Chronos

Chronos with its team

"*Times up!*"
— Bradley Warren Hanstad
**Chronos** (Chinese: **滴答滴**, romanized as **Dīdā dī**, meaning **Tick Tock**) was a robot from California in the United States of America, which originally competed in the 2018 series *This is Fighting Robots*. It was built by Team Ghetto Logic Robotics, who were joined by Bradley Warren Hanstad, himself previously competing as part of the Megabyte team at *King of Bots*.

In *This is Fighting Robots*, Chronos was selected to participate in the main competition after impressing celebrity manager Sa Beining during a preliminary group battle. As part of the Yellow team, it lost to Sandstorm on a Judges' decision in the Freestyle Combat rounds, before being eliminated by Tánshè upon getting thrown out of the arena in a subsequent Alliance War battle.

## Design

Chronos is themed after the Ancient Greek god of time, with an exposed gear pattern representing the clockwork. It is an invertible, green and black, two-wheeled, circular robot. For weaponry, Chronos was armed with a spinning ring surrounding the entire body of the robot. Chronos could be stranded on its side or against the wall, but the force of its spinner can eventually break the robot free. However, Chronos suffered throughout the competition from a very slow spin-up time, allowing quicker robots to shepherd it, and prevent the spinner from reaching top speed. The robot is complete with a logo designed by Bradley Warren Hanstad on a livestream.

## Robot History

### This is Fighting Robots (Season 1.5)

Chronos was not selected by a celebrity manager during the initial 'blind selection' process, though Zheng Shuang briefly considered adding it to the Green team before being convinced to choose Tungsten instead. Thus, it needed to take part in a preliminary group battle to secure its qualification, putting Chronos against Mexican newcomer Blue Demon, along with two UK machines from *Robot Wars* and live event roboteers - Bonfire and Sandstorm.

Chronos started the melee tentatively, and was immediately rammed by Sandstorm, the impact briefly launching it into the air. It struggled to get its rim spinner rotating as all four robots converged in the corner; however, Chronos drove straight into Blue Demon, sparks flying as the Mexican machine’s spinners hit its rim. Despite Blue Demon having initiated the attack, Sa Beining was sufficiently impressed with Chronos at this point to select it for the Yellow team. However, after briefly nudging Bonfire aside, Chronos drove away, avoiding its opponents as its rim spinner remained motionless.

After driving and stopping in various places around the arena, it was eventually pushed and flipped into one of the spinning maces by Sandstorm; the attack also resulted in Sandstorm flipping itself over. Rolling a full 360 degrees, Chronos landed upright, and spun hastily before advancing to the other side of the arena. It survived to the end of the battle, and qualified for the main competition through being selected by Beining.

Chronos’ first battle in the main competition occurred during the second Freestyle Combat round, where it was selected by Sa Beining to face Sandstorm for the second time.

Immediately, it retreated towards the corner to get its rim up to speed, allowing Sa Beining to activate a floor ejector to lift and block Sandstorm’s initial charge. However, it was quickly shepherded and pushed against the spikes by Sandstorm, and was repeatedly knocked off-balance as the British machine rammed and attempted to flip it a few times. As it finally got its spinner up to speed again, Chronos drove towards Sandstorm as it drove into a set of rising battle rings, only to bump into the rings itself in the process. Moments later, Chronos was launched off the floor several times as Sandstorm drove into its now-rotating rim, but escaped being flipped over completely as Sandstorm drove underneath it and in between the electric saws.

Evading Sandstorm yet again, Chronos finally got its rim spinner up to full speed as both machines circled around each other. It sustained a head-on collision with the latter’s wedge, which launched Chronos several feet into the air before Sandstorm deflected it again into the wall spikes. Chronos lost speed in its weapon as Sandstorm continued to ram and deflect it upwards – moments later, it was sent speeding into the wall spikes following another push from Sandstorm. As it struggled to escape from the spikes, Chronos was scooped underneath and tipped against the wall by Sandstorm, where it immediately spun its body up to try and free itself. However, it initially remained motionless, resulting in it nearly being counted out.

With one second before it was due to be eliminated, Chronos shook itself off the wall and gradually positioned itself back onto its wheels, to Sa Beining’s delight and in spite of Sandstorm’s attempt to hold it in place with its lifter. Chronos continued to evade and weather Sandstorm’s rams for the remainder of the battle, even as the latter pushed it into the maces. It was launched into the air by Sandstorm one last time before time ran out. Chronos was ultimately deemed to have lost the battle, and thus did not score a point for Sa Beining and the Yellow team.

Chronos did not appear again until the final head-to-head phase of the Alliance War stage. Here, it was chosen by Sa Beining to face the UK flipper of Tánshè, even with knowledge amongst Yellow team roboteers of its slow spin-up time and vulnerability against opponents with these weapons.

"*I think that was a poor choice. I mean... that was kind of almost a suicide mission.*"
— Jerry Serafin, responding to Sa Beining's decision to pit Chronos against Tánshè

Immediately, Tánshè charged directly towards Chronos to prevent it from powering up its spinning rim, causing it to recoil into the air. Tánshè then edged Chronos towards the mace, and bounced the spinning robot off its flipper repeatedly.

"*During the fight with Chronos, we knew that we had to get on them very fast. If we let them spin up, we could take damage. So we went straight over to them, and started to worry them, like a dog with a bone!*"
— Gabriel Stroud of Team Legion

Chronos tried in vain to spin up its weapon, grinding on the side of Tánshè, but caused no damage, and was pushed towards the corner of the arena. Tánshè attempted to flip Chronos out of the arena, but was not fully underneath it, and instead flipped Chronos onto the side of the arena wall, hanging from the protruding spikes.

"*Oh, god damn it!*"
— Jerry Serafin as Chronos is stranded on the wall

Held in place, Chronos could only spin its outer rim in an effort to break free from the wall. Tánshè held off, hoping to claim a win by knockout, while the referee started to count Chronos out. Halfway through the referee's count, Chronos started to jump through the air, sliding along the wall, but did not reach its wheels.

Straight after the referee delivered the '9' of the count, Chronos finally fell back to its wheels and rejoined the battle. However, this recovery was short-lived, as Tánshè drove straight back under Chronos, delivered it to the other corner of the arena, and flipped it straight over the wall, winning the battle by knockout. This eliminated Chronos from the competition.

"*It was really tough because when we tested Chronos, it did a great job in our test, and it looked very formidable and strong. And then, we entered and it just wasn't performing like it should.*"
— Team Ghetto Logic Robotics

## Results

### Wins/Losses

* Wins: 0
* Losses: 2

*NOTE: Chronos' preliminary group battle is not considered to be a win or a loss.*

## Outside King of Bots

After its appearance on *This is Fighting Robots*, Chronos competed in the 2019 season of *BattleBots*, in the USA. In its first battle, it faced another full-body spinner, Gigabyte, but it was immobilized relatively quickly after coming off worse in the spinner exchanges. However, it redeemed this with a destructive win over Copperhead, after installing a new weapon motor before the match. However it still did not compete in enough battles to qualify for the Top 16, although it still competed in a US vs UK tag team battle, teaming up with MadCatter but lost to Monsoon and Ragnarök on a judges' decision.

Chronos was rebuilt to compete in the 2020 season of *BattleBots*, sporting a taller, angled design and improved weaponry. It lost an untelevised fight against P1, before losing a judges' decision to Bloodsport, subsequently failing to qualify for the main competition for the second series in a row. Outside the main competition, Chronos also fought in the *Bounty Hunters* spin-off series, where it fought for the right to face Son of Whyachi. However, it was swiftly immobilised in its first fight in a rematch against Copperhead.

Aside from Chronos, Team Ghetto Logic Robotics are known for building overhead spinners.

Bradley Warren Hanstad is the captain of Team Think Tank, who first entered the robotic scene by entering Season 5.0 of *BattleBots* with **Ringmaster**, where it collected four straight wins before falling in the Round of 16 to Omega-13. The team also entered **InTriVerter** into *Robotica*, and borrowed **Mad Cow Bot** to enter Season 2 of *Robot Wars: Extreme Warriors*.

During the mid-to-late 2000s, Team Think Tank rose to prominence at North American live events with a lineage of vertical spinners in the **VD** series. One of these, the tracked heavyweight **VD6.0**, achieved four victories in the unaired 2009 *BattleBots* Pro Championship - including one against future ABC era champion Tombstone - to finish third overall.

The design of VD6.0 was adapted into Team Think Tank's entry into the second season of *BattleBots* on ABC, **Bad Kitty**, which also featured a small minibot and inspired the team's cat theme. Bad Kitty lost its only battle to Black Ice in a three-way rumble to enter the main bracket of the tournament.