You can flip if short, loop if long. Nothing wrong with topspinning with short pips, you don't always have to flat hit.

If your footwork is up to par, step around and take it with the forehand. Try to stand to the far left while receiving serves, helps with the step around. But do practice minding the risk of fast serves to far forehand.

Waran is quite hard to block the type of serve you mention and is too hard fast to chop them. Try blocking these with a short fast lifting action with soft hands to create a little lift to get over the net and topspin to bring the ball down again.

The problem with that particular serve was that it was going out of the side of the table and below it. I don't think flip would be possible.
I thought about stepping around but he would also serve fast down the line to my FH. I think he's just too good at exploiting SP and my personal weaknesses.

Having played with Waran II for 2 weeks, I'm considering switching back to Waran.

I'm feeling that I'm missing a lot more BH hits with Waran II. That just got confirmed by a guy at the club whom I lost to (although I think I'd beaten him last time we played about a month ago); he said I was missing a lot more BH shots than usual - and I blame Waran II for that. The original version is more forgiving and is lighter, too. One area in which it isn't as good is, in my opinion, blocking; perhaps, I'll have to buy another sheet with a thicker sponge.

Missing more BH with Waran II is not surprising. The low throw angle gives you a very small margin to hit the ball over the net and get it on the table.
Waran is IMHO superb for blocking. Give it some time! Thicker sponge will not give you better blocks unless you have a very thin sponge and it bottoms out a lot.
Usually with 1.5mm sponge you will block better than with 1.8mm and with that better than with 2.0 mm.

Waran II will give you some astonishing hits, but you must always ask yourself: With wich rubber do I have the best relation of winners and faults? And what can I perform in a match under pressure?

Not tried Waran 2, but Waran 1 on the backhand to me is a bit of an adrenaline junkie rubber. You can hit amazing winners but on a percentage basis in a match it does not deliver at my moderate game level. Blocks have low margin of error in bat angle due to the hard top sheet and low throw and taking speed off fast topspin is difficult i.e. it need to be played very actively. For me it really only becomes a good all round BH rubber on a slow def blade or combination blade with a slow BH side, when I have found 1.8mm better for active blocking with more disruptive effect than the 1.5m as the latter seems to bottom out too easily and thus have less dwell and control. 1.5mm although not great for blocking or topspin is however surprisingly good for hitting, chopping and pushing especially on the FH.

To me Waran and no doubt Waran 2 are FH rubbers and I am moving towards more controlled but still deceptive pips for the BH with S&T Zargus on my list to try

The problem with that particular serve was that it was going out of the side of the table and below it. I don't think flip would be possible.
I thought about stepping around but he would also serve fast down the line to my FH. I think he's just too good at exploiting SP and my personal weaknesses.