For the first two series of Robot Wars, the robots didn't just to go to war. In fact they didn't get to that point until halfway through the show. The first two rounds were always a trial of some kind. Round 1 was always the Gauntlet, an assault course with a selection of different routes, and then the second round would change every week. In Series 3, the main competition was changed to be all combat, but the more popular/interesting trials were retained as sideshows. There was a bit of a kerfuffle that led to filming on some of these being shortened or cancelled, but they stayed on for Series 4 more successfully... but then, Series 5 was filmed alongside the 'Extreme' series, and there wasn't time for any of the trials.
Here, then, is a listing of all the trials you might expect to encounter had you entered Robot Wars in the twentieth century, in order of appearance.
GAUNTLET
Appearances: Every episode in Series 1 & 2 except the Series 2 Grand Final
The assault course, basically. In series 1, each robot started in a rotating turntable (one robot failed to make it off the turntable at all because it was too big), and had three choices: to their right was a maze followed by an obstacle course and spikes; in the middle were two ramps; and to their left were two house robots with other obstacles (most notably the grilles, a forerunner of the Pit which would immobilise them if they were pushed onto them). Beyond the initial path they took they'd then need to beat another house robot to get to the end zone. The robot that covered the least distance was eliminated; in the event that all six of them managed to complete the course, the slowest to finish would go out. (A recurring problem was that the house robots could move in to attack but actually help out the competitor by pushing them further down the course!)
The Gauntlet was changed for Series 2: the robots would now start in a static pen, for one thing. The three routes were now also different, and would change throughout the series, with an additional beefing-up for the semi-finals!
To their right were the pits and two House Robots; midway through the series, this route would also play host to the unofficial sixth House Robot of the time, the Sentinel, a modified JCB arm which aimed to push them into the pit. In the semis, the Sentinel was upgraded so it had 360 degrees of control, also allowing it to reach into the other lane.
The centre route was regularly changed throughout the second series; contestants would first have to break down a wall of either barrels or blocks, then get over a see-saw ramp and a house robot. Other obstacles that would feature on this route included floor spikes, a massive sphere and the ram-rig (a part of the wall with circular saws that moved in and blocked the robot's path). For the semi-finals this route was changed to add a second, static ramp with a pit inbetween the two; the Sentinel could also reach you if you took the static ramp, allowing it to push you into the pit.
To the robot's left there would also be a ram-rig, a house robot and a flame pit; other obstacles such as the sphere or the pendulum would also be added later on in the series to impede the robots in getting stuck on the ram-rig.
On one and only occasion, two robots managed to exactly tie for last place (Mace and Panic Attack, in the second series semi-finals). This resulted in a 'race-off', where both robots ran the Gauntlet at the same time.
Although this event was not retained when the trials were removed from the competition proper, it was used as a way of auditioning Series 3 applicants, before the qualification process was changed to also be combat-only. A not dissimilar event, the Assault Course, appeared in RW's sister series, Techno Games.
SUMO
Appearances: Series 1 Heat A, Series 2 Heat F, Series 2 Heat L, Series 4 Side Tournament
Stay on the ring with Shunt for as long as possible. Alternatively: Shove Shunt off before time runs out, if you can. (On the few occasions a robot did manage this, it would be due to clever driving rather than having more pushing power.) Except for S2 HL, where you were up against Dead Metal instead. In Series 2, you had to survive for 30 seconds, but in its Series 1 & 4 incarnations you had a whole minute. (It's not known what the show would have done if all the robots had survived the full amount of time.) Was also planned to be a sideshow in Series 3, but was one of the many events cancelled in the wake of the accident in the pits. This was one of several events to also appear in Techno Games, and was also recreated for some of the many Robot Wars computer games.
BRITISH BULLDOG
Appearances: Series 1 Heat B
Race from one end of the arena to the other, with all five robots going at the same time; either the least distance covered or slowest to finish is eliminated. The House Robots and some static obstacles are there, but that's about it. The relative lack of imagination is probably why this was only ever played once.
FOOTBALL
Appearances: Series 1 Heat C, Series 2 Heat D, Series 2 Heat H, Series 3 Side Tournament
A house robot serves as the goalkeeper with another as defender (both roles were rotated between Sgt Bash, Matilda and Dead Metal - for some reason Shunt was never used), and the contestants have to score a goal. In the Series 1-2 incarnation, all five robots remaining would be in the arena together; the first to score a goal was removed from the arena and play continued with the others, and so on until the only one which failed to score a goal was eliminated. In its Series 1 appearance, the final two robots left standing were unable to move, and the robot with the most touches of the ball was sent through to the next round. In truth, however, one of the two, WYSIWIG, was a stock robot provided by the production team to make up the numbers, and this was a cover story as the stock robots were not allowed to get to the arena stages.
This tournament survived into Series 3 as the Robotic Soccer Cup, although it was truncated by the accident in the pits; there were four one-on-one qualifiers, and then a four-on-one grand final. (The final ended with nobody having managed to score a goal, and the judges deemed the 'most aggressive' robot, Evil Weevil, to be the winner.) The Series 3 version was less interesting because the qualifiers didn't have the novelty of so many robots being in the arena at the same time, which may be why it wasn't brought back for Series 4.
Another event that made it into Techno Games; this was also one of the few trials to be replicated for any of the computer games, although not very well as it was just regular combat mode with a ball and goal added, meaning the CPU-controlled robot would ignore the goal and just attack you.
STOCK CAR
Appearances: Series 1 Heat D
Simple enough: all five robots race, the aim is to cover the most laps, fewest laps is eliminated. There's a simple reason for why this was only ever played once: in Series 1, each show would feature a different weight category (leading to the ludicrous situation in the Grand Final where an 11.4 kg robot had to fight against a robot nearly eight times its weight, and actually got eliminated when it got stuck under a middleweight), and this trial appeared in the Featherweights show. It couldn't be played with bigger robots, so when the show switched to only having heavyweights in the main competition it had to go.
(The reason for the mix of weights in the first series was because they didn't have enough heavyweight competitors, and had to allow robots from the lower weight categories to compete just to get close to the required number - Prince of Darkness was built in under five hours, and The Destroyer was literally just a store-bought remote control car with a metal shell bolted on. The following series had more than enough heavyweights for the main competition, with the other weight classes receiving their own mini-tournaments, which were fought on a recurring basis in Series 2, 3, both Extremes and Series 7, either as special episodes or special events during the main series.)
LABYRINTH
Appearances: Series 1 Heat E
A maze, run by all five at the same time. Least ground covered gets eliminated. Noteworthy for completely screwing over one of its competitors the only time it appeared, as the competitor in question was Psychosprout, a sphere containing a radio-controlled truck in a wire frame; because of this they'd originally been meant to do a different show with a different trial, but got moved into this one despite the obvious disadvantage. (To be fair, they'd have been at a disadvantage no matter which trial they had to do, but this one was particularly harsh as it needed precise movements and no turning circle; Psychosprout ended up rolling backwards and covering no distance at all.)
SNOOKER
Appearances: Series 1 Heat F
The robots must collect balls from the triangle in the middle and return them to their pocket; fewest balls in when time is up is eliminated. Quite a fun idea, and there's no obvious reason why it was only played once (it showed more imagination than the three other Series 1 trials which were never played again) apart from the fact that on its only appearance it ended up being rather dull through no fault of its own (one of the robots got speared on the side wall the moment the trial started, and another was a stock robot which had to be eliminated by default).
SKITTLES
Appearances: Series 2 Heat A, Series 2 Heat G
Stacks of barrels are the skittles, and the robot must knock as many down as possible in the time limit. The House Robots are present, but cannot attack if the competitor is in the triangle where all the skittles are. Noteworthy for one robot managing to score 0 points in its first appearance, and for nearly eliminating the reigning champion in its second.
TUG OF WAR
Appearances: Series 2 Heat B, Series 2 Heat J
The competitor is chained to a house robot, both roboteers floor the 'accelerate' button and aim to avoid being dragged into the pit that's inbetween them. Longest time survived wins (up to a 30 second time limit; as with Sumo, there seemingly wasn't any provision for what would have happened if all the robots managed to last the full time). One robot (Chaos) actually managed to beat the house robot and pull them into the pit! Another event that would later appear in Techno Games.
JOUST
Appearances: Series 2 Heat C, Series 2 Heat I
A raised platform runs from one end of the arena to the other; the competitor charges down the ramp at the same time as Matilda, hoping to gain enough ground as possible (any robot falling off would be declared out). Notable for the worrying frequency at which competitors managed to rack up minus scores.
KING OF THE CASTLE
Appearances: Series 2 Heat E, Series 2 Heat K
Not dissimilar to Sumo; the competitor starts off on a platform very much like the one from that trial, but the difference is that there are two house robots trying to get onto the platform from ramps at either end, and the competitor must try and survive against them within the 1 minute time limit.
PINBALL
Appearances: Series 2 Semi-Finals, Series 3 & 4 Side Tournament
Debuted as a special trial for the Series 2 semis, this quickly became the most popular trial ever created for the show and was used as a side tournament until the trials were phased out altogether (there may even have been some preliminary plans to keep it for Series 5), as well as attracting notoriety after the producers conspired to rig it to keep their favourite in the competition. Ways of scoring points were dotted around the arena:
Series 2
75 points for the car-tyre target guarded by Dead Metal
50 points for the targets guarded by Matilda and Shunt
20 points for pushing the silver sphere into the pit
15 points for each successful run over the see-saw ramp
10 points for each barrel knocked down
5 points for each brick knocked down or put in the pit
Sir Killalot has freedom of the arena
Series 3 changes
Shunt and Sgt Bash would now guard the 50-point targets, with either Dead Metal or Matilda guarding the 75-point target
Barrels now only worth 5 points
The multiball release added - 10 points for opening it, 5 extra points for every ball in the pit
The car door added - 25 points for knocking it open
Bricks no longer worth points
Series 4 changes
Bash and Matilda now regularly guarded the 50-point targets, with Dead Metal always guarding the 75-pointer
See-saw ramp now worth 20 points
Silver sphere in the pit now worth 25 points (there was now a second, shallow pit for this)
Pinball was used as the basis for much of the show's merchandise, with the action figures based on competitor robots and house robots featuring a piece of pinball equipment; collect the whole set and you could recreate the entire Pinball course! It's perhaps surprising there was never any attempt to use it for the computer games.
The slow reduction of the trials was a contentious point amongst both roboteers and the viewers, as many felt they were a test of driving and skill (although you could argue that applied to the fighting as well), and they gave a chance to get to know the robots and teams better; their use in Series 3 as sideshows was also an opportunity for several robots that had not qualified for the main tournament to still be seen on television. It's a shame they were scrapped altogether; Series 4 is, for my money, the best run of the show, and that's in part thanks to the variety offered by the regular trials (being rather better implemented than they were the previous year, thanks to nobody accidentally getting a spike in their leg).
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Since I mentioned the rigged round of Pinball above, here's something I didn't ponder in the article about it: the reason the Napalm team are in tears after that round is because they've just been stitched up by the producers in order to keep the favourite in the competition, isn't it? This feels like a rather unpleasant edit, given that the show tries to make out that they were beaten fair and square. The Mortis team are also rather cruelly treated by the edit in the later "Grudge Matches" show, which insinuates that they were given a second chance to do the trial because they protested, when the truth is that they were given another chance despite their protests. This incident resulted in Mortis being portrayed as a Heel for the rest of its time on the show, characterised in tie-in media as "the robot everyone loves to hate!", and in the following series their second round battle against Gravedigger is unusually intercut with footage of the other teams watching the fight from the pits and everyone cheering when Mortis goes in the pit. This doesn't really square with Rob Knight refusing to drive the robot because he felt the producers' interference was wrong.
* * *
Although they're not trials per se, here's a guide to some of the other recurring side events that were played in later series for completeness' sake (many of these were also the basis for episodes of the various American series):
TAG TEAM TERROR
Appearances: Special episode in Series 4, recurring event in Extreme 1, special episode in Extreme 2
Initially planned as a side tournament to be held across Series 3 but cancelled, each Tag Team battle featured two teams of two robots. One robot from each team fought at a time, and a robot could 'tag' their partner by driving into their safe zone (in Series 4, each side of the arena was painted red or blue to denote this (pictured above), but in later series the house robots' CPZs would be used). At least, that was the theory; in practice, nearly every Tag Team battle turned into a free-for-all with both robots from both teams entering the fray.
The Series 4 tournament only featured four teams (with the format being the same as the Grand Final of the regular series, including a playoff for third place), but the two Extreme tournaments both featured eight (one of which was the defending champions from last time round, who on both occasions went out in the first round to the eventual winner).
ANNIHILATOR
Appearances: Special episode(s) in Series 4, Extreme 1, Extreme 2 & Series 7
The most popular special event ever to be created for the show, the Annihilators started with six robots in the arena, who all fought until one was immobilised. The remaining five then returned for the second battle and fought until they were down to four, and so on until only one was left standing.
The two Series 4 episodes each featured robots from the North and South respectively, and were titled the Northern and Southern Annihilators; in Extreme 1 the two Annihilators featured robots who had qualified from the twelve Mayhem battles (a three-way melee from which the last robot standing won); and the Extreme 2 and Series 7 Annihilators featured the first six robots which happened to be available for the filming dates (the latter featured Kan-Opener, the winner of the Extreme 2 Annihilator who was branded the "reigning Annihilator champion" and went on to win for a second time despite never winning a single battle in the main competition).
CHALLENGE BELT
Appearances: Recurring event in Extreme 1, special episode in Extreme 2
At the beginning of Extreme 1, Behemoth were awarded the Challenge Belt (it is unclear what selection process led to them being given this - the show claimed it was awarded by the World Association of Robotics, but said association was completely fictitious). Any robot could challenge them, and take over the Belt if they won. If the current holder of the Belt saw off three challenges in a row, they could keep that Belt outright and a new one would be issued. Behemoth won the first two Challenge Belt fights, but lost the third to Tornado, who went on to win four more fights in that series of Extreme.
The first series of Extreme featured different fights from different events in each episode, but the second had each episode dedicated to one tournament. As such, Challenge Belt's format changed completely for Extreme 2 - eight robots fought a mini-tournament for the right to challenge Tornado, with the winner's fight against them being shown at the end of the episode. (Hypothetically, the incumbent holder of the belt could have refused any of the challenges and automatically conceded the belt, but for obvious reasons this never happened.)
ALL-STARS
Appearances: Recurring event in Extreme 1, special episode(s) in Extreme 2 & Series 7
A knockout tournament featuring the 'best of the best'. Extreme 1 featured sixteen robots who were all semi-finalists or finalists in UK or World Championships, but the precise selection criteria is unclear (it included X-Terminator, who had made the semi-finals of Series 4, but excluded Spawn Again, which had made the semi-finals of Series 3 & 4). The Extreme 2 tournament featured the twelve semi-finalists from the most recent series, with the exception of Wild Thing, which did not participate for unknown reasons and was replaced by Chaos 2, the statistically next most successful robot. This particular tournament was notable as many of the teams did not return for the following series of the main championship, and it was the last time they were seen on television.
As previously mentioned, the Series 7 tournament was originally planned as a "Veterans Special", with the criteria being teams that had fought in five or more series. However, many of these were unable to compete due to damage sustained in the main tournament, and in the end they had to include Dantomkia (a participant in only two series, but a semi-finalist in both of them) and rename it the All-Stars.
WILD CARD WARRIORS
Appearances: Recurring event in Extreme 1
Robots which had never appeared on television before got to fight veteran teams such as Hypno-Disc and Panic Attack. In all but one case the veteran won, but the sole fight where the Wild Card was victorious was not broadcast at all due to its poor nature, making it one of a very few battles in the original series to meet such a fate (there was also at least one fight filmed shortly after Series 3 which went unaired, but the exact reason for why these battle(s) were even being filmed at all is unknown, let alone why they didn't make it to air).
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| One of the unaired battles, between Behemoth and Cerberus (we know about the existence of this one because a still of it was included in a CD-ROM given away free with Robot Wars Magazine). |
Appearances: Recurring event in Extreme 1
Two teams with old scores to settle fight each other in a one-off match. In some cases this would be a genuine grudge match (notably Razer vs Pussycat and Panic Attack vs X-Terminator), in other cases the reason would be something other than a previous defeat (Firestorm vs Diotoir was because the Diotoir team captain had insulted the Firestorm team in his column for Robot Wars Magazine), and in some cases the reason for the match would be somewhat spurious (Stinger vs Tornado was actually repurposed from another event, and after Bigger Brother vs Comengetorix the Bigger Brother team admitted to Craig Charles there was no grudge between the two teams and they had simply pretended there was so they could have an exhibition match against the House Robots).
There were also two similar battles broadcast as part of Series 2's end-of-series 'Grudge Matches' special, which were referred to as 'Judgement Day'.
HOUSE ROBOT REBELLION
Appearances: Special event in Extreme 1 & Series 7
A one-off fight where two or three competitor robots volunteered to fight the House Robots; not only did the House Robots have the freedom of the arena, the producers would also use the arena hazards against the competitors, such as using the floor flipper against a still active competitor robot or bringing the pit back up if a House Robot was in it. In the Extreme 1 version the last competitor robot still active was declared the winner, but in the Series 7 iteration the robots were judged as 'sides', with the two competitor robots successfully defeating all three House Robots and being declared the winners. (The Series 7 fight, although broadcast a few weeks before the show's final episode, was the last fight to be filmed for the original run as the House Robots were needed for other fights first.)
NEW BLOOD
Appearances: Special episodes in Extreme 2
This tournament took up five episodes of Extreme 2 (four heats plus a final), and featured new or inexperienced robots fighting in a mini-tournament. The winner would be granted automatic entry to the next series of the main championship by being seeded. (Every other episode of Extreme 2 not mentioned here was a themed mini-tournament, such as "University Challenge" where all the teams were from universities, "Minor Meltdown" where all the robots were driven by children, "Iron Maidens" where the robots were driven by the usual teams' wives, girlfriends and mothers, and various shows featuring international robots such as the Commonwealth Carnage or European Championship.)
* * *
To finish off, I have already written a far-too-comprehensive guide to the various international championships here, and here's a summary of the various tournaments for alternative weight categories:
Series 2: The Super Heavyweight Championships (for robots weighing up to 154kg, more than twice the 80kg limit for the main tournament) were fought for the only time in the show's history. There were four three-way melees followed by a four-way grand final between the melee winner, but only the final was shown in full as part of a special 'Grudge Matches' episode at the end of the series, billed as the 'Super Showdown'. Highlights of the four melees were shown before this, but you can read write-ups of them on the Robot Wars Wiki. The Middleweight, Featherweight and Lightweight Championships each consisted of a single three or four-way battle, which were also partially broadcast during the Grudge Matches special. (The special also featured a number of one-off events, perhaps most notably the Reserve Rumble, which featured several robots which had not qualified for the main series and would not have otherwise been seen on television.)
Series 3: The various weight championships were planned to go ahead, but most of them were cancelled by the accident in the pits. The Middleweight Championship went ahead as a single four-way melee; there were also two exhibition battles for walking robots.
Extreme 1: The Antweight Championship (for robots weighing no more than 150 grams, which obviously went ahead in their own specially designed arena) was a single seven-way melee; there was also a single featherweight battle and a middleweight melee, with a similar fight for lightweights being cancelled.
Extreme 2: A special episode, "Robot Rampage", featured a variety of different weights; the two-round Middleweight Championship, a single Lightweight battle, the two-round Featherweight Championship, and the two-round Antweight Championship. (Some of these, such as the first round of the Antweight Championship, were only shown as highlights.)
Series 7: The Featherweight Championship was held across the series as three melees followed by a final, each being shown as special events in certain episodes (the other special events were World Championship Qualifiers and one-off fights such as the 'Axe Attack', 'Crusher Crunch-Up' and 'Battle of the Spinners', between three robots who all had axes, crushers or flywheels). There was also a single middleweight battle.
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