Beginner
A first competition. The simplest rule set for the arena, a smaller budget with fewer choices, and coaches who help the team get its four decisions written down. The pitch is short and structured.
- Goal
- A working entry and a defended plan
The competitive systems
One process. Seven arenas.
Every Haxios competition follows the same Venture Bot process: form a team, make four decisions, pitch them to a panel, then compete. What changes from arena to arena is the game on the screen and the lesson students take home. Every arena is built for high school and college teams, and each one can be run at a beginner, intermediate or advanced level.
The process every arena shares
Decide. Pitch. Compete. Reflect.
Whatever the arena, a team's weekend or semester has the same shape. That's on purpose. A student who has been through Venture Bot once can move to a new arena and spend their energy on strategy instead of relearning the format.
Half the points are earned before the first match. Every arena is scored on a judged pitch plus measured results, so the venture work is never optional.
How the Venture Bot process works- Form a team and assign rolesThree to five students decide who owns code, who owns strategy, who owns the budget, who presents.
- Make the four decisionsTeam and roles, budget and configuration, language and technology, strategy in the arena. Written down, so the team can be held to it.
- Pitch to the judgesA short, timed presentation to a panel of professionals. Scored on how clearly the team can explain and defend its choices.
- Submit and competeConfiguration choices are final and published, and code is submitted by the deadline. Then the matches run, every team against every team.
- Watch the replay and reflectEvery match can be replayed. Teams see where their plan held and where it broke, and talk about why.
Two audiences, three levels
High school and college. Beginner, intermediate, advanced.
Every arena can be run at three levels. The game stays the same; what changes is how much of the Venture Bot process the team carries on its own and how demanding the rule set is. The AI mode is a separate choice the program administrator makes, and it doesn't change the level.
Intermediate
The full Venture Bot process. Standard rule set, full budget, a full-length judged pitch and a complete round-robin. Coaches ask questions; the team makes every call.
- Goal
- Strategy that survives contact with other teams
Advanced
Competition rule sets, the largest rosters and toughest optional rules, and a judging panel that presses on reasoning. Teams are expected to organize, budget and present the way a professional team would.
- Goal
- A plan a professional would fund
High school track
Most high school teams are competing for the first time, so the track starts with the arenas that get a first entry working fastest and builds toward the ones that need a real playbook.
- BeginnerRobot Sumo · Rally Racing time trial · Robo-Football 3v3
- IntermediateTanks · Robo-Soccer · Rally Racing grid races · Robo-Football 4v4 · Relay Obstacle Course
- AdvancedTanks with competition rules · Robo-Football 5v5 · Robo-Basketball · Robot Tanks Live (coming soon)
College track
College teams usually arrive able to code and short on time, so the track starts with Tanks and moves quickly to arenas that reward coordination and quantitative reasoning.
- BeginnerTanks · Rally Racing · Robo-Soccer
- IntermediateTanks with the standard rule set · Robo-Football 4v4 · Relay Obstacle Course · Robo-Basketball
- AdvancedTanks with competition rules · Robo-Football 5v5 · Robo-Basketball with statistics coursework · Robot Tanks Live (coming soon)
Choose an arena
Seven arenas, seven lessons.
Tanks is the original. The six sports arenas carry the same strategic depth with a game every student already understands, and nothing gets destroyed. All seven are available now, and an eighth, with real robot tanks, is on the way.
HS intermediate–advancedCollege all levels
Robot Tanks
Equip a tank on a budget, pitch the plan, then go head-to-head in a round-robin tournament. Students learn to read a situation, anticipate an opponent, and defend a budget.
strategybudgetingpresenting
HS beginnerCollege beginner
Robot Sumo
Push the opponent out of the ring. A first working entry takes an afternoon, so the whole Venture Bot process fits a first-time class. Students learn timing, positioning and the heavy-or-fast trade-off.
first competitionphysics intuition
HS beginner–intermediateCollege beginner
Autonomous Rally Racing
Find the fastest way around a track. Students practice alone against the clock before they ever race someone, then tune their car for the course. Planning ahead beats reacting.
solo practiceplanningtuning
HS intermediateCollege beginner
Robo-Soccer
Three players, one ball, two goals. Students learn to give each player a job, predict where the ball will be, and keep a formation when the instinct is to chase.
teamworkanticipationformation
HS beginner–advancedCollege intermediate–advanced
Robo-Football
Call a play, run the routes, throw or hand off, make the tag. Students learn to commit to a plan before they see what the other side does, and to read what a formation gives away.
play callingreading opponentsgrows with the class
HS advancedCollege intermediate–advanced
Robo-Basketball
Half court, one hoop, a shot clock. Shots don't always go in, so students learn to weigh odds, make decisions under a deadline, and put a number on their strategy.
probabilitydeciding under pressure
HS intermediateCollege intermediate
Relay Obstacle Course
Four students each take one leg of the course and must agree on how the baton gets handed off. Students learn to specialize, to agree on an interface, and to debug each other's assumptions.
cooperationcommunicationgroup classrooms
Coming soonHS advancedCollege intermediate–advanced
Robot Tanks Live
The tank competition with real robots. Students program physical tanks that battle with infrared cannons, laser-tag style. Same pitch, same scoring, with real hardware to test the plan.
physical robotshardware trade-offspilot events
Side by side
Which arena fits your students?
Start from your audience and the level they're ready for, then the lesson you want them to walk away with. Every arena carries the full Venture Bot process.
| Arena | High school | College | Team dynamic | What students walk away with |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Tanks | Intermediate · Advanced | Beginner · Intermediate · Advanced | One team, one tank, head-to-head | Reading a situation, anticipating an opponent, defending a budget |
| Robot Sumo | Beginner | Beginner | One team, one robot, head-to-head | Timing, positioning, the heavy-or-fast trade-off |
| Rally Racing | Beginner · Intermediate | Beginner | One team, one car; solo practice, then races of up to eight | Planning ahead, tuning for conditions, iterating on a result |
| Robo-Soccer | Intermediate | Beginner | One team directs three players | Giving each player a job, anticipation, keeping formation |
| Robo-Football | Beginner (3v3) · Intermediate (4v4) · Advanced (5v5) | Intermediate (4v4) · Advanced (5v5) | One team directs a whole side, 3 to 5 players | Committing to a plan, reading opponents, coordinating at scale |
| Robo-Basketball | Advanced | Intermediate · Advanced | One team directs two players | Weighing odds, deciding under a deadline, quantifying a strategy |
| Robot Tanks Live Soon | Advanced | Intermediate · Advanced | One team, one physical tank, head-to-head | Calibration, managing a battery, testing under pressure |
| Relay Obstacle Course | Intermediate | Intermediate | Four students, one entry each, one shared team | Specializing, agreeing on an interface, debugging each other's work |
Whatever the arena
What every student walks away with.
The game changes. These don't.
A decision they can defend
Every team commits to choices under time pressure and then explains them out loud to people who fund and approve projects for a living.
Budget thinking
A fixed budget forces trade-offs. What you buy, what you skip, and what that buys you in the arena becomes a story the team can tell.
Working in a real team
Roles, hand-offs, disagreements and a hard deadline. Students learn what it takes to ship something together in a weekend.
Evidence of what they built
A replay of every match, a scored pitch, and a finished entry. Whatever the standings say, they made something and stood behind it.
Why sports, and why robots
Same depth. None of the baggage.
Robot Tanks teaches real skills, but the theme is combat, and some schools and programs won't touch it. Sports carry the same strategic depth, and a robot competing in a sport is instantly understandable to a student who has watched a game on TV.
Cooperation as well as competition
Several arenas have a team directing multiple players, or several students sharing one side. Coordination and communication become part of the lesson.
Rules students already know
Offside, out-of-bounds, a shot clock. The learning curve is about strategy, not about learning an invented world.
Nothing gets destroyed
A match ends on a score, a clock or a finish line. Every arena is welcome in every classroom.
A path to real robots
Each arena has a real-world student robotics counterpart, so a class can move from the simulation to hardware later.
Ready to pick an arena?
Tell us about your students.
All seven arenas are available now. We'll help you match one to your audience and level.