DSL IRL Building Guideline Suggestions

[russian roulette]

I believe we should have strict guidelines just like in real world bot building but for the IRL building style of DSL.
For now this would be for suggestions and I'll edit it once I am satisfied.


Building Rule Ideas:

-Heavyweights and Middle Weights must have armor that is greater than 1mm thick.
-Horizontal and Vertical Spinners must either have a Motor in the inside of the chassis or an outer mounted motor that must have adequate adjacent supports (judged by users)
-Bottom Armor must use upside down anchors
-Heavyweight and Middleweight bots must have "big batteries" or a "connected ant battery system" (ant batteries close to each other)
-The control board cannot be placed where Motors or any other object would cut the "wires" off from the batteries.
-Flails are only allowed with extenders of any kind and small concussion weapons (beater bars)
-No jugglers, face spinners, popups, crawlers or any kind of gut ripper
-SnS's MUST use melty brain AI (Provides controlled movement and gives the other opponent a fair chance)
-No Door Hinge Wedges
-IRL Robots entered in tournament MUST have a "Sponsor" indicator
-Trov Glitch IS allowed
-.BOT file editing can be used to make the chassis thinner as long as it is still realistic
-Limit to two flamethrowers per robot
-Flamethrowers must be concealed inside the chassis or in a manufactured container (Hoses could be cut in battle otherwise)
-The Judge Burst and Lifter Burst ARE allowed (Limit 1 per bot)
-There must be at least 1 CO2 Tank and a Small Buffer Tank in a judge burst flipper (high pressure flipper)
-To prevent control issues, the chassis in a shell spinner must be stable (not spinning in circles)
-Robots cannot start with their weapons on the ground (flippers are an exception)
-Tank Tread Robots get a 200 kg Weight Advantage
-Walkers and Shufflers get a 400 kg Weight Advantage
-MultiBots must be within 75 kg of each other

Be my guest to request change in the rules or even add rules.

[Squirrel_Monkey]

Face Spinners exist IRL
Door Hinge wedges are fine in certain places.
Sponsors are not part of Combat Robotics much anymore.
SnSs can act like a whipper rather than melty-brain
Burst motors are in n way connected to pistons, the are 100% electronic, Co2 is only valid in pistons.
Shuffler/walker must be defined. Along with "crawlers" (e.g. Saw Point IRL).

[Clickbeetle]

I saw this thread and I immediately thought "Uh-oh, 20-page controversy bordering on flamewar ahead".
 
I'd comment on your rules but I don't see the point as everyone is just going to start arguing and posting their own rule ideas shortly.
 
Basically I think IRL building rules should be as "loose" as possible... you look at a bot and it's either IRL or it's not.  You can't objectify that with rules.  As soon as you start relying on standard IRL building codes, you'll get bots that meet the rules but still don't really look IRL, and bots that miss one or two rules but are clearly realistic.
 
If we did develop more objective IRL rules, I think they should focus more on limiting competitiveness than on ensuring realism.  For example, caps on total weapon weight and restrictions on wedge use.

[russian roulette]

I saw this thread and I immediately thought "Uh-oh, 20-page controversy bordering on flamewar ahead".
 
I'd comment on your rules but I don't see the point as everyone is just going to start arguing and posting their own rule ideas shortly.
 
Basically I think IRL building rules should be as "loose" as possible... you look at a bot and it's either IRL or it's not.  You can't objectify that with rules.  As soon as you start relying on standard IRL building codes, you'll get bots that meet the rules but still don't really look IRL, and bots that miss one or two rules but are clearly realistic.
 
If we did develop more objective IRL rules, I think they should focus more on limiting competitiveness than on ensuring realism.  For example, caps on total weapon weight and restrictions on wedge use.

That seems fair enough, just suggesting the idea.

[smashysmashy]

Robots cannot start with their weapons on the ground (flippers are an exception)

Why this rule, by the way? Curiosity, mainly.

[Jack Daniels]

Rules suck with this game because the community is too damn savvy and smart.   

But really, if you set defined rules... then some people will still exploit them to the max in the name of winning.  (as usual)

The voting system is really the only way that could push people in the right direction for IRL building.

Example:
Host starts an IRL tourney and offers to accept a max of 24 bots.
A nice high quality splash is posted with all bots showing outside and insides. Actual Builders are kept secret.
Community (or just people that entered the tourney) vote for the 16 bots that are the most IRL suitable.
New splash is produced with the 16 competitors and their builders listed with them.
Tourney starts.

I'm pretty sure that the voting system would result in a lot of defensive Bawwwwwing, but it sure would weed out a lot of the bots that exploit the spirit of the IRL style.

[Thyrus]

I prefer what jd said

[NFX]

I think a community vote is probably the best solution we could come up with, short of the tournament host being able to reject bots that they deem unrealistic. The problem with that is that people have differing views on what's realistic and what isn't, and what is deemed perfectly IRL by some might be rejected by the host, and vice versa. We can't really put hard and fast guidelines on what makes IRL building, because people will just exploit them for the sake of victory, as has already been mentioned. If you're building in IRL style, then my view is that you should place aesthetics before efficiency and combat effectiveness, and not the other way around.

[smashysmashy]

If you're building in IRL style, then my view is that you should place aesthetics before efficiency and combat effectiveness, and not the other way around.

This.

[Pwnator]

Dude, it's just common sense. Anyone can differentiate between this:



and this:

[nicsan2009]

There is no real guidelines but it is just like common sense like pwnator said

[123savethewhales]

If IRL tournament is 50% vote/50% combat, then ppl won't spend all their time trying to make it combat effective.

Encourage realism by making realism pay.

[Dexterhunter]

Its all common sense. I now suggest we all lock this thread before 123svethewhales begins politicking all over the place.

[Jack Daniels]

I am afraid the "common sense" argument is invalid.

1: A good portion of GTM members do not have any common sense.

2: New members are not going to know any better unless they are guided or educated.  The "common sense" in relation to IRL bot building will be completely foreign to them.

[MikeNCR]

I think an easy "rule" would be that you should be able to find a similar weapon/drive/chassis/etc... setup on a real combat bot with picture or video evidence. The robot wouldn't need to match entirely, simply proof that any particular mechanism is at least probable, independent of the other mechanisms.

[Unreal]

I think if bots had to have the correct amps for the motors they use then that will do alot for realism. If you have to consider the weight of the batteries you will realistically need it makes the bots tend to come out more realistic.

Maybe an overall upper weight limit of about 800kg would be good?

[NFX]

That's a heavyweight in the game anyway. If you've come from a realistic robotics background, the physics in RA2 is hideously counter-intuitive. But once you understand it, you can make some pretty cool designs. Personally, I've never been too bothered about battery power, but I always make a point of overpowering my bots slightly to make them last, like Valid Query 2 did. Although the internals of some IRL bots are forced to be unrealistic by vitrue of the game mechanics, i.e. Ring Spinners, and the newer motor-on-top designs like Frequency and the one MikeNCR made.

[Unreal]

Yeah, but despite all of its many many faults RA2 is probably one of the most addictive games I've ever played, on the addictivometer its right up with RDR and [Open] Transport Tycoon :D I think I have to try to think from inside the game rather than outside. All things are equal if its the same for all in the game aren't they.

[Tweedy]

i think that restricting irl to a certain set of rules apart from it being realistic would make it alot harder to build and would restrict the ammount of designs that you could build irl, and whether a bot is irl enough to enter an irl tournament should be up to the organizer

[Scorpion]

Really? You guys need rules for something completely subjective?