Welcome back to the Beat! Last week, we had some of the mirror matches. Not all of them, we got one more. Also, there’s something we’ve never seen before, and something we saw two years ago but hey, maybe it’ll be different? To the fights!

Gruff vs. Witch Doctor
Gruff: 1-1 (W, JD 3-0 vs. Ripperoni; L, KO 2:52 vs. Quantum)
Witch Doctor: 2-0 (W, KO 1:15 vs. Ribbot; W, JD 2-1 vs. Fusion)

Well, Gruff’s win over Ripperoni looks a whole lot better. They’re very likely in with just one more win. Make that win over Witch Doctor? That becomes almost a definite.

Witch Doctor is likely already in as well, but a win here puts them on lock status and a potential showdown with Minotaur for the top seed. They actually decided to run the weapon at a lower speed because Gruff is a tank, with a slight fork configuration. The switch to brushless motors (documented in their Pit Pass series on YouTube) could mean extra torque? I have no idea how weapons are geared.

Gruff… is not feeling the love from the crowd, but they’ve got their usual config to hope to tank it.

Gruff rushed but enough of a juke to get away from a direct rush cost Gruff a wedgelet. The lifter was getting under, but Witch Doctor was spinning Gruff out with each hit, continuing to push the tempo. Gruff was bouncing off the screws, then off the screw casing, pieces flying off after every hit. Wedgelets, one of the forks, even the gas tank as Witch Doctor joined the fireball club at Gruff’s expense as they continued to send the lifter flying, eventually into the Upper Deck, overturned and counted out.

Witch Doctor wins by KO in 1:35. And yeah. That looks like a top seed showdown against Minotaur. Gruff’s going to hope to punch it in against Malice. And speaking of…

Malice vs. Valkyrie
Malice: 1-1 (L, JD 3-0 vs. Lock-Jaw; W, KO 1:52 vs. Emulsifier)
Valkyrie: 1-1 (W, KO 1:45 vs. Mammoth; L, JD 3-0 vs. Banshee)

Both of these bots’ wins weren’t exactly the greatest. Especially Malice’s, which was because Emulsifier got high-centered and was otherwise winning the fight. Valkyrie’s at least was being a bit skittish from getting stuck the first time in Mammoth’s struts. Maybe not the best strategy, where getting stuck that second time would have still been a little better looking than waiting back (though it’s still a KO against a WCVI tournament* bot), but it’s definitely a win that Valkyrie worked for.

Malice has AR500 corners that hold the frame together (probably because of Emulsifier) and their 55 lb “drumstick”. I don’t know if that’s a lighter weapon due to the necessary armor up. Valkyrie’s going with a classic weapon, Glory.

Malice came out first, but missed and went toward screws. Valkyrie had some traction, but was getting the worse of the hits. Oh, like the hit that took the weapon totally off the shaft.

But Malice had lost its right side of drive from the recoil. But so did Valkyrie. Malice made contact once more but it pushed them away. After an action-packed first, what, 30 seconds?—it seemed like this fight had suddenly tanked They made contact, but due to lack of engagement the fight was called and went to the judges. The two bots made contact at 1 and the weapon on Malice started to spin up, but a little too late for the refs to keep it going.

Damage: Both bots lost drive, but Valkyrie had the greater armor damage, and the whole weapon came off. Malice 4-1
Aggression: Malice led almost every exchange. Malice 3-0 
Control: Malice drove into the screws, but Valkyrie spinning throughout didn’t mean they controlled the fight. 2-1 Malice.

Wow, they went to a split decision. Derek Young: Malice; Fon Davis: Valkyrie; Lisa Winter: Valkyrie

Wow, I am surprised. Valkyrie wins by split decision. And so were the fans, and so was Bunny.

So for the first time, we see an appeal! The way it works is: The judges review using all camera angles to see if they had missed anything. If Malice is unsuccessful, they cannot appeal the rest of the season.

The cards had 3-8, 6-5, 6-5, as Derek had Malice winning all 3 categories, Fon and Lisa had 2-3, 2-1, 2-1 each.

Appeal overturned: Malice wins by unanimous decision, 8-3, 6-5, 8-3. (Lisa Winter also flipped control and aggression for Malice.)

What had apparently happened was that when Malice restarted the weapon in the dying seconds, they did so… but were facing the wrong way, so the judges got screened from seeing it, which meant they never saw Malice’s weapon spinning. Granted, I don’t know how losing the weapon flipped aggression and control, but as it is, it’s Malice that moves to 2-1 and fights the previously mentioned Gruff in a potential bubble battle. Valkyrie likely needs a win over a desperate Glitch.

MadCatter vs. Big Dill
MadCatter: 1-1 (W, KO 1:57 vs. Whiplash; L, KO 1:01 vs. Riptide)
Big Dill: 0-2 (L, KO 1:52 vs. HiJinx; L, KO 1:26 vs. Skorpios)

Well, Martin Mason and co could use this one after the loss to Riptide. But both teams could use this. though, as Big Dill needs this to probably stay in it.

Fun Fact: Emmanuel Carrillo, Big Dill’s captain and driver used to drive MadCatter. (And both of them were both on WAR Hawk together, if you remember WAR Hawk. And if you don’t it’s the robot whose pods all failed to stay together after Hydra flipped it one too many times.) Also, please note he does all of this with one hand.

The two bots had as close to similar setups as they could, as both went with the lifter and vert in this one. And they both had minibots, which had their own brief fight! (Toe Biter and Catnip vs. Nacho Supreme)

Big Dill got its forks in which kicked MD off the short corner screw casing and yanked off a wedgelet. Big Dill doing the early pushing, winning the ground game and using lifter and weapon. Like what I originally expected Whiplash to be!

Around the midpoint MadCatter got under once or twice as they pulled the lifter to get more weapon engagement, and it looked the added pressure was getting to Big Dill, as there was some minor smoke from the pickle bot. But whatever that smoke was they were still getting the pushes, and that was still going to count for something

A drive error from Eman meant MadCatter could get a hit in on Big Dill, but Big Dill was able to reverse it a bit. But again, more smoke emanated from Big Dill. Then they lost a wheel in the final 15, as MadCatter had one more hit before the buzzer. This one seemed like it would be pretty close.

Damage: The loss of wedgelet, wheel, and smoke swings it to MadCatter. 3-2 or 4-1.
Aggression: Definite 2-1 but a coin flip. It hinged around the midpoint but the later half looks a little better, so 2-1 MadCatter I guess.
Control: 2-1 MadCatter

MadCatter by UD. Honestly, this one I would have seen being split over Malice-Valkyrie. MadCatter is probably in as-is, but a win over Lock-Jaw would be a cherry topper. Big Dill is 0-3, and has nothing to play for except to try and play spoilers for Free Shipping.

Ribbot vs. Jackpot
Ribbot: 0-2 (L, KO 1:15 vs. Witch Doctor; L, JD 3-0 vs. Claw Viper)
Jackpot: 0-2 (L, KO 0:55 vs. Skorpios; L, KO 2:49 vs. Rotator)

Who had these bots a combined 0-4? You know, last year’s 2 seed and a robot that hadn’t lost a Fight Night card in 2 years? And the loser could be out already.

Ribbot went in their undercutter config, seeing how it worked with Rotator vs. Ribbot. Jackpot went with its Heartbreaker single disk config.

Both bots spun up but Ribbot charged and send Jackpot back. Ribbot lost the front left wheel, but J then lost the minibot (The Ace) and a piece of their plow armor. But then Jackpot took the rear left off Ribbot. So that you figured had to be it as Ribbot didn’t have the left wheels, right? Nope, it was still mobile, but Jackpot sent it flying and flipped the frog over, foam frog lost a long time ago. Overhead Ribbot was a lot less mobile to the point it looked like they had to power down the weapon in order to move. Jackpot for an attempted killshot sending it into a coin spin, where it self-righted and somehow didn’t blow up its weapon.

Another hit and now Jackpot was having some drive issues, but Ribbot was moving in circles. It looked like Jackpot was just high-centered and came forward while Ribbot was getting counted out. But then Ribbot moved enough to stop the count and send it to the judges.

Jackpot wins by by unanimous decision. Any hope Ribbot has of getting on the bubble rests on a win over Skorpios (and possibly Witch Doctor and Claw Viper, its two losses, to stay undefeated), while Jackpot could be okay, provided they beat Captain Shrederator. It’s not a Giant Screw, but Ribbot will probably win the BattleBots Subreddit’s “I Didn’t Hear No Bell” Prize.

Skorpios vs. SawBlaze
Skorpios: 2-0 (W, KO 0:55 vs. Jackpot; W, KO 1:26 vs. Big Dill)
SawBlaze: 2-0 (W, JD* 3-0 vs. HyperShock; W, KO 2:36 vs. Lock-Jaw)

We finally get the long-awaited sawbot/hammer saw battle. Except we didn’t… because of SWORDIOS.

Swordios is Skorpios’s configuration that uses… one of the blades off of notable Comedy Central era robot, Christian Carlberg’s OverKill. (Now updated to become one of the robots at BattleBots Destruct-a-thon!) It was best known… for having a giant fucking knife.

Okay, my apologies, including to BattleBots Update. It’s a replica.

Anyway, the strategy is to try and cut SawBlaze’s weapon belt with the knife, and because it’s 20 lbs. lighter than the full weapon apparatus, that means 20 lbs. of magnets! Meanwhile SawBlaze had UHMW ears for the hammer-saw… or I guess the knife.

Well, the magnets didn’t work as Skorpios was wheelieing. The knife didn’t work because they planned on the knife cutting the moving belts. If the weapon doesn’t spin up the weapon belts on SawBlaze aren’t moving.

SawBlaze threw Skorpios to the screws knife-first, then cut into the knife. RIP Overkill’s blade. It only lasted 20-something years.

SawBlaze wins by KO in 49 seconds. After all, SawBlaze also wanted the sword, because Overkill’s one of his favorite robots of all time. SawBlaze, with a win over Hydra, they could also be in that top seed conversation. Skorpios is 2-1, but this loss definitely hurts more than if they had lost with the hammer-saw against SawBlaze. A win over Ribbot would be ideal.

Well, as the Will Bales quote goes, “If it works, it isn’t stupid. If it doesn’t, we’re just idiots.” Unfortunately it’s one of those times where you hope for the former and get the latter.

Ripperoni vs. HiJinx
Ripperoni: 1-1 (L, JD 3-0 vs. Gruff; W, KO 1:37 vs. End Game)
HiJinx: 1-1 (W, KO 1:52 vs. Big Dill; L, KO 2:22 vs. Captain Shrederator)

Well, the favorite for this fight turned on a dime. Or a fork. After what it did, Ripperoni does not want weapon to weapon. They’ve gone for a totally different body, and an anti-horizontal wedge.

HiJinx has a long enough bar to make it peck hard. So far, it hasn’t always worked. HiJinx is hoping to use the tail to get Ripperoni excited.

Neither bot rushed, but first hit sent HiJinx off the Lexan in front of themselves and the weapon wasn’t spinning. Special guest commentator Bunny mentioned that you could see the gears separate, and that definitely did not sound good. Ripperoni spun from it but got back. The wedge tail was doing its thing, but Ripperoni was dishing hit after hit and HiJinx with a fire and lost a hubcap and the top armor was separated from the side. So the tail was okay-ish, but the rest of the bot?

The spinner spun on HuJinx for a half second… and then it and the rest of the bot stopped.

Ripperoni wins by KO in 1:41. Well then, it’s no fluke. At 2-1, they may already have their ticket punched. Copperhead’s next. HiJinx is 1-2 now and definitely needs a win.

As Fred Moore put it: “Did we want to be methodical or did we want that Florida Man energy?”

Main Event: End Game vs. HyperShock
End Game: 1-1 (W, JD 3-0 vs. End Game; L, KO 1:37 vs. Ripperoni)
HyperShock: 1-1 (L, JD* 3-0 vs. SawBlaze; W, KO 1:48 vs. Whiplash)

This can’t possibly go any worse than the last time HyperShock fought End Game… they hope. I mean, that was about as disastrous as possible. I’d say they got better.

Nick Mabey on HyperShock: “Their biggest weakness is Will likes to drive too much.” You know, that’s not a bad point, sometimes Will goes too much into chaos mode. (See vs. P1)

End Game with the piano keys, with two big hooked forks. HyperShock has their standard long forks, nothing outlandish for them.

End Game’s forks were so sharp that they were scraping the paint off the starting square, but they more importantly got under HyperShock, flipping it. Will Bales, still having gyro issues, was trying to get the tires Flipped, and used EG to re-right. There did go the tire but End Game lost a fork. This was all relative as the front right was barely on and finally came off. Tried to gyro, and not this time, as not enough traction. The chain came off entirely and that would do it as HyperShock was parked where its wheels would have been

End Game wins by KO in 2:37. It went… slightly better for HyperShock? I’d sau they sucked less. End Game has Gigabyte next. HyperShock has Claw Viper, and it might not be a must-win, but if could be the different between a seed in high teens and the bubble. I mean, losses to SawBlaze and End Game are some of the brandest of names so they won’t hurt too much.

With that we’ll look at next week, headed by a team in need of a win, Whiplash. They’ve gotta withstand Monsoon. Other bots in the desperation column: Death Roll, both Bots FC bots (Shatter! and Emulsifier), and Ominous. Can any of them get on the left side? Find out next week!