risk of confusing the opposition and the writers to the point that they might misinterpret the robot entirely.

I will, though, say something about sit and spinners here: There is a good reason you don't see many on FRA - they don't generally work well. This is because nothing requires your opponent to drive into your spinning robot, they can just sit and wait for your batteries to die and the judges/writers would not look favourably on you if just spinning is your only tactic. Having a shell spinner or a disc/bar spinner is preferable as it allows you to be far more proactive when attacking, which will win you more fights.
A few vapours (Propane Nightmare, my own No Consequences, MDU, et cetera) use a variation on the full body thwackbot idea known as 'melty brain' - this is because the complexity involved can cause your brain to melt

- which makes use of custom control electronics to vary the speeds of the motors and allow the robot to move around slowly as it spins. These can work well but I would advise against them if your grasp of the concept is in any way shakey, heh :P

To be honest for a first vapour I would go for something a bit more conventional and effective - this is not in any way to stifle originality, we love that here

but instead because it is easier to make the stats for something like a wedge with a flipper, or an axebot, or a triangluar robot with a spinning disc Once you've got those designs sorted you can then build on that knowledge to do awesomely original things *properly* and make them work and be understandable.

Shape: round disk
Dimensions 2 ft diamater, 1/2 tall

The shape is fine, some people might want more detail but you'd get away with that in my tournaments.

The dimensions aren't fine though - for a start this is a British forum (note the .co.uk in the URL

) and we use - largely - the metric system here, this means dimensions are usually stated as length x width x height in centimetres or millimetres, with the unit stated - with a round robot you can just state diameter x height though.
The other problem is their size...2 feet, according to some rough maths in my head, is about 70cm, which I would personally say is perhaps slightly on the small side for a heavyweight - I'd go with at least 80cm, possibly even a metre diameter to get all the components to fit in. The height - which seems to be about 15cm - might also be a little low but you might get away with it.
Look at other robots' dimensions to get a general idea of the range you should be aiming for

Colors: Blue, with dark blue flames
Propulsion: Two Whyachi TWM3M gear boxes
Wheels: Two Colson Wheels 3 x 1-1/2

...aaaah....those gearboxes you have mentioned need motors :P you cannot drive a robot on gearboxes alone. The Team Whyachi gearboxes are made to be powered by the motors formerly known as Magmotors (they were sneaky and changed the name), specifically the A28-150s (a bit weedy for heavyweights if you ask me, they're small motors and will be straining a lot to produce their peak power), and the A28-400s (which are pretty much perfect for heavyweight drive).

FRA stats have a bit of a reputation for being overly demanding with regards to propulsion - what you have to bear in mind is that you have a physical limit, you can't throw as many features as you like in and it'll still be alright as you can at ARC. You also have to describe the robot as best you can so that the writer of the battles can get a good idea of how good the robot is, and can picture it inside and outside with some accuracy.
For this reason, generally you are expected to provide info on:
~ how many wheels you have (which you have, so that's good

),
~ which motors are driving the robot;
~ the robot's top speed (this is used along with the motor to get an idea of pushing power as well as speed);
~ and the voltage you are running the motors at - this may well be the voltage they're supposed to run at, or you might choose to 'overvolt' them for more power at the expense of reliability.
A while ago I did a table - which can be seen if you click on this very link! - which gives an idea of motor power, speed, and weight (as you still need to bear the 100kgs limit in mind)

Batteries...this is a thorny subject. Personally I think if you don't know much about them then the correct thing to do is account for, say, between 5 and 10kg of NiCad batteries in your stats and weight estimation, and for the vast majority of sensible designs 5 to 10kg of NiCad batteries will cover it.
Just remember to state '--kg of NiCad batteries accounted for' in the stats to stop Aaron biting your head off.

Weaponry: Four Custom Machined Teeth that line the edge of the robot

...right...now THIS is where you say how the robot attacks and that the drive powers the spinning motion

The 'weaponry' section is where you have to state all the info about the weapons, this varies from weapon to weapon. For a spinning weapon, the Team Cosmos Kinetic Energy Calculator is your very best friend as that tells you the weight and energy that the weapon puts out, both of which are really handy to have in the stats, hehe. I would advise playing around with that for a spinning weapon and finding a value that sounds good - generally below 10kj is too little in vapourbot-land, but above 100kj will probably spread the bits of your own robot across a wide area if you hit something without shock proofing yourself, so go for something in between those two.
For flippers, the tip force, gas you're running on and pressure are all needed, as is how many tanks you have; other details are helpful but not essential.
For axes and claws, tip force also helps; for all weapons, at the bare minimum state what it does, what it's made of (PARTICULARLY with axe heads and teeth of spinning weapons), and what powers it, be it linear actuators, geared down motors, pneumatics, hydraulics, or hamsters in wheels.

One area you have missed our is armour, which I would imagine is important :P read other robots' stats that have similar weaponry to get an idea of materials and thicknesses and come up with something similar of your own.
It also helps to state the robot's total weight, whether you can self right or not or if you can run inverted, your ground clearance, and any miscellaneous notes - all these are expected by writers in some form.

Finally (and I do hope this has been of some help) there is a thread dedicated to helping people just like you - if you post stats in the How Could I Improve thread then people will quite literally come buzzing around to make suggestions and help improve the stats. And then you can enter tournaments when they open and hopefully do well