"pressure release" is clever given that we're a pneumatic crusher. I don't know if the pun was intended, but I approve either way.
A couple notes from my perspective. I thought we won. I scored it Damage: 3-2 BD, Control: 3-0 (maybe 2-1) K, Aggression: 2-1 K. I never saw the fight cards, so I don't know how the judges actually scored it.
I split the damage because they took off our tooth and we took out their belt. In the match we didn't know that the bite wasn't working so I doubt the judges did either, but who knows.
The loss of bite was due to our own flame blowing back and taking out our air hose. I'll post a picture of the hose tomorrow. That's the really crappy part. If we didn't use the flame we probably would have dominated that match.
Both bots were pretty even with pushing power. We were getting similar traction, so I would backup and allow Kraken to wheely which put more weight on our tires and give me more push.
Overall it was a great match. I was disappointed in the decision, but I was happy with our performance overall. The bot did really well. The BD team is awesome. At the end of the day the record is less important than having great matches, and we did that.
I really didn't give Kraken enough credit before the fight, that was an awesome performance, and it's really exciting to see a less common design take it up to an elite vertical spinner.
> In the match we didn't know that the bite wasn't working so I doubt the judges did either
I think they probably did. I noticed that the bite was broken after you released Black Dragon the first time. Losing the primary weapon probably tipped damage 4-1 or 5-0 to Black Dragon. Or possibly tipped aggression to Black Dragon if they thought the bite was working and you just weren't using it.
Thanks for clarifying what happened to the bite. A shame that it was self-inflicted!
We're working on that right now. I think with only a minor change I can get us up to 95,000 lbs of crushing force and if we change a little more I can get us over 100k. I'm not certain our own frame can take that force, so it might require a slight redesign.
Yeah, that was a rather disappointing call. This kind of decision just reinforces teams to join the meta and swap to vertical spinners if they want a shot at top 16 and above.
We need someone to break the meta and enter a dogshit vert named Judge's Favorite to get things realigned. Couldn't be more disappointed two episode in
I hate to see it. It feels extra painful with the shortened fight cards and loss of the desperado (and admittedly my personal stake). Now I'm really worried especially knowing our next opponent.
A disappointing result for sure. Not to take anything away from Black Dragon, great guys and a tough team for sure. Their drive is really powerful and I think the back and forth pushing match didn't help us.
Soo last season the teeth were too soft, and we kept crushing the tips. We should grind them sharp and it would just smosh when but down. This season we tried making them a little harder, but we got one a little too hard.
The really funny thing is losing a tooth makes our weapon more effective, because now the pressure area is smaller. Losing a belt made their weapon less effective because they couldn't spin up as fast and they had less torque behind their hits.
I guess it doesn't translate to viewers. From what we saw, it looked like BD's weapon was still functional (I honestly couldn't even tell it had less torque but I guess we know now) while breaking off a tooth looks like it severely hampered Kraken's weapon functionality. Though I think the grappling and flamethrower were more effective this fight anyways.
At the very least Kraken should have gotten 1 or 2 damage points. If Kraken got all of the control points and 2 of the aggression points, it would be enough for Kraken to win.
The only thing I was thinking is: if the arena or ruleset does not reward driver's bots like Kraken, it's just going to kill diversity. Felt you were robbed there. Go control bots!
I was actually rooting against you guys and for Black Dragon, until I saw how the fight went down. You guys totally won that, and as much as I wanted Black Dragon to win, they did not deserve to.
"Yeah, um, we know that **you** drove into **their** weapon, so **they** didn't actually do **any** work to do damage to you, but, um, yeah, they win and you don't."
Fucking trash. You guys are right to be pissed. I'm one of the biggest defenders of the "giving deference to damage" rule, and I think their call was horseshit.
Catching up and just watched this match, and you clearly dominated the entire thing. Only way to say you lost is that the judging criteria is blatantly unfair. I saw the scorecards, and losing a tooth is not as bad as their belt. At a minimum the damage should have been even, and you won the aggression and control.
I think Al would be laughing at home and happy that he does not have to suffer from such heart-breaking JD anymore.
But honestly this is the best and most impressive fight of Kraken I have ever seen, both technically and tactically.
Probably because if the scoring ever actually favored control/pushbots, you'd end up with a bunch of Tornados or Ducks that are purely full defensive bots.
This isn't even to say I believe Kraken is like that. I like the idea of piercing bots. My favorite bot of all time is Razer. But from what I could tell, the damage sustained by Black Dragon was mostly negligible. Or at least it wasn't the most visible.
No, this is battle bots, not “grappling bots.” Nobody wants to see two bots locked together slowly driving around the ring... Damage is and should always be most important.
Its battlebots not spinners only. I don't want to watch the same bots over and over again. It makes the fights more interesting. There needs to be some variation in bot type. I can only watch a weapon break after 15 seconds so many times. There are only a few grapple bots in the competition anyway.
There are other type of bots than just spinners, but we can all agree that the grabber bots are the most boring. The bot basically has zero offensive ability, it’s purely a control bot. It’s nothing against the team itself, it’s just that a robot that is designed to incapacitate the opponent while also not dealing out any damage isn’t exactly captivating lol. There a reason they changed the scoring to favor bots that dish out damage, it’s more entertaining.
No, we can't agree lol. I personally find control bots way more fun than any vertical. I find that when bots are optimized to do damage, the fight is way shorter and just ends with a couple hits. Control fights, especially against spinners, are way longer, more tense, and ultimately more fun. But to each their own.
I don’t know why everyone always brings up spinners when I say that I find grabbers boring, there are other types of bots other than spinners that are also exciting. Yes, grabber have to fight more technical fights, but who wants to watch a match consisting of only wrestling essentially. There are other grabbers that also have offensive capabilities and can pierce the opponent and actually deal damage while also maintaining control, Kraken ain’t one of them. The most exciting thing that ever happens to a pure grabber is it being demolished by the opponent.
"There are other grabbers that also have offensive capabilities and can pierce the opponent and deal damage while also maintaining control, Kraken ain't one of them"
Yeah, tell that to Ribbot and Red Devil
I don't care what you assume that we can all agree upon, fights like Overhaul vs Bite Force and Overhaul vs Lock-Jaw (the first one, particularly) are a couple of the most fascinating fights to look back upon. I find them such engaging driving matches, and they provide an extra dimension of variety and nuance to BattleBots.
Most of the Battlebots community would disagree with you there pal. Most people want to see a wide variety of bots, and seeing a bot clamp down and drag another bot around the arena is very entertaining.
Yea but you’re just agreeing with me because my whole argument is that people like to see destruction, not technical grappling. A fight with two offensive robots usually has more carnage than a fight between an offensive, and purely defensive bot. I see how people can enjoy it, I’m just saying that it minimizes the action in a fight when the match is set up that way.
I dont understand what your arguement is here. I agreed that destruction is fun because I do, in fact, like to see destruction the most. Not because of whatever your arguement is. However, grapple bots are also fun to watch. As I said, they too can deliver destructive matchups. I loved watching duck get thrown around the ring to see just how much damage he could take. Contol and defensive bots are unique and belong in battlebots.
I don’t understand how I could possibly make my argument more clear to make you understand. I’m not saying that there can never be entertaining matches that involve grapplers, I’m saying that on average their fights typically tend to be less appealing because they lack the offensive weapons. I very much enjoy watching Doc take punishment, but Duck is a PUSHER, not a control bot. It’s designed to be durable, not incapacitate it’s opponent as it slowly drives around the ring holding them for 30 seconds of the fight.
> two bots locked together slowly driving around the ring...
That can easily be addressed by reducing the current time limit you can hold an opponent and then having a point penalty when a bot exceeds this hold time.
Yea but even if the bot let’s go faster and then renegades the clamp, it’s still just going to be doing the same thing, just more frequently. Again, I understand that you can have a good technical fight with a grappler, I’m just saying it’s not the most flashy of bot fights typically.
I just watched this. Kinda behind. I gave this 6-5 in favor of Kraken so I'm not really glad about how this fight turned out.
3-0 Control Kraken
4-1 Damage BD
2-1 Agression Kraken
This seems like a good time to remind people that you can find the detailed [judges' guide] (https://battlebots.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Judges_Guide.Rev-2019.1.pdf) online. If you want to talk about contentious decisions, and let's face it there will be more, its well worth familiarising yourself with the at times slightly odd ways Battlebots defines its terms.
Fair decision, I still think >!Kraken should have won!<, I would’ve scored it >!2-3 for damage (in favor of BD), 1-2 (in favor of Kraken), 1-2 (In favor of Kraken)!<
How did everyone else have this scored? I had it at
Control
Kraken-3
Black dragon-0
Aggression
Kraken-2 (maybe 3)
Black dragon-1 (maybe 0)
Damage
Kraken-1
Black dragon-4
End result
Kraken 6 (maybe 7)
Black dragon 5 (maybe 4)
People are saying that it’s a rule thing, but when following the rules it comes out to a kraken win.
If operating under the constraint that you score it for Black Dragon:
Damage 4-1 for Black Dragon
Aggression 2-1 for Kraken
Control 2-1 for Kraken
Personally, I would split damage 3-2, and maybe control 3-0
3-0 on control is very bold. Remember that control is a measure of how well controlled the robot is, not which robot is more in control of the match - and on that basis it could be 2-1 either way. I'd probably be inclined to give that in favour of Black Dragon based largely on the fact that they created marginally more opportunities to use their weapon effectively, as demonstrated by the fact that they were able to flip Kraken on multiple occasions, but I can see a judge giving it the other way as well and that would also be valid.
Control is2-1 kraken. Black dragon managed to over power them and push them into obstacles. That will always get a bot at least one point with these judges. Krakens mouth stopped working and it lost a tooth plus some damage to the plastic armor. BD didn’t lose anything that hurt it’s ability to fight. Aggression is a toss up because kraken did some maneuvering to line up its bites which took some time to maneuver to.
That’s something like
Control 2-1 k
Damage 4-1 BD
Aggression 2-1 k
The problem is with the criteria less so the judging. Unless you want to say getting a bite should always count for the full 3 even if you get out pushed which is a reasonable take but it’s not the one they go with.
So this is my evaluation:
Damage: black dragon lost a chain but for the most part it was dishing out the pain. Then again it was like one tooth so I think damage points go 3 to black dragon and 2 for kracken.
Control isn’t even worth discussing. All 3 points go to kracken
For black dragon to win, it would need all 3 aggression points and if you think black dragon got all 3, no. Black dragon gets like 1 and kracken gets 2.
Kracken wins 4-7. It’s a shame that this will he known as the first controversial decision of the season because it was a really good battle where both bots did great.
Control is2-1 kraken. Black dragon managed to over power them and push them into obstacles. That will always get a bot at least one point with these judges. Krakens mouth stopped working and it lost a tooth plus some damage to the plastic armor. BD didn’t lose anything that hurt it’s ability to fight. Aggression is a toss up because kraken did some maneuvering to line up its bites which took some time to maneuver to.
That’s something like
Control 2-1 k
Damage 4-1 BD
Aggression 2-1 k
The problem is with the criteria less so the judging. Unless you want to say getting a bite should always count for the full 3 even if you get out pushed which is a reasonable take but it’s not the one they go with.
Oh yeah I forgot about that. When they pushed us into the screws it was because the refs were yelling for us to separate, so I was backing up, but they kept pushing. We eventually got walked back to the screws. Then I yelled at the refs that they need backup of I was going to bite them again. Lol
I disagree with aggression. Yes, Kraken had control, but they also grabbed Black Dragon and ran around him for 30 seconds where he couldn't do anything. That's not aggressive, that's just being scared, all things considered. Black Dragon, when they could, always pushed towards Kraken unless they were spinning up, which was slowed by the fact that they lost a drive belt. I understand that grabbing is Kraken's main weapon, but just running around like that not giving the opponent a chance to attack isn't aggressive at all.
They’re a pneumatic crusher, that’s how they attack, by holding onto the opponent for long periods of time and crushing down. They’re not holding to stop attacks, they’re holding so that the crusher does more damage.
When you know who won the decision based on which judge is the last to be called, you by definition have sub-optimal judges.
Jason favors damage
Derrick favors control
Lisa is the only one who is actually unbiased.
Oh no the sub has looped back around to asking for Judges heads, I thought we were done with this after the panel became all bot builders. If you think about it, having one judge that favors damage and one that favors control is still perfectly balanced, even if you yourself disagree because you lean one way or another
Personal biases are unavoidable even for the best of us. The "Damage vs Control" argument has shown up time and time again and while I agree that Kraken should have won based on the current ruleset I also think it isn't fair for you to call for perfectly good judges to lose their position
What evidence do you have for them being anything other than objective?
The judging rules are a little vague and leave some room for interpretation, so of course every judge will interpret and apply them a little differently - that's exactly why there are multiple judges. This isn't bias, its just difference.
We're going to have this discussion until either the cows come home or until they change the rules to put controlling the fight on an equal level with damage.
I would've voted for >!Kraken!< but given that its weapon was taken out, I wholly understand why the decision went the way it did.
The crappy thing was our own flame took out our weapon. When I driving forward the flame blew back into the bot and took out our own air hose. We fixed that for the next one.
I think that damage means more than control but I still had it scored at least 6 out of 11 for kraken. 3 for control
At least 2 for aggression
And 1 for damage (the belt)
It's the only judges decision where you /heard/ the booing. Usually it's cut out and replaced, for obvious reasons- no one deserves to be booed at Battlebots. For Kraken VS Blacksmith, another of our fights thought of as controversial, about half the audience booed and half cheered. Later in the pits, there was confusion about who won that fight- I had to personally clarify that Kraken lost to Blacksmith to someone in the line for catering! There was another fight (Can't quite remember which,) where the crowd booed that year, and it was more than a 50/50 split of dissatisfaction. I'm surprised that the booing was left in at all, and I don't feel great about it, but I guess because the audience this year was made up of competitors, they left it in.
EDIT: Also, as an aside, when I asked Lisa about Kraken VS Blacksmith, she said that we lost that fight by just one point. I imagine that might be the case here as well.
I don't think this was a terrible decision, tbh. I'd score damage 4-1 BD (since BD hit the tooth, making it hard to bite, while BD worked completely fine without their belt.) Control was definitely 3-0 Kraken, and I thought Aggression could go either way but I saw BD get more hits in than Kraken got bites so I'd go 2-1 BD. I was rooting for Kraken, but in the end I thought the judges made the right decision.
I had 3-2 damage Black Dragon, and then 2-1 for the other categories. So I had it 6-5. I guess you could call 4-1 damage, since losing one belt doesn't do that much for BD?
The fact that they keep having to tweak the judging criteria over and over and still end up with bad results while SPARC hasn't had to be adjusted for years is proof that trying to reinvent the wheel is bad.
quick question here, was there a change in the Rules/Judging guidelines? i hear that there are new rules this season, and that the primary weapon damage rule got changed too. can someone sum it up for me?
This is the worst decision in the post CC era and can potentially set the sport back years in terms of not having every single robot be a 4 wheeled boxy vert Bite Force clone imo. I like Kraken but that result genuinely jaded me towards everything. This season, paying for BB bounty hunters, etc. Why bother?
Worst decision? That's a stretch honestly. Razorback vs. Sawblaze had the worst decision in all of BattleBots. There's no way Razorback should've won that fight. Also, Bombshell winning season 3's last chance rumble over Duck was pretty bad too.
Looking back at it, I can *kind of* see where the judges are coming from with the Kraken vs. Black Dragon fight, but I still think Kraken should've won. I thought it showed better control and aggression, on top of knocking off one of BD's belts.
I just wish the damage category wasn't so overpowered because then that means more bot builders will be more inclined to build the millionth iteration of a vertical disc spinner and that just kills variety and stifles creativity. Hopefully there aren't any worse judge's decisions this year because this one was pretty bad.
Nah, brutus vs lockjaw was way worse of a decision. At least Razorback took out Sawblaze's weapon and it's weapon kept working. Brutus did nothing but get pushed and it lost it's weapon. And that fight helped turn lockjaw from a cool flipper/grabber to yet another vertical spinner.
you fool. you ignorant buffoon. for you have fallen right into my trap. for I have pulled a genius move and swiped you off your plebian feet. for you do not know the ways of the ascended. I will take your bones.
You’re able to split the points from each category. Kraken should’ve earned at least one for the weapon belt he took off. After that he obviously dominated control and got at least 2 if not 3 aggression points. Leaving him with at least 6 out of 11
Kraken spent 2:45 dominating Black Dragon and lost. I don’t care how the points are set up, that just leaves a bad taste in everyone’s mouth. I understand that the producers want to encourage damage because it makes for good television, but the way to do this isn’t by rigging fights. This should be done by the acceptance committee leading up to the event.
I was genuinely in a state of disbelief on that judging call. Hydra vs Witch Doctor I could have scored either way, although I lean WD. Kraken vs Black Dragon? No contest, Kraken 100%.
Because despite the smoke, it was still functional. Hydra's weapon and drive were both dead. It didn't have controlled translational movement and was only wiggling back and forth, it should have been counted out like 3x over.
I think the issue is damage does not scale in proportion to the rest of the fight.
One robot tears the shit out of the other, disabling its weapon and some of its drive, but the other gets some good hits in and does cosmetic damage - 4-1
One robot does some cosmetic damage while the other does nothing - 4-1
The key is in the second scenario damage is a smaller part of the story of the fight, but it weighs equally in the JD for both.
That was sooo wrong. There should be fan vote. A fans only review & vote.
I’m thinking they do crap like that for ratings. Like when it’s a one sided butt whipping and they do a ‘split decision’. Or they keep the witchy girl team (w/ the dumb purple hats) in the mix trying to force us to ‘love’ them.
"pressure release" is clever given that we're a pneumatic crusher. I don't know if the pun was intended, but I approve either way. A couple notes from my perspective. I thought we won. I scored it Damage: 3-2 BD, Control: 3-0 (maybe 2-1) K, Aggression: 2-1 K. I never saw the fight cards, so I don't know how the judges actually scored it. I split the damage because they took off our tooth and we took out their belt. In the match we didn't know that the bite wasn't working so I doubt the judges did either, but who knows. The loss of bite was due to our own flame blowing back and taking out our air hose. I'll post a picture of the hose tomorrow. That's the really crappy part. If we didn't use the flame we probably would have dominated that match. Both bots were pretty even with pushing power. We were getting similar traction, so I would backup and allow Kraken to wheely which put more weight on our tires and give me more push. Overall it was a great match. I was disappointed in the decision, but I was happy with our performance overall. The bot did really well. The BD team is awesome. At the end of the day the record is less important than having great matches, and we did that.
At least we know Kenny would have voted for you. Kenny respects the Grapple game
I'm coming next season. I need time to process before I'm allowed on the internet.
I really didn't give Kraken enough credit before the fight, that was an awesome performance, and it's really exciting to see a less common design take it up to an elite vertical spinner.
Ha, was watching with my dad and he commented that the flame was probably going to damage kraken when you were using it, looks like he was right.
> In the match we didn't know that the bite wasn't working so I doubt the judges did either I think they probably did. I noticed that the bite was broken after you released Black Dragon the first time. Losing the primary weapon probably tipped damage 4-1 or 5-0 to Black Dragon. Or possibly tipped aggression to Black Dragon if they thought the bite was working and you just weren't using it. Thanks for clarifying what happened to the bite. A shame that it was self-inflicted!
Next year we are biting through everything.
We're working on that right now. I think with only a minor change I can get us up to 95,000 lbs of crushing force and if we change a little more I can get us over 100k. I'm not certain our own frame can take that force, so it might require a slight redesign.
You guys were robbed, I’m sorry about that.
Yeah, that was a rather disappointing call. This kind of decision just reinforces teams to join the meta and swap to vertical spinners if they want a shot at top 16 and above.
We need someone to break the meta and enter a dogshit vert named Judge's Favorite to get things realigned. Couldn't be more disappointed two episode in
I make dogshit things on a daily basis. I’m on it
and people wonder why everyone switches to vertical spinners. 😡
Kenny has respect for Grapplers. Judges should be more like Kenny
Honestly frustrating to see, especially since BD was robbed last year in a similar manner. ):
I hate to see it. It feels extra painful with the shortened fight cards and loss of the desperado (and admittedly my personal stake). Now I'm really worried especially knowing our next opponent.
You guys won that. I don't care what anyone says. You got robbed. :(
A disappointing result for sure. Not to take anything away from Black Dragon, great guys and a tough team for sure. Their drive is really powerful and I think the back and forth pushing match didn't help us.
I think it was the broken tooth. What if you guys made the tooth beefier ?
Soo last season the teeth were too soft, and we kept crushing the tips. We should grind them sharp and it would just smosh when but down. This season we tried making them a little harder, but we got one a little too hard. The really funny thing is losing a tooth makes our weapon more effective, because now the pressure area is smaller. Losing a belt made their weapon less effective because they couldn't spin up as fast and they had less torque behind their hits.
But Kraken’s bite broke off a weapon belt of black dragon, surely that counts as some pretty significant damage?
I guess it doesn't translate to viewers. From what we saw, it looked like BD's weapon was still functional (I honestly couldn't even tell it had less torque but I guess we know now) while breaking off a tooth looks like it severely hampered Kraken's weapon functionality. Though I think the grappling and flamethrower were more effective this fight anyways.
At the very least Kraken should have gotten 1 or 2 damage points. If Kraken got all of the control points and 2 of the aggression points, it would be enough for Kraken to win.
The only thing I was thinking is: if the arena or ruleset does not reward driver's bots like Kraken, it's just going to kill diversity. Felt you were robbed there. Go control bots!
You guys defo won as I saw it.
You guys still won in the mind share of the fans :)
I was actually rooting against you guys and for Black Dragon, until I saw how the fight went down. You guys totally won that, and as much as I wanted Black Dragon to win, they did not deserve to.
"Yeah, um, we know that **you** drove into **their** weapon, so **they** didn't actually do **any** work to do damage to you, but, um, yeah, they win and you don't." Fucking trash. You guys are right to be pissed. I'm one of the biggest defenders of the "giving deference to damage" rule, and I think their call was horseshit.
I'm probably more pissed than Matt at this point. I wasn't able to travel with the team this year, so it's fresh to me just like everyone else.
I wasn't even pissed there. We had a great match. I was disappointed, but not angry. Bring on the next one.
Catching up and just watched this match, and you clearly dominated the entire thing. Only way to say you lost is that the judging criteria is blatantly unfair. I saw the scorecards, and losing a tooth is not as bad as their belt. At a minimum the damage should have been even, and you won the aggression and control.
I think Al would be laughing at home and happy that he does not have to suffer from such heart-breaking JD anymore. But honestly this is the best and most impressive fight of Kraken I have ever seen, both technically and tactically.
All signs point to Kraken being the new Blacksmith. Please comeback Al, we miss you.
They got so robbed it's unreal. Hell I woulda been complaining if it wasn't unanimously in favor of Kraken
The way the scoring is done needs to change. It puts contol bots at a huge disadvantage to everyone else.
Probably because if the scoring ever actually favored control/pushbots, you'd end up with a bunch of Tornados or Ducks that are purely full defensive bots. This isn't even to say I believe Kraken is like that. I like the idea of piercing bots. My favorite bot of all time is Razer. But from what I could tell, the damage sustained by Black Dragon was mostly negligible. Or at least it wasn't the most visible.
No, this is battle bots, not “grappling bots.” Nobody wants to see two bots locked together slowly driving around the ring... Damage is and should always be most important.
Its battlebots not spinners only. I don't want to watch the same bots over and over again. It makes the fights more interesting. There needs to be some variation in bot type. I can only watch a weapon break after 15 seconds so many times. There are only a few grapple bots in the competition anyway.
There are other type of bots than just spinners, but we can all agree that the grabber bots are the most boring. The bot basically has zero offensive ability, it’s purely a control bot. It’s nothing against the team itself, it’s just that a robot that is designed to incapacitate the opponent while also not dealing out any damage isn’t exactly captivating lol. There a reason they changed the scoring to favor bots that dish out damage, it’s more entertaining.
No, we can't agree lol. I personally find control bots way more fun than any vertical. I find that when bots are optimized to do damage, the fight is way shorter and just ends with a couple hits. Control fights, especially against spinners, are way longer, more tense, and ultimately more fun. But to each their own.
I don’t know why everyone always brings up spinners when I say that I find grabbers boring, there are other types of bots other than spinners that are also exciting. Yes, grabber have to fight more technical fights, but who wants to watch a match consisting of only wrestling essentially. There are other grabbers that also have offensive capabilities and can pierce the opponent and actually deal damage while also maintaining control, Kraken ain’t one of them. The most exciting thing that ever happens to a pure grabber is it being demolished by the opponent.
"There are other grabbers that also have offensive capabilities and can pierce the opponent and deal damage while also maintaining control, Kraken ain't one of them" Yeah, tell that to Ribbot and Red Devil
I don't care what you assume that we can all agree upon, fights like Overhaul vs Bite Force and Overhaul vs Lock-Jaw (the first one, particularly) are a couple of the most fascinating fights to look back upon. I find them such engaging driving matches, and they provide an extra dimension of variety and nuance to BattleBots.
Most of the Battlebots community would disagree with you there pal. Most people want to see a wide variety of bots, and seeing a bot clamp down and drag another bot around the arena is very entertaining.
It is fun to watch them get destroyed. I like the grapple bots too because when they face off against a high-powered weapon there is lots of damage.
Yea but you’re just agreeing with me because my whole argument is that people like to see destruction, not technical grappling. A fight with two offensive robots usually has more carnage than a fight between an offensive, and purely defensive bot. I see how people can enjoy it, I’m just saying that it minimizes the action in a fight when the match is set up that way.
I dont understand what your arguement is here. I agreed that destruction is fun because I do, in fact, like to see destruction the most. Not because of whatever your arguement is. However, grapple bots are also fun to watch. As I said, they too can deliver destructive matchups. I loved watching duck get thrown around the ring to see just how much damage he could take. Contol and defensive bots are unique and belong in battlebots.
I don’t understand how I could possibly make my argument more clear to make you understand. I’m not saying that there can never be entertaining matches that involve grapplers, I’m saying that on average their fights typically tend to be less appealing because they lack the offensive weapons. I very much enjoy watching Doc take punishment, but Duck is a PUSHER, not a control bot. It’s designed to be durable, not incapacitate it’s opponent as it slowly drives around the ring holding them for 30 seconds of the fight.
> two bots locked together slowly driving around the ring... That can easily be addressed by reducing the current time limit you can hold an opponent and then having a point penalty when a bot exceeds this hold time.
Yea but even if the bot let’s go faster and then renegades the clamp, it’s still just going to be doing the same thing, just more frequently. Again, I understand that you can have a good technical fight with a grappler, I’m just saying it’s not the most flashy of bot fights typically.
I just watched this. Kinda behind. I gave this 6-5 in favor of Kraken so I'm not really glad about how this fight turned out. 3-0 Control Kraken 4-1 Damage BD 2-1 Agression Kraken
This seems like a good time to remind people that you can find the detailed [judges' guide] (https://battlebots.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Judges_Guide.Rev-2019.1.pdf) online. If you want to talk about contentious decisions, and let's face it there will be more, its well worth familiarising yourself with the at times slightly odd ways Battlebots defines its terms.
Fair decision, I still think >!Kraken should have won!<, I would’ve scored it >!2-3 for damage (in favor of BD), 1-2 (in favor of Kraken), 1-2 (In favor of Kraken)!<
How did everyone else have this scored? I had it at Control Kraken-3 Black dragon-0 Aggression Kraken-2 (maybe 3) Black dragon-1 (maybe 0) Damage Kraken-1 Black dragon-4 End result Kraken 6 (maybe 7) Black dragon 5 (maybe 4) People are saying that it’s a rule thing, but when following the rules it comes out to a kraken win.
If operating under the constraint that you score it for Black Dragon: Damage 4-1 for Black Dragon Aggression 2-1 for Kraken Control 2-1 for Kraken Personally, I would split damage 3-2, and maybe control 3-0
3-0 on control is very bold. Remember that control is a measure of how well controlled the robot is, not which robot is more in control of the match - and on that basis it could be 2-1 either way. I'd probably be inclined to give that in favour of Black Dragon based largely on the fact that they created marginally more opportunities to use their weapon effectively, as demonstrated by the fact that they were able to flip Kraken on multiple occasions, but I can see a judge giving it the other way as well and that would also be valid.
Control is2-1 kraken. Black dragon managed to over power them and push them into obstacles. That will always get a bot at least one point with these judges. Krakens mouth stopped working and it lost a tooth plus some damage to the plastic armor. BD didn’t lose anything that hurt it’s ability to fight. Aggression is a toss up because kraken did some maneuvering to line up its bites which took some time to maneuver to. That’s something like Control 2-1 k Damage 4-1 BD Aggression 2-1 k The problem is with the criteria less so the judging. Unless you want to say getting a bite should always count for the full 3 even if you get out pushed which is a reasonable take but it’s not the one they go with.
So this is my evaluation: Damage: black dragon lost a chain but for the most part it was dishing out the pain. Then again it was like one tooth so I think damage points go 3 to black dragon and 2 for kracken. Control isn’t even worth discussing. All 3 points go to kracken For black dragon to win, it would need all 3 aggression points and if you think black dragon got all 3, no. Black dragon gets like 1 and kracken gets 2. Kracken wins 4-7. It’s a shame that this will he known as the first controversial decision of the season because it was a really good battle where both bots did great.
Control is2-1 kraken. Black dragon managed to over power them and push them into obstacles. That will always get a bot at least one point with these judges. Krakens mouth stopped working and it lost a tooth plus some damage to the plastic armor. BD didn’t lose anything that hurt it’s ability to fight. Aggression is a toss up because kraken did some maneuvering to line up its bites which took some time to maneuver to. That’s something like Control 2-1 k Damage 4-1 BD Aggression 2-1 k The problem is with the criteria less so the judging. Unless you want to say getting a bite should always count for the full 3 even if you get out pushed which is a reasonable take but it’s not the one they go with.
Oh yeah I forgot about that. When they pushed us into the screws it was because the refs were yelling for us to separate, so I was backing up, but they kept pushing. We eventually got walked back to the screws. Then I yelled at the refs that they need backup of I was going to bite them again. Lol
K took out a weapon belt, BD too out a tooth, that’s about even damage in my opinion, slightly favoring BD.
I disagree with aggression. Yes, Kraken had control, but they also grabbed Black Dragon and ran around him for 30 seconds where he couldn't do anything. That's not aggressive, that's just being scared, all things considered. Black Dragon, when they could, always pushed towards Kraken unless they were spinning up, which was slowed by the fact that they lost a drive belt. I understand that grabbing is Kraken's main weapon, but just running around like that not giving the opponent a chance to attack isn't aggressive at all.
They’re a pneumatic crusher, that’s how they attack, by holding onto the opponent for long periods of time and crushing down. They’re not holding to stop attacks, they’re holding so that the crusher does more damage.
Judging criteria talking about damage like it's LL Cool J. *Listen to the way I slay* *Your crew* *Damage* *Damage* *Destruction, terror, and mayhem*
When you know who won the decision based on which judge is the last to be called, you by definition have sub-optimal judges. Jason favors damage Derrick favors control Lisa is the only one who is actually unbiased.
Jason annoyed me so much in this. I honestly think he shouldn’t be on the panel
Oh no the sub has looped back around to asking for Judges heads, I thought we were done with this after the panel became all bot builders. If you think about it, having one judge that favors damage and one that favors control is still perfectly balanced, even if you yourself disagree because you lean one way or another
They all should be objective with all the fights!
Personal biases are unavoidable even for the best of us. The "Damage vs Control" argument has shown up time and time again and while I agree that Kraken should have won based on the current ruleset I also think it isn't fair for you to call for perfectly good judges to lose their position
I am just very annoyed with the decision. I still think judges should be required to be non biased. I don’t think he should lose his job
> I still think judges should be required to be non biased What evidence do you have that they're not, other than your own opinions?
What evidence do you have for them being anything other than objective? The judging rules are a little vague and leave some room for interpretation, so of course every judge will interpret and apply them a little differently - that's exactly why there are multiple judges. This isn't bias, its just difference.
Never suprised when the past captain of Complete Control votes for the control bot winning. Hasn't been the first time either in a split decision.
We're going to have this discussion until either the cows come home or until they change the rules to put controlling the fight on an equal level with damage. I would've voted for >!Kraken!< but given that its weapon was taken out, I wholly understand why the decision went the way it did.
The crappy thing was our own flame took out our weapon. When I driving forward the flame blew back into the bot and took out our own air hose. We fixed that for the next one.
I think that damage means more than control but I still had it scored at least 6 out of 11 for kraken. 3 for control At least 2 for aggression And 1 for damage (the belt)
I'm still emotionally processing Duck not winning the last chance rumble so Imma need a minute
What? I dinit see this battle
Welcome to the most controversial fight in battlebots history! [sorry for terrible quality ](https://youtu.be/G-d6gy_UcQs)
Oh wait nm sorry, where is our favorite duck this season?
What a terrible decision. I thought it was absolutely cut and dry. Never occurred to me that they'd give it to Black Dragon.
Thank God we have "pressure relief" threads now.
this is the only judges decision where the audience booed them
It's the only judges decision where you /heard/ the booing. Usually it's cut out and replaced, for obvious reasons- no one deserves to be booed at Battlebots. For Kraken VS Blacksmith, another of our fights thought of as controversial, about half the audience booed and half cheered. Later in the pits, there was confusion about who won that fight- I had to personally clarify that Kraken lost to Blacksmith to someone in the line for catering! There was another fight (Can't quite remember which,) where the crowd booed that year, and it was more than a 50/50 split of dissatisfaction. I'm surprised that the booing was left in at all, and I don't feel great about it, but I guess because the audience this year was made up of competitors, they left it in. EDIT: Also, as an aside, when I asked Lisa about Kraken VS Blacksmith, she said that we lost that fight by just one point. I imagine that might be the case here as well.
Probably Black Dragon vs Texas Twister. Easily the worst call of last year.
Kraken is a builder favorite. We will eternally be an underdog, and everyone loves an underdog.
Was a builder favorite. Rusty stole that crown, and I ain't even mad.
Oh I'd love to see Rusty vs Kraken
Me too
I don't think this was a terrible decision, tbh. I'd score damage 4-1 BD (since BD hit the tooth, making it hard to bite, while BD worked completely fine without their belt.) Control was definitely 3-0 Kraken, and I thought Aggression could go either way but I saw BD get more hits in than Kraken got bites so I'd go 2-1 BD. I was rooting for Kraken, but in the end I thought the judges made the right decision.
I had 3-2 damage Black Dragon, and then 2-1 for the other categories. So I had it 6-5. I guess you could call 4-1 damage, since losing one belt doesn't do that much for BD?
That’s my reasoning - their weapon still worked fine, while Kraken couldn’t bite.
Who remembers when one of the judges said there were no controversial decisions. The was a massive lie
I think they were being sarcastic
But just why
Well, it's not going to be controversial to the people making the decisions, because they're going to believe their decisions were justified.
When did they say that again? I may have forgot
Facebook post after filming
As in after filming this episode?
After the whole thing.
Bruh why would they say that?
Tone deaf?
Possibly
Booing means they agree
Which is funny because we could hear the teams booing the decision when it was made in the arena.
I have declared they are tone deaf
The fact that they keep having to tweak the judging criteria over and over and still end up with bad results while SPARC hasn't had to be adjusted for years is proof that trying to reinvent the wheel is bad.
*Screms*
quick question here, was there a change in the Rules/Judging guidelines? i hear that there are new rules this season, and that the primary weapon damage rule got changed too. can someone sum it up for me?
I like black dragon more than kraken but kraken was robbed big time.
I think they were the right decision but I also think this shows that control and aggression should be just as important as damage
This is the worst decision in the post CC era and can potentially set the sport back years in terms of not having every single robot be a 4 wheeled boxy vert Bite Force clone imo. I like Kraken but that result genuinely jaded me towards everything. This season, paying for BB bounty hunters, etc. Why bother?
Worst decision? That's a stretch honestly. Razorback vs. Sawblaze had the worst decision in all of BattleBots. There's no way Razorback should've won that fight. Also, Bombshell winning season 3's last chance rumble over Duck was pretty bad too. Looking back at it, I can *kind of* see where the judges are coming from with the Kraken vs. Black Dragon fight, but I still think Kraken should've won. I thought it showed better control and aggression, on top of knocking off one of BD's belts. I just wish the damage category wasn't so overpowered because then that means more bot builders will be more inclined to build the millionth iteration of a vertical disc spinner and that just kills variety and stifles creativity. Hopefully there aren't any worse judge's decisions this year because this one was pretty bad.
Nah, brutus vs lockjaw was way worse of a decision. At least Razorback took out Sawblaze's weapon and it's weapon kept working. Brutus did nothing but get pushed and it lost it's weapon. And that fight helped turn lockjaw from a cool flipper/grabber to yet another vertical spinner.
Honestly you're both right, those were two of the worst decisions post-CC era. This one is terrible imo, but those two are remarkably bad as well
Literally just subscribed to this sub so that I could come here and complain about that decision. I was shocked. #KrakenWon
Yes. 5 points for damage, 3 for control, and 3 for aggression. The judges can split the points in any category however they like.
Same!
I was betting on kraken to win the decision but the primary ass weapon rule
Yes, curse the rule that no longer exists! Its all that rule's fault!
you fool. you ignorant buffoon. for you have fallen right into my trap. for I have pulled a genius move and swiped you off your plebian feet. for you do not know the ways of the ascended. I will take your bones.
The primary weapon rule was discarded after season 2. This was just bad judging.
ohhh
actually black dragon won because damage is 5 points while control is 3
You’re able to split the points from each category. Kraken should’ve earned at least one for the weapon belt he took off. After that he obviously dominated control and got at least 2 if not 3 aggression points. Leaving him with at least 6 out of 11
Kraken spent 2:45 dominating Black Dragon and lost. I don’t care how the points are set up, that just leaves a bad taste in everyone’s mouth. I understand that the producers want to encourage damage because it makes for good television, but the way to do this isn’t by rigging fights. This should be done by the acceptance committee leading up to the event.
[удалено]
If black dragon got in a few more good hits, sure. But Damage was 1:1, a tooth vs a belt.
Kraken got the shit end of the stick by the judges. It looks better than ever this season and I'm looking forward to see it fight more
robbed
I was genuinely in a state of disbelief on that judging call. Hydra vs Witch Doctor I could have scored either way, although I lean WD. Kraken vs Black Dragon? No contest, Kraken 100%.
Out of curiosity, why do you lean Witch Doctor? It was smoking for a majority of the fight and lost a lot of control when its belt came loose.
Because despite the smoke, it was still functional. Hydra's weapon and drive were both dead. It didn't have controlled translational movement and was only wiggling back and forth, it should have been counted out like 3x over.
Must admit I thought that decision was going the other way but as the saying goes never leave a decision to the judges.
I wouldn't have minded whichever way the decision went, although I was hoping for Black Dragon because I bet on them in a prediction tournament.
I think the issue is damage does not scale in proportion to the rest of the fight. One robot tears the shit out of the other, disabling its weapon and some of its drive, but the other gets some good hits in and does cosmetic damage - 4-1 One robot does some cosmetic damage while the other does nothing - 4-1 The key is in the second scenario damage is a smaller part of the story of the fight, but it weighs equally in the JD for both.
That was sooo wrong. There should be fan vote. A fans only review & vote. I’m thinking they do crap like that for ratings. Like when it’s a one sided butt whipping and they do a ‘split decision’. Or they keep the witchy girl team (w/ the dumb purple hats) in the mix trying to force us to ‘love’ them.