Check out this fight in Battlebots: Champions, Episode 2. (Marked as “Battlebots Season 7” on many platforms)
After a swift exit from the Battlebots World Championship tournament, we set our sights onto the “Battlebots: Champions” spinoff show. This show roughly followed the “Bounty Hunters” format carried over from 2020, but culminating into a final Tournament of Champions to fight for the Golden Bolt trophy. We were placed in the bracket leading to LockJaw, which we felt was a great opportunity for us to show off… if only we could make it to the bounty final.
Our first match in this bracket was against Deep Six - often requested by fans, but dreaded by our team. In a sport that can sometimes seem very Rock-Paper-Scissors, Deep Six is the equivalent of ten rocks to our scissors. HUGE relies on its reach advantage, and the frame is extremely vulnerable to any opponent with a greater reach. Compared to our 36” diameter weapon, Deep Six swings an unheard-of 48” vertical blade. While they only managed a 1-2 regular season in 2021 (winning over Pain Train, and losing to SMEEEE and Minotaur), this was undoubtedly our toughest possible matchup in the building.
Our strategies for this fight came down to two options. Either a full-on box rush, or a longer looping route to try to approach Deep Six from the side. In reviewing prior fights, we knew that Deep Six had never quickly left its starting square, so we decided that the looping route was the best approach. We would be fast enough to get there before they spun up, while approaching from a more favorable angle. We mounted extra chin-guards, and utilized the same blade from the Switchback and Uppercut fights. HUGE was swapped to our second set of frame weldments, as the Uppercut frames were barely repairable but would never be perfect again.
Close watchers may have noticed by now that this was the first time that Deep Six ever rushed forwards out of their starting square at the beginning of a fight. In hindsight, this makes sense given their prior fight with Minotaur, where they were pushed back into the screwbox. But at the time it caught us off guard. We continued to drive in attempting to go around the side, knowing that we had to get close to Deep Six before they got their bar up to speed. But in a fast turn, they swung around to attack (in part because their bar was going slowly, so they could turn without gyroscopic forces affecting them). Their first hit cut both drive belts to one of HUGE’s wheels in an incredibly perfect shot, and we were dead in the water from there. We likely could have withstood this hit anywhere else on the robot, but some days luck is not on your side.
We were lucky enough to score a hit on Deep Six’s weapon belts during the follow-up moonshot hit (which consequently also cut our own weapon belts on one side), slowing down their weapon and preventing too much damage to our frames. The rest of the fight was pretty uneventful, and ended in a clear decision in favor of Deep Six. Considering the driving skill seen from Deep Six in this episode’s following fights, we’re now confident that the straight-up box rush approach would have been the best idea. “Getting around the side” would never have been a reliable option. But there would never be a “good” option for us against a robot like Deep Six.
Beyond that, we were done for the season! But we weren’t ready to be done! This version of HUGE showed a ton of promise with the drive speed, and newly powerful weapon. Our loss to Riptide had some unique factors to it, and Uppercut/Deep Six are oddball hard counters to a HUGE design. We were still confident in HUGE’s ability to beat conventional robots, and felt that we could end the year on a high note with a grudge match. The robot wasn’t in perfect shape after the beating from Deep Six, but it was workable enough to put it back in to fight again. Captain Shrederator wrote their name next to ours on the big whiteboard, and we agreed, so the grudge matchup was set!
The “gigachins”, a last-minute change attempting to keep Deep Six as far away as possible. Note how perfectly their blade must swing to hit the drive pulley without striking anything else.
In an attempt to feed something (anything) to Deep Six’s weapon that was not our frames, I threw HUGE over and offered up the wheel. This bought us a couple of hits.
The tegris wheels showed their ability to catch a bullet. This hit resulted in a suplex, but no damage beyond a slot punched into the wheel! This wheel would be repaired and used later against Captain Shrederator!
Undoubtedly the biggest hit in our Battlebots career. Not only did Deep Six hit us upwards, but our blade (spinning downwards) also contributed to the height. HUGE sheared a number of bolts holding together Deep Six’s weapon, climbing up to hit Deep Six’s weapon pulley and cut one of their belts. This prevented Deep Six from fully spinning up for the remainder of the fight. While this hit did not fully disable HUGE’s weapon, you can see that the remaining weapon belt has migrated to a different groove, and also flipped over in its groove. This was due to a combination of the looseness in HUGE’s center weapon shaft mounting in 2021, combined with the insane forces applied during this hit. After a few more hits, this remaining belt fell off and fully disabled HUGE’s weapon.
HUGE’s weapon assembly immediately after the fight. Notice how crushed the weapon hub is, plus bending over the motor axle. The belt remains flipped.
Close-up on the pulley: Split the machined piece, sheared a bolt, crushed another bolt, and split the part on the far side from the hit.
Our pound of flesh that we got from Deep Six. This is one of the diagonal uprights that provide sideways support to their weapon tower. This was from our final hit on Deep Six, which caused the weapon belts to come off of HUGE. The left side was attached to the driving base of the robot, and pushed back against Deep Six’s batteries. The right side was attached up near the weapon, and had to be chopped off the frame after the fight.
Deep Six was gifted the ruined weapon pulley from HUGE, and went on to do an amazing job in this episode of Battlebots Champions. Truly a high note for the Deep Six team, now that they have transitioned into Triton.
Photo Credits: Dan Longmire, JCRB Photography