Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

FCS - 148, 2169
Pure Climber - 1421, 4451
Defense - 3284 and 2337 are both very good since they have built in 84" blockers and strong drive trains
Floor Pickup - 469, 987, 1538, 2056, 118, 1477, 624, 33, 3539, etc.
Shooter-Climber - 1114, 67

All Around - 1114 when they're at their best, just because of how unique they are. It's been shown that three cyclers w/ a 7 disc auto can put up huge scores; i.e. The World Champs. Had one of them been able to convert their last cycle to 28 extra points it would have made their scores even harder to beat.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

To be fair, 1477 had a good 7-disc auto. It rarely made all 7, but it was good no less. They also swept the floor for their alliance sometimes.
Now, yeah, if you replaced any of the three world champs with 1114, they would have been better, but if 1114 had worked at their best during their divisional eliminations, they might have been where the eventual world champs are.
I hesitate to put 1114 on top for that reason.
I put 469 on top because they do everything amazing except climbing, they have any auto you could ask for, and they're just amazing overall.
Now imagine if the rumors are true and they're actually adding a climber for IRI. Scary.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

what about 558 for defense, strong drive train and a high blocker

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

FCS: 1519, 148, 67, 2169, and 195 all deserve nods here. They all peaked at different times and have various advantages and disadvantages. The common factor in all of them - they used FCS as their primary strategy, their CG was low enough to avoid tipping (at least in their final iterations), and they were more accurate than many cyclers.

Climber: 3467, 254, and 1114 were the only three climbers consistent and fast enough to be in contention for this title. Many good climbers and climber dumpers this year, but these three were the best. Special nod to 2170, probably the best / fastest climber dumper I have seen this year, and one of the only ones that did the maneuver quickly enough that they could afford to actually play some defense.

Defense: 862, 4814, and 2168 all stand out as robots with specific defensive functions built into their robot that allow them to effectively defend in a variety of scenarios. All three of them were very well driven.

Floor Pickup: Ruling out any team without a 7-disc autonomous (sorry 20). 469 cycled more than they swept the floor, but that pickup was amazing. 33, 254, 341, 1538, 1310, 2056, and many others all had great floor pickups. There is a lot of parity in terms of quality of pickup mechanisms this year.

Shooter-Climber: See "Climber". The only change is the omission of 2170.

All Around: In my opinion, the best overall robot of 2013 was 469. (Is this what this category was supposed to mean? Because not one robot in FRC executed every game task this year)

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

Canadian bias or not, this is a great list. Your defense on Curie was the most exciting and unexpected highlight of champs for me.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

What I love about this post is it's pretty much dead accurate, even with the Canadian bias.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

What you sayin bout the rest of us fool! :p

For all around my vote goes to 469. We faced them in 3 matches on Archimedes and they are just flat out amazing. Its impossible to predict what they will do aside from score the living daylights out of you. One second they are cycling extremely fast and then blasting away with their deadly accurate FCS and seconds later will be sweeping the floor on the other side of the field. You go to block them and they change their strategy quickly and efficiently.

Amazingly consistent and probably have the largest "bag of tricks" to perform in a match.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

469 was literally incredible, especially seeing them on Einstein buuuuuut there might some controversy here.

We will find out at IRI!!! :D

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

1114 pities the fool.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

I first read "Scare the living daylights". I'm firmly convinced that's an appropriate translation as well.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

I don't see where there is controversy. While 1114 is amazing this year as always, they aren't my personal #1 from the season. FRCTop25 also isn't the final metric of robot performance and who is the best. I personally see it as a "who is the most popular at the moment" list and due to participants ranking teams in voting based on differing reasons the list will never truly represent who THE best robot of the year is. Even its creators have said its just a fun show and shouldn't be taken seriously because "outside the top 25" are always a slew of amazing robots that can be considered the best for various reasons. 469 also came much closer to the world championship.

At the end of the day they are both amazing robots but each in their own separate ways.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

I think the "controversy" in the rankings was due to 469 not usually releasing any type of robot showcase video. This puts them under radar of teams such as 118, 254, and 987. I also think not pairing with 67 this year hurt 469 as they were not able to put up a 220 type score together. As elite as 469 is, it's always weird that people will sometimes not put them in the top 5 competitive robot teams overall.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

Remember that those rankings are not only Pre-Championship, but Pre-MSC. They directly beat two of the teams ahead of them at the championship, and finished better then everyone else.

They scored 219 at MSC, and had 4 scores over 220 at the championship, including 266.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

They used it just as a test to show that they could at CMP after they switched their shooter design around a bit.

Re: Best Robot for Each Category?
 

Best all-around robot that stood above the rest: 469.
**Must be because Dan's family is from Hawaii.;) Hawaii people can easily identify other Hawaii transplants in the mainland, including offsprings. Seriously...