BattleBots: Vengeance In Vegas Part 1

BattleBots season 11 is the season that just won’t die and I mean that in the nicest possible way. What was originally a 14-episode main season also gave way to 6 episodes of BattleBots Champions and 15 unaired fights. Now there are an additional 10 bonus fights consisting of exhibition and grudge matches that BattleBots has dubbed “Vengeance in Vegas” and released as a standalone mini-episode on their YouTube channel. Needless to say this has been the most fruitful season of the show to date; no other television outing for BattleBots has provided us with so much bonus footage and content. Exciting!

Since these are bona fide BattleBots matches it was only a matter of time before they’d wind up being chronicled here. I know I’ve dropped the ball on unaired fights in the past but this time I’m committed to not fucking it up. There are ten new fights, but this article only covers the first five because as I’m sure you saw this is “Vengeance in Vegas Part 1”. I could’ve done a whole ten fight article but I feel like that would’ve wound up being extremely long and potentially overwhelming for some readers so chopping it into two halves was the more sensible solution… until I realized that the second half will need to be posted while I am in Las Vegas for the taping of season 12. I just can’t win with this shit, I swear.

Anyways this special episode wastes no time getting right into the fights. There’s no Chris, no Kenny, and not even Faruq appears (probably because they’d all have to be paid for another episode and that wasn’t in the books). Up first is Big Dill and Blip but later on in this first part we’ll see bots like Riptide, Captain Shrederator, Cobalt, and Deadlift return to the arena for another go at getting one of those little “WINNER” pogs.

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BLIP vs. BIG DILL

Blip is a compact and innovative flipper from the mind of Aren Hill, the same guy who brought us the current reigning champion robot Tantrum. Aren stepped away from Tantrum this past year to focus his attention on Blip because its new flywheel flipper design is something we haven’t seen before and needless to say this kind of complicated bullshit requires undivided focus. Was it worth it in the end? Well, Blip reached the quarterfinals in its rookie year so that’s gotta be worth something. Blip looked unstoppable with its electric flipper and was tossing opponents left and right until it met with Hydra in a showdown of muscle. Hydra caught the better of Blip and flipped it in such a way that it damaged one side of drive when the robot landed badly; Hydra then tossed Blip onto the lip of the Upper Deck and because of the high powered magnets on Blip’s underside the robot became adhered to the hazard and its only side of drive touching the ground was the one that Hydra had splayed open with a previous attack. Blip’s been patched up and is ready to go for its final showing of the season.

There are only two robots who have more than one exhibition battle in this episode and Big Dill, surprisingly, is one of them. I never thought this pickled beast would be a camera hog but here we are. Big Dill had a pretty shitty debut back in season 10 where it only managed to win a couple of fights, one of them in the Bounty Hunters spin-off before getting shut down. I guess the selection committee wasn’t feeling this robot this year because Big Dill was accepted as an alternate entry and not as a full competitor. Big Dill got to fight in the Champions event where it immediately lost to Bloodsport after the helicopter blade of its opponent sliced its lifting mechanism’s chain and then promptly tore the entire fucking ass end of the robot off. That was literally Big Dill’s only fight in this entire season. Emmanuel Carrillo has reattached Big Dill’s butt plate and slapped a new chain onto the weapon so it’s go time for the pickle man.

Both of these robots have leading forks so naturally the game is going to be who can jam their forks under their opponent first. Big Dill potentially has the upper hand here because Blip requires more travel distance up its front wedge in order to be on its flipper whereas simply getting forked by Big Dill means you’re on its lifter. Blip’s forks win the ground game though and Big Dill perfectly mounts Blip’s stupid fucking face. Blip lets loose on its bungee cord flipper of death and Big Dill is thrown across the arena into the Pulverizer from just about half court. If this were a carnival game Blip would’ve won a big stuffed dog made in China stuffed with poison. Big Dill lands hard but manages to rebound and roll onto its wheels. The lifter scurries away to try and line up a better run on its opponent.

Now the two bots take turns getting their forks stuck in various snags and slots on the floor because we’re 20 episodes and 15 unaired fights into this fucking season and this has comprised literally half the fucking battles. Blip rears up due to the gyroscopic forces generated by its flipper mechanism which still takes me by surprise even though I know it’s there. Big Dill darts across the Battlebox toward the shelf and Blip catches up again and gets underneath the lifter. It’s a messy affair though and Blip doesn’t fire off its flipping wedge because Big Dill is sliding all around on the front end of Blip and Aren Hill knows using his robot’s weapon opens up a world of ground clearance under it so a miss would be a critical cock up. Big Dill is able to whip around and actually get underneath Blip from the back and pin the flipper against the side of the Upper Deck. You can hear like one person in the crowd or something shout “Lift! Lift!” but there’s no action coming from Big Dill’s pickle spears. Perhaps the tumble it took after being heaved into the Pulverizer broke something inside the robot? We saw the lifters work in the opening seconds of the battle so that’s my only guess as to why Big Dill isn’t trying to even the scorecards up here.

All is not well with Blip however because it seems as though there might be some lingering damage from its fight with Hydra; as Big Dill reverses to try and get another ass ram on Blip one of Big Dill’s forks catches the back right tire of Blip and knocks it loose. Unfortunately for Big Dill this has happened on the far side of the stupid shelf out of the line of sight of the judges so I’m sure they probably haven’t noticed this damage. Blip dives under Big Dill and gives it a light toss and this causes the lifter to land on its back. Big Dill can right itself using its lifting forks but yeah those things are toast because the robot is doing fuck all right now. Blip, wanting to make this a sure thing, gets back under Big Dill again and lets loose with a higher power flip that hurls Big Dill through the air and lets it land on the Upper Deck where Big Dill sticks its landing. No really, Big Dill literally sticks the fucking landing; Big Dill was traveling at just the right angle and speed that its lifting forks dig into what appears to be the thick plastic flooring of the shelf and the robot becomes jammed into the fucking floor. We ran out of Killsaw slots to stick forks into so now the robots are inventing new ones on the fly.

Another dud of a showing for Big Dill and a great performance from Blip so long as you ignore the part where its wheel fell off. Blip definitely still has some growing to do but as Aren and his crew become more in tune with their new robot it wouldn’t surprise me to see Blip make another deep run for the Nut next season.

WINNER: Blip, KO

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RIPTIDE vs. BLOODSPORT

Another rookie that had a strong showing this season is Riptide who also reached the quarterfinals before eventually losing. Riptide is basically a big ass variant of a drum known as an “eggbeater” presumably because the person who named the design that had never seen an eggbeater before. It hits with the force of a drum spinner but has the reach of a vertical disc spinner. We’ve seen eggbeaters before in BattleBots but more often than not what we usually get are drums so Riptide is a nice change of pace. The robot absolutely demolished Duck and Uppercut in memorable season fights that saw the arena littered with parts and foam filling from wheels. It took Sawblaze to eventually come in and end this robot’s reign of rookie terror but Riptide had still made a name for itself and designer Ethan Kurtz and his team were awarded the title of Rookie of the Year during the end of season awards ceremony.

Bloodsport has been around the block a few times now in BattleBots. This robot is basically a throwback to designs like Hazard which was a middleweight champion for three seasons of the Comedy Central era of the show. If Hazard stuck around and updated its internals and motors to stay competitive with today’s bots you’d have Bloodsport essentially. Bloodsport is known for absolutely fucking demolishing opponents if they’re unprepared for a horizontal spinner and because its weapon sits atop the robot you cannot attack Bloodsport while it’s spinning without getting hit yourself. Despite this Bloodsport fell in the Round of 32 to Minotaur who fucked up Bloodsport’s spinning hammer-style weapon for an easy win. Bloodsport wasn’t through though because it showed up in the Skorpios bracket of BattleBots Champions and smashed its way to the top only to eventually lose to Skorpios in a battle that kind of sucked. Bloodsport’s problem is that is “gets tired” as the season wears on and the robot hits weaker and weaker until it eventually just gets outclassed and shoved around.

Riptide leaves its square first and starts pursuing Bloodsport who does a little fake out move in order to rev its blade up to speed. Both robots have their weapons going now and Riptide draws first blood by ramming into Bloodsport as the spinner is trying to muscle for a better angle. The hit deflects Riptide away lending credence to Skorpios’ Zach Lytle assessment of Bloodsport’s fighting style, “they hit you by running away”. Bloodsport tries to get going again but Riptide is on its ass and already you can see what I mean when I said Bloodsport gets “tired”. The weapon just doesn’t have any muscle behind it and even though it’s spinning it doesn’t deliver any oomph when it hits. Either it’s not spinning hard enough or fast enough or both but if this is how Bloodsport is going to fight then we’re probably about to see Ethan Kurtz start screaming “LET’S GO” by the time the fucking match ends.

Bloodsport continues to spin its blade as slowly as possible and somehow one of these light hits causes Riptide to rear up onto its side and flip over. That’s fine; Riptide can drive upside down and we’ve seen this robot rocket itself into the goddamned air to flip back over. What you’re probably not expecting to see happen is Bloodsport land an actual power shot here that severs one of the bunny ears from Riptide’s chassis. These are the little wings that ride along the ground to prop its weapon off of the arena floor so it can keep spinning. Right away Riptide starts hopping around like mad as its weapon bumps along the floor but we are spared the cripple fight when one of these jolts actually flips Riptide all the way over back right ways up. Bloodsport charges in for an attack but winds up hitting the spike strip instead. Smooth.

The two spinners get back up to speed again and dance about the arena looking for an opening. Riptide eventually takes another hit that spins it around but also simultaneously flips Bloodsport over. Bloodsport can actually right itself using its blade because it has that squiggly pipe thing on top of it; that’s not just for show. The problem here are the stupid forks that Bloodsport inexplicably has on its front bumper for this fight, one of them has bent backward and is in the way of the blade preventing it from spinning. So far these forks have done fucking nothing and now Bloodsport stands to lose the match because one piece of aluminum has fucked everything up. Justin Marple and Bloodsport’s crew cheer for another hit from Riptide and Riptide delivers. The hit knocks Bloodsport back onto its wheels but the offending fork is still bent backwards and impeding the robot’s weaponry. Mercifully for Bloodsport a rough bump into Riptide is enough to dislodge the fork and free the spinner up.

I pointed out that Chris and Kenny are absent from this episode so these fights are going off of what’s called “box audio” only. There are microphones both in the arena and pointed at the audience to record all the crashes and smashes as well as the cheering from the crowd. Someone in the crowd starts that fucking high school sing-song chant with the clapping and it sounds like they’re all yelling “fricken awesome”. That nonsense chant is so pervasive and bothersome though you can never tell what the fuck they’re actually saying. Thankfully this shit dies out pretty fast because my finger was hovering over the fast forward button in my video player. I shit you not I would rather write a play by play using muted video stills than listen to that. I graduated high school. That means I should never have to hear that stupid fucking chant again for as long as I live. I hope whoever started that chant spills their overpriced food truck soda on their clothes.

Riptide and Bloodsport have locked heads and are pushing back and forth against each other. Riptide appears to be coming out ahead in this exchange because Bloodsport starts smoldering and wisps of thick smoke puff out from around the robot’s weapon axle. It looks like it might be motor smoke from stalling against Riptide. Riptide pins Bloodsport against the wall and the robot continues to smoke. Riptide has to let go and Bloodsport gets away to try and spin back up. Meanwhile, Riptide’s weapon has no action coming out of it; that big hit to Bloodsport must’ve knocked something loose. Riptide continues to get in Bloodsport’s face and control the pace of the fight and all Bloodsport can do is just coast around idly smoking. Bloodsport eventually breaks away and starts revving its blade up and as Riptide comes in for another ram one of Bloodsport’s forks deflects upward into its blade and gets sheared off. Good design, guys. Really. Top notch stuff.

Bloodsport gets shoved back against the wall and the smoke coming out of the robot intensifies as a brief flash of flame erupts from the top of the bot. Amazingly Bloodsport is still fully operational after this happens; the robot drives away and tries to spin its weapon back up. It does neither one of those things particularly good but it’s still trying. No telling what just blew up. The clock winds down on this fight and sends it to the judges who are also absent from this episode so instead we get a split decision complete with weird jump cuts to remove Faruq and all shots of the judges. The only reason I think this was a split is because Riptide’s weapon eventually died but the robot still owned the entire battle and that’s the verdict that’s delivered.

WINNER: Riptide, Judges’ Decision (2-1)

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CAPTAIN SHREDERATOR vs. HUGE

When you think of bots that have competed in every season of the BattleBots reboot there are some crowd favorites that come to mind; Witch Doctor, Tombstone, Lock-Jaw. But there’s another robot that can say it’s competed in every season and doesn’t receive a lot of fanfare. That robot is Captain Shrederator. This shell spinner has never really lived up to the former glory it once had when it competed under the names Phrizbee and Shrederator but god damn it the team keeps on trying. Captain Shrederator probably had its best ever season this year because right out of the gate it shocked the world by defeating the newly redesigned Tombstone after a killer blow busted a tooth off of Tombstone’s spinning blade and the robot destabilized and caught fire. I guarantee Brian Nave and his team have never felt a high quite like that in the entirety of their current BattleBots career. Captain Shrederator made it into the main tournament with a relatively low seeding and was destroyed by Rotator who clipped off both of Captain Shrederator’s shell teeth and cracked the robot’s outer armor. Captain Shrederator also participated in the Champions event because I guess they just have shells to spare but Ghost Raptor rose from its grave to take it down.

Huge is a bizarre design that takes all of its important components and lifts them off of the ground by way of using wheels that are fucking massive. Three feet in diameter, I think? It’s something stupid like that. There have been very few instances where Huge’s opponents have been able to hit anything other than its wheels and this fight looks to be more of the same. Huge reached the main tournament this season but lost to Uppercut after being disabled by a particularly nasty blow; Uppercut’s spinning blade was just tall enough to strike Huge and this was key. Huge also lost to Deep Six in the Champions event because if Uppercut was able to hit Huge then yeah fucking Deep Six was definitely able to. This is a curious match-up for Huge because we’ve seen Huge fight a shell spinner before; a couple of seasons ago Huge fought Gigabyte and managed to earn a win by KO when Jonathan Schultz opted to spin his robot’s weapon downward to slice into Gigabyte’s shell. This actually worked. Will we see a similar strategy employed against Captain Shrederator? Or will Huge just wait for Captain Shrederator to die on its own because we know that’s probably going to be the case.

So Captain Shrederator comes into this fight with a totally weird load out; the top half of the robot is basically a spinning lid with two bulky teeth coming off of it and the bottom half is just an armor package sporting what looks to be the same forked “wedge” thing that Gigabyte tried to use against Tantrum earlier this year. Why that’s being used against fucking Huge is beyond me but I’m willing to believe it’s because Team LOGICOM trashed all of their shells this season and this is the only one they have left. I’m surprised by the number of configurations Captain Shrederator actually has, it’s like we see at least one new one every season. Captain Shrederator spins up and starts slicing at Huge’s wheels but the heavy Tegris wheels just flex and bend to dissipate Captain Shrederator’s kinetic energy. The wheels look smashed up but that’s because these are the same ones that Huge used against Deep Six so all that damage you see isn’t Captain Shrederator, the wheels were already like that.

Credit where due, Captain Shrederator is holding its own out there against Huge. The spinner is maneuvering around, dodging the blade of Huge, and landing hits to the wheels. It’s not doing any visible damage that I can see but Huge is being bounced away and reeling up onto one side and these hits are scoring legitimate points. In the early seconds of this fight dare I say it but Captain Shrederator just might be in the lead. Until Huge gets its first hit. Captain Shrederator shakes and convulses as it spins down and when it does this we can see one of the upper panels of its shell lid has come loose. Nothing’s come off of Captain Shrederator yet however so the robot is still able to spin, this plastic chunk looks like it’s not going to cause a problem. No, that would be when Captain Shrederator loses an entire fucking tooth the next time Huge hits it. Now we have a problem. Captain Shrederator is unstable but you know Brian Nave is still going to gun the throttle with his spinner because he doesn’t give a fuck; Captain Shrederator spins around while missing teeth all the time this situation is no different.

As you might imagine spinning up to top speed while missing a whole ass chunk of your weapon isn’t a smart idea and Captain Shrederator reels up like a spun quarter and very nearly pulls off the first Mauler Dance that the show has seen in 20 goddamned years. Captain Shrederator spins down and lands on its wheels but that was a close one. The robot keep spinning though just not at that high of a speed because fuck you, that’s why. Huge takes a few shots at Captain Shrederator and ricochets off of its spinning shell but these hits are actually doing damage because past a certain point Captain Shrederator just stops moving completely. It’s still spinning, and the robot nearly blows the fuck up again, but its drive is totally dead. The referee starts his countdown and even pauses momentarily to let Captain Shrederator do its thing before resuming at “3” and calling the fight for Huge.

WINNER: Huge, KO

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COBALT vs. PARDON MY FRENCH

Cobalt is a ham sandwich and a half. This is a robot that has really come a long way from its initial design back in season 7 when it was a horizontal spinner like Tombstone. As soon as that blade became a disc and was mounted vertically a real motherfucker was born. Cobalt has been responsible for some of the biggest hits we’ve seen in BattleBots and yes I am going to mention the time it fucking melted Ghost Raptor into nothing. You officially cannot mention Cobalt without talking about that fight. Cobalt’s ass ripper led it all the way to the quarterfinals where it lost to eventual champion Tantrum in a battle that was not as action packed as it probably could have been. Because it made it so far into the tournament Cobalt didn’t participate in the BattleBots: Champions specials so the team has had plenty of time to retool and repair Cobalt for this exhibition match. Given its opponent I don’t really think that was necessary but hey you’ve gotta treat every opponent like they can kill you I guess.

Tombstone was designed around its blade. What’s the biggest blackest dick of a weapon that you can put on a robot and get away with it? Pardon My French is here to answer that question so long as you replace “blade” with “drum”. Looking like it’s spinning a fucking trash can out here Pardon My French’s weapon weighs approximately 70 pounds and is more akin to just three big ass spinning discs with weights separating them so they hit harder. We’ve yet to see this robot perform well though because it had only two Fight Night matches this season and it lost both of them. Claw Viper suplexed this thing into oblivion and Valkyrie used its super low undercutter blade to strike at Pardon My French’s drive chains to snipe them. We’ve yet to see a good hit from this machine and something tells me we probably won’t be getting one here either. Just a hunch.

Pardon My French makes an effort – I think – to get its drum spinning at the start of the fight but it just doesn’t turn. It makes like four rotations, literally, before it comes to a halt and a shunt off of the front of Cobalt is nearly enough to turn the non-invertible robot onto its lid. Pardon My French still tries to position itself strategically in the arena but it’s all for naught because Cobalt cruises in and slices up the front of the drum bot and tosses it into the air. Pardon My French lands on its wheels but really if this is all Pardon My French has to offer I don’t see it staying in the fight very long. Pardon My French flees from Cobalt and amazingly its drum starts to turn. Not very fast or anything, but it’s going. I’m fairly certain at no point has this stupid thing ever achieved top speed in the arena and now’s not the time either because Cobalt comes in and clips Pardon My French from the side and tears up one of the robot’s side panels while flipping it over.

The side panel that was ripped off of Pardon My French bounces around before getting sucked into the screws and jamming the hazard causing a loud buzzing sound to emit from the jammed weapon. The camera angles change and we get a better look at Pardon My French’s bad side and you can see a drive chain hanging slack behind where the side armor used to be. Cobalt lines up a field goal because you know Pardon My French is about to experience the sights and sounds of the Upper Deck and sure enough Cobalt punts its opponent up there and breaks part of the BattleBots sign in the process. Pardon My French lands on its wheels and with what remains of its drivetrain it tries to get off of the deck but instead only manages to high center itself on the side of it. An excellent maneuver. The crowd starts chanting for one more hit and Cobalt tries to give the fans what they want but unfortunately its dumb front forks stick out too far from the robot and they get in the way of Cobalt and the shelf.

Pardon My French is counted out and Cobalt gets another win relatively easily.

WINNER: Cobalt, KO

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PAIN TRAIN vs. DEADLIFT

Pain Train has been busy riding its namesake for most of its pitiful existence. This is a robot that has one win and five losses to its name with that only win coming from a split judges’ decision so even then the win wasn’t exactly convincing. Evan Arias has a fantastic three pound robot called Shreddit Bro and Pain Train is kind of like the bigger bulkier version of that robot except unlike Shreddit Bro this robot sucks ass. That’s probably why after this season Pain Train was retired and replaced with a literal 250 pound rebuilt of Shreddit Bro for next year. Pain Train’s first fight was against Deep Six because the producers hate this competitor. Pain Train’s second fight was against Yeti because the producers hate this competitor. Pain Train did not get a third Fight Night qualifier round because the producers hate this competitor. Despite the deck being stacked against it Pain Train did make it into BattleBots: Champions wherein Shatter stabbed it to death with its spike axe thing. On a list of “worst BattleBots of all time” Pain Train definitely makes the list, the question now is can it avoid being at the top of that list by scoring a measly win here?

I just got done talking a whole lot of shit about Pain Train but you know who else is hovering around that “worst BattleBot of all time” territory? Deadlift. With a mathematically better – but only slightly – 2-6 career record this lifter bot is not the all muscle beast that its team wants it to be. Much like Pain Train this robot is also staring down a winless season with losses to Jackpot and Icewave in the tournament qualifiers and a loss to Blacksmith in BattleBots: Champions. That’s kind of a shame too because for all the things people say about Deadlift it is objectively a better robot this year than it was last year; this year the robot has that grappling arm that I swear is not a penis and that’s there to help it grab and suplex opponents over its back. It’s also still armed with a flamethrower too so it can grab and roast just as easily as it can grab and lift. Or fuck it, it can do all three at the same time. Who fucking knows?

Deadlift immediately gets in Pain Train’s face weapon be damned and starts shoving the little drum spinner around. Pain Train is scraping some colorful sparks off of Deadlift’s front end but none of this is doing any serious damage to the lifter. Deadlift blows some fire out onto Pain Train as it does its thing and honestly this is shaping up to possibly be a decent outing for Deadlift; it’s controlled, it’s executing, it’s doing everything right. Pain Train gets shoved into a corner and as Deadlift retreats to line up a better angle Pain Train manages to catch Deadlift by one of the inside corners of its front wedge. This bows out the armor panel and ensures that Deadlift’s wedge will probably do fuck all. Now all the sparks Pain Train is throwing off of Deadlift are coming from contact on that piece of snagged metal and it’s getting further bent up and distorted. We’re talking about a literal fucking corner of a robot’s armor being peeled up and bent and here I am saying this is probably the most damage Pain Train has done to a robot since the time it hit SMEE and blew its own goddamned drum off.

Both robots meander around a bit as Deadlift tries not to get snagged on all the hazards and imperfections in the floor. Pain Train really ought to be going for Deadlift’s sides or something but the robot just seems uncontrollable. It’s ambling around doing nothing other than sitting on top of some Killsaws (which aren’t active yet) and waiting for Deadlift to come to it. Deadlift eventually stops hitting the dings in the floor and gets a respectable across the box shove on Pain Train. This move also puts Pain Train up onto Deadlift’s wedge so the robot grapples down with its boner arm thing and tries to perform a suplex. The problem is Deadlift’s upper arm clamps right down in between Pain Train’s drum and its chassis meaning the arm gets stuck. Pain Train is now upside down and caught on Deadlift’s arm and all Deadlift can do is spin around and blow fire onto Pain Train because I guess Deadlift’s upper arm isn’t torqued enough to handle 250 pounds pressing down on it. At least the crowd is enjoying the fire display.

Eventually Deadlift is able to fight against Pain Train’s spinning tires and shove it into the corner backwards to knock its penis free. Deadlift resets its lifting arm and Pain Train’s drum is pretty much dead as usual. Deadlift grapples down on Pain Train a second time and heaves it up into the air. A third lift happens moments later. The crowd cheers Deadlift on as the grappler bot mops the floor with Pain Train and shoves it back into the arena wall. Pain Train is fed into the screws and just once I’d like to see it get trapped behind the hazard is that too much to ask for? I mean this thing is fucking bite sized it should slot right back in there. Pain Train gets stuck for a moment but the screws reverse and spit the robot out right into the waiting maw of Deadlift who gets another heave-ho in. It’s not a spectacular fight by any stretch of the term but it’s a solid performance from Deadlift and the match exists purely to delineate where the bottom of the barrel is. Props to Deadlift, your season isn’t winless after all. Good luck getting accepted into season 12 though.

WINNER: Deadlift, Judges’ Decision (3-0)

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Those five fights went by pretty fast didn’t they? That’s what happens when you cut out literally all of the show except for the battles. No hosting segments, no Faruq introductions, no post-fight interviews, nothing. Just fights. Truth be told it made writing this article feel somehow less daunting I guess because I only needed to review what amounted to 15 minutes’ worth of video to get here. But still, halfway is halfway and for the sake of not churning out an article that’s 10,000+ words long I think here’s a good place to stop for this week. Next week we’ll have the other half (assuming I can get the article posted from my hotel in Vegas because BattleBots is taping next week).

I know these battles don’t have the glam and stardom as the main tournament fights but exhibition battles are still fun to watch. These are all the matches that took place while production was trying to give as much time as possible to the teams preparing for championship matches; everyone who’s out just signs up for fights on a big whiteboard in the pit area and I guess the producers check the board and then contact the teams to arrange the matches. There’s a system in place but I’m not 100% sure as to how it works, it just does.

I’m entering a particularly busy phase of the year right now so I’ll do my best to have the second half of this special covered on time next week. That much I can assure you, I’ll just head back to the hotel between taping sessions or something to post the article. Or do it in the morning before I leave. Or fuck it, do it at night when I get back and will surely be too tired to do anything so I’ll forget about it!

Thank you for checking out BattleBots Update. If you’d like to support this project you can do so with a monthly pledge on Patreon or a one-time donation with Ko-Fi. Special thanks to Buddy who made a generous contribution to the Ko-Fi page at the end of BattleBots: Champions! As always you can also pick up some BBU stuff on Redbubble and be sure to follow BattleBots Update on Facebook for updates and everything else.

See you next week!

– Draco