Storm Cut

**Storm Cut** (Chinese: **暴风斩**, romanized as **Bàofēng zhǎn**, translating to **Storm Slash**) was a Chinese competitor robot which fought in Season 2 of *King of Bots*. First appearing in the second episode, it was the last robot to be chosen by Tao Shen during the opening rounds, winning over Green Goblin after removing one of its opponent’s wheels and immobilizing it. However, its place on Tao Shen's team was taken by Big Carioca, which defeated Storm Cut in a quick knockout. Storm Cut instead joined Emma Dumont's team by immobilizing Silver Scorpion in a single blow, and defended its place on her team by teaming up with Drift to defeat Saber. However, it would end up compromising its team's performance during the Attrition War after being flipped over in seconds while fighting Boxing Champion. As a result, Storm Cut was cut from its team, thus ending its run at redemption.

## Design

Storm Cut was a silver, white and red, low box-shaped robot armed with a large horizontal bar spinner. The spinner was centrally mounted between the chassis and a top section resembling a 'Mecha' head, which also served as a mount for the weapon motor, exposed atop the robot. This configuration gave Storm Cut a considerable attack range from multiple sides, as well as a passing resemblance to *BattleBots* competitor Icewave. The robot's front end also incorporated an angled wedge, primarily used to feed opponents into the spinner. The rear wheels of Storm Cut are exposed, which allows the robot to drive itself back down onto its wheels when stranded on its back, at the cost of an additional target for spinning weapons.

## Robot History

### King of Bots II (Season 2)

Storm Cut first appeared in Episode 2 of Season 2, where it was chosen by Tao Shen to fight in the final head-to-head battle of the episode. There, it was drawn against another horizontal spinner in the form of Green Goblin.

Initially, Storm Cut met Green Goblin in the center of the arena, before turning round and clipping the latter's front end. Pirouetting along the floor, it drove head-on into Green Goblin's disc, again sending Green Goblin into a spin and causing its front-left wheel to briefly lock up. A few moments passed before both robots approached each other again; Storm Cut proceeded to cleave off and destroy Green Goblin's damaged wheel before its spinner stopped rotating. Storm Cut again spun around and bumped into Green Goblin, this time managing to immobilize Green Goblin with this collision. With its knockout victory almost secure, Storm Cut began driving around the arena in celebration, while Green Goblin was fully counted out. Storm Cut would take the third and final place on Tao Shen’s team with this result, in what would become the last battle of the opening rounds of the competition.

Storm Cut's place on Tao Shen's team did not last long, as Episode 3 saw the Brazilian entry Big Carioca challenge it to a head-to-head battle, fighting to replace Storm Cut on Shen's team.

Both robots spun their weapons up to full speed, but it was Big Carioca that drew first blood, bringing its bar spinner under the blade of Storm Cut to launch it upwards, and briefly onto its back, although Storm Cut quickly fell back onto its wheels, after hitting the weapon housing of Big Carioca with the face of its now-motionless weapon while airborne. Big Carioca had completely bent Storm Cut's blade out of shape with this attack, and when the two robots came together again, Big Carioca threw sparks off the wedge of Storm Cut, which suddenly started to smoke copiously. Big Carioca did not let up, and connected another blow with the motionless bar spinner of Storm Cut to launch it into the air and towards the Grinders, although Storm Cut landed on its wheels.

The robots returned to the center of the arena, and Big Carioca landed a blow on one of Storm Cut's rear wheels, which was enough to disable its drive on one side, also further bending the bar spinner of Storm Cut. While Storm Cut pivoted on one wheel, it vented more smoke, and came to a complete standstill. As a result, Storm Cut lost the battle by knockout, and forfeited its place on Tao Shen's team to Big Carioca, leaving the team with many repairs to make.

In the Redemption Round, Storm Cut's builder was able to freely choose his next opponent, opting to face Silver Scorpion, which the team believed they could comfortably defeat.

The battle between Storm Cut and Silver Scorpion was very quick and destructive, as Storm Cut was easily able to power its spinner up to full speeds, while Silver Scorpion slowly meandered around the arena, even showing its backside to Storm Cut. While Silver Scorpion aimlessly meandered around, Storm Cut used over twenty seconds to power up its blade before slamming into the back end of its opponent. The resulting impact was gigantic, ripping both of Silver Scorpion's ridged armor panels away, along with wiring that led to its weapon, and other critical parts of the machine. While pieces of Silver Scorpion landed across the arena, the main robot was immobile, and Storm Cut turned off its blade, having already won by knockout in order to join Emma Dumont's team.

Storm Cut's place on Emma Dumont's team would later be put in jeopardy, as her team had grown too large, and she was required to remove two robots from her team, out of Storm Cut, Cat King, Doraemon and Excelsior. However, Emma Dumont believed in her need for a horizontal spinner, and retained Storm Cut on her roster alongside Cat King. The next round would also threaten Storm Cut's place on Emma Dumont's team, as an overall loss from her team after a sequence of three battles against Di Yang's team of five robots would also lead to Storm Cut or Cat King falling from the team. Nevertheless, Storm Cut teamed up with Drift to prevent this from happening, taking on Saber which fought alone.

Storm Cut was initially the more passive machine, allowing Saber and Drift to fight individually, with Drift maintaining a slight lead. Under pressure from Drift, Saber twice drove within reach of Storm Cut's spinner, the first hit resulting in one of its sidepods being torn open. Saber drove head-on into and underneath Storm Cut, steering it into Drift before spectacularly throwing it across the arena.

Storm Cut retreated to the blue corner to spin up its blade, allowing Drift to lead the attacks on Saber again. After a sequence of attacks from Drift and Saber, it was Saber which came off worse, and it remained in the blue corner, its front-left wheel buckled and the robot seemingly hesitant to drive away. Eventually, it reversed into Storm Cut, whose spinner ruptured Saber's CO2 supply and immobilized it completely. Storm Cut and Drift therefore secured a third point for Emma Dumont's team, cementing their victory over Di Yang.

Storm Cut later represented Emma Dumont in the 'Attrition War', also fighting on behalf of former manager Tao Shen, and Tu Ziya. The team of three celebrities were already losing the Attrition War to Zhu Zheng Ting's team, and Storm Cut only widened the gap when it fought Boxing Champion.

The battle between Storm Cut and Boxing Champion proved to be the fastest of the season so far, as Boxing Champion - which had not been repaired after its previous victory - wasted no time charging into Storm Cut in the first five seconds of the match. Storm Cut's blade caught the forks atop the wedge of Boxing Champion awkwardly, and caused the whole robot to flip itself over, sliding into a Grinder. Storm Cut had no method of self-righting, and it was soon counted out, resulting in the quickest knockout of the series so far.

Ultimately, the team of Emma Dumont, Tu Ziya and Tao Shen lost the Attrition War, putting Storm Cut in danger of being eliminated. However, at this stage of the competition, Emma Dumont stepped down as Storm Cut's team manager without cutting a robot, leaving Ye Hong Li ("Leo") of Drift as the new manager of the team. Instead, it fell to Leo to cut Storm Cut from the team, and it was eliminated at this stage.

## Results

### Wins/Losses

* Wins: 3
* Losses: 2

## Series Record

 Season 2 | **Ye Hong Li's first cut**(3-2 record)

## Trivia

* Across its first two fights, Storm Cut's team never received an introduction.
* The English name "Storm Cut" was confirmed when the team signed Emma Dumont's jacket with this name. Until this revelation, the robot was often referred to as **Storm Slasher** in English.

## References

1. ↑ Name signed on Emma Dumont's jacket by the team