Backlash - BotBash 2000

How Backlash Did at BotBash, May 2000

Trial 1-Obstacle Course: The obstacle course consisted of a taped-off portion of the arena to follow with your robot, time was added on for going ouside any marker or hitting any pylon. The robots had to first drive straight the length of the arena, turn right over a wooden ramp, right again through a series of six colored pylons, left around a bend and straight into the finish zone. Some robots did very well at this, and I knew Backlash would do pretty good as long as I could get over the ramp. But, I should have taken off Backlash's wheelie bar, because it got hung up while driving up the ramp, costing me too much time to back off and attack the ramp at full speed, which pushed the ramp out of alignment and caused me to go out of bounds. The pylons were navigated easily, and on to the finish, but the time added for my errors took me out of the running for top speed.

Trial 2-Capture the Flag: The next trial was a capture the flag contest, where two robots would start in opposite corners of the arena with a small construction cone in the center of a circle. The object was to get your opponent's cone outside of the circle as quickly as possible. The best time wins.

Backlash's capture the flag contest was against Christian Carlberg's Toe Crusher. I knew I didn't want to waste time trying to protect my own cone, that I would do better to just attack the other cone instead, and Toe Crusher had the same idea apparently, we clashed in the middle (I didn't turn on Backlash's disc because I didn't think it was fair to attack and cause damage before the fighting actually began), but then we separated and headed for each other's cones. Toe Crusher beat me to it though, pushing out my cone about 3 seconds before I got his.

Match 1-Carnage: Backlash was picked to first face the dreaded Carnage. Although this was my first year at BotBash, Carnage's builder, Chris Harriman, is a BotBash veteran whose robot was greatly feared by the other competitors. Apparently, Carnage did a LOT of damage to his opponents at the 1999 BotBash, so I was definitely NOT looking forward to facing him on my first match. As a matter of fact, I thought I was in for a repeat of my first-ever robot match against Blendo in 1997, because it was the same situation: after looking at the competition, I picked Carnage as the one I least wanted to face, and then guess who they pick to fight me.... I've got the worst luck in match-ups!

Well, I was in for a pleasant surprise, as the match was over in such a blur that if you had blinked twice, you would have missed it. From what I can remember, Backlash and Carnage headed straight for each other, and Backlash's disc first impact on Carnage's axe-weapon tore the entire weapon arm off his robot and literally exploded the top half of his PVC armor. (A close inspection of the axe afterwards showed that I had hit the axe head so hard that it BENT the steel cutting edge into a V-shape). Disarmed, Carnage could do nothing else, so I went in for another quick hit or two, which shattered more of his armor and provided a devastating blow to one of his drive motors, destroying it with one hit. Carnage was dead less than 20 seconds into the match, and I was standing there amazed that it happened like that.

There was a lot of Carnage's PVC armor parts all over the arena, so they swept up all of it and bits of Carnage were given away to fans, signed and passed around the pit the rest of the day. Chris later showed me the damage to Carnage's motor, the impact had completely fractured the internal magnet of the motor. Carnage, without a spare, was unable to return to battle. That was very unfortunate.

Backlash sustained no damage on this short match, and went on to the next match.

Click on the image to view the 355K Quicktime movie of the Backlash vs Carnage match

Match 2-Evil Fish Tank: The next match, Backlash fought Dan Danknick's Evil Fish Tank. This was my second-most-feared robot at the event (don't I have the greatest luck on these matchups?). The robot was basically a mini clone of Vlad The Impaler (heavyweight BattleBot), but with a pneumatic ramp-wedge in front instead of a forklift, meant to flip over the enemy. I had watched this robot perform nicely in the trials, and I knew that the driver was very good, and the robot is very low to the ground, so I had my hands full on this one.

At the start of the match, Backlash and Evil Fish Tank clashed in the middle of the arena, and Backlash's disc smashed the front forks of his opponent, breaking a weld or two, but it wasn't enough to distract Evil Fish Tank, as he kept on coming, pushing Backlash to the side of the arena and flipping him upside-down (it's cool to watch the gyroscopic forces at work during this momen when Backlash appears to "hover" above EFT). Backlash was not designed with any self-righting ability, so I thought it was over. However, the disc was still spinning at full speed, and amazingly, when the disc hit the ground 1, 2 and then 3 times, the impact was enough to flip Backlash forward back onto his wheels! Wow, I didn't know it could do that! Cool! Well, the match was back on, and the robots met again, Evil Fish Tank smashed Backlash hard enough that the front leg was bent in and caused Backlash's own disc to hit his weapon drive motor shaft, shearing it completely off, disabling my own weapon. Rats. Disarmed, but not dismayed, I kept on the onslaught for another minute, but Evil Fish Tank was able to ram Backlash one last time and flip him onto his back, ending the match.

Damage to Evil Fish Tank was fairly minimal, some broken welds in the front weapon and some scratched lexan armor, but Backlash did a lot of damage to himself with his own disc, besides the sheared and ruined weapon motor shaft, the disc also took out my own caster wheel.

30 minutes later, I had Backlash back up and running with a replacement caster and weapon motor, ready for the next fight.

Click on the image to view the 227K Quicktime movie of Backlash Flipping himself back over

Match 3-Oops: The next match, Backlash was scheduled to fight a robot named The Green Dragon, made by John Pagano.

I was ready to get Backlash into the arena, but at the last minute, I made a stupid decision to check the innards of my robot, and accidentally left the power on while pulling off the armor, and I shorted out the battery wires going to the Vantec Speed Control, resulting in an unfortunate puff of smoke from the Vantec. Arrrgh! I didn't bring a spare, nor did I have time to replace it, so I was out of the competition. I guess I should have left it alone, huh?

A warning to ALL builders- make sure you PAY extra attention to what you are doing in the Pit, I've found that the pressure of the event causes you to make stupid mistakes a lot easier than while working on your robot at home.

Special award : Due to streaks of bad luck, Backlash didn't do so well in the competition itself, but because of his interesting and effective weapon design, he was voted "Most Innovative Robot" and took home this cool BotBash trophy!