Nerd speak? Oh don't get me started...

So... do people not... like... consider the concept of a robot that can drive on both sides or something?

It's basically a rock, paper, scissors thing because you have to consider practicality and the problems certain configurations will bring to a battle. Most bots are heavily armored in important areas where or have fail safes incase the enemy gets a good hit. They therefore stick with three important types of weapons and designs. Though they can do variants of the robots, they will have components that will be similar.

There's robots that drive on both sides. They have the ability to reverse and stuff. It's just that their weapons are typically either front or back as situational weapons or the body of the robot itself is the weapon. It's just being efficient with the space you have while still reaching weight requirements.

Typical weaknesses of battle bots: Exposed wheels with no armor, big weapon but not enough armor surrounding areas around it, weak weapon but tough armor, etc.

Most of the ones I see are metal though. So... electric discharge could easily short circuit one. Tesla bot of doom :D

I would make one that had wheels on the top and the bottom. And weapons all around it.

Using separate servo motors for each set of wheels would be good and keeping all of the circuits independent of the others is a plus. Then it's like Cole said and you have backups. One of the weapons would need to be a water gun, and another could be a flamethrower. The water gun would have to be aimed just right, and you'd probably need to damage the hull first to make it count.

Spray adhesive could be good too because it can mess up moving parts really fast if you do it right. You could make a directional spray adhesive bomb that showers the other robot with the stuff when it attacks your robot. You could even set it on fire like napalm!

Ironically, the droid cares none for robot talk. Then again, we don't all enjoy anthropology and anatomy.

A water gun sounds like a clever idea...
I wonder what the rules are on what is allowed.

Rust wouldn't do crap to a battle bot since it wouldn't effect the bot till years after.

I don't know but they use tons of different materials in the modern battle bots. Alot of it is costly lightweight materials but strong stuff.

Well the idea behind water I think is to get water into the circuit board if they didn't fully seal it.

That'd be a cheap shot though but it's extremely unlikely when you think of how armored they are and how they hide the electronics really well.

Isn't the point to be cheap and effective? I mean are there like moral rules or something?

I think whatever works should be the rule. Except for using giant robots. That would just be cheating.

And nuclear weaponry would just be stupid. The cameras would get messed up! And everyone there would die!

Nuclear weapons are illegal for commercial use I do believe so they wouldn't have to worry about that.

Hey, don't you like IRC? I like it too sometimes. We should hang out there sometime! Nobody I know ever even wants to learn how to use it! I like it!

I almost got made an IRCOP when I was younger but they found out I wasn't really old enough. They said I had to be a grownup. I learned all the commands and everything and they wouldn't let me!

Originally Posted by The Wandering Poet

Isn't the point to be cheap and effective? I mean are there like moral rules or something?

Nah, they use aircraft grade metal on some robots. Alot of the teams entered in the competition have million dollar companies related to robotics.

I still haven't figured out what IRC is... I really should look that up one of these years.
If you can make one, make it without them knowing then. Screw being an adult, someone has to feed their inner child or they become boring.

There is an "IRC" like thing I use for a game periodically, but nobody ever talks when there's 80 people online =/

Ah... million dollar gotcha. So water will do nothing. Electricity might still do damage, but I guess it could easily short out the owner's bot if designed poorly.

I've never seen any defective areas of a robot though. They've always tended to be pretty well covered. That's why they always use the opposite of water. Fire. Because it can melt the metal plating and make it easier to take out a robot.

Fire makes sense, though fire can always backfire as well, break the gun or bend it and it fires perhaps at itself

Never seen that happen either except for the weakening of armored opponents. Most robots with fire also tend to have hammers and the sort to cause serious damage.

Interesting... I find it hard to understand how you could stay in the weight limits without having to win by luck.

Not just by luck but also by how good of a robot you have is. Some robots seem cool in theory but aren't super practical. Yet they somehow win because of random chance.

Like the premiere episode of the new Battle Bots, a robot that walks with legs and was slow didn't lose because a fast robot got too cocky and the slow robot made the fast robot on the side of the stadium causing it to be unable move and surrender. If your bot doesn't move for 10 seconds(Stuck or otherwise) then your opponent wins.

Well before you mentioned it as Rock Paper Scissors.

Typically, yes, but random chance also plays a factor in as well. I was just talking exclusively about the weapon choices when it came to the rock, paper, scissors thing since all robots tend to have at least one of those types of set ups. And they at max will have a combo of two of them.

I never said that the rock wouldn't beat the paper.

If you have more than one kind of weapon it can really help. Especially if you can distract them with one thing and then unleash the other thing. The real way to win is to outsmart your opponent. It isn't all about the robots, it's also the people running them and how well they know how to use the robot to fight.

I could have sworn you had said you wanted an IRC channel for the site Poet. Maybe it was someone else. I used to remember every single thing I ever heard or saw but I don't know what's happened to me. I have trouble remembering things sometimes now. It's kind of scary!

Well more ways to chat with menewshans would be nice. We used to have one but nobody else used it so it got removed or something...

Erma are you on any new medications or anything like that? Sometimes they have side effects like that.

Sounds like a game of luck then... hoping you hit them before they hit you

Hoping you hit them before they hit you, that your bot is stronger than theres, and that the arena doesn't work against your bot. Alongside hoping nothing bad happens to your bot.

The only way to chat with fellow Menewshans should be via telepathy.