Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

Thankfully, our team had a parent who made the actual bumpers themselves for ultimate ascent and aerial assist. She was able to use that knowledge and improve upon it to make really robust bumpers (after lone star (our second event) our bumpers were only slightly ripped). And regarding mounting mechanisms, we just decided to go overboard and add mounting points in every free spot on the frame perimeter. With those two things combined thankfully we were a "carpet bumper" team :D .

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

:confused: :( It is because there are so many challenges on just scoring points and playing "legal" defense

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

And that's what makes a good driver and drive coach, being able to make these decisions on the fly.

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

I would say 2003 is still the worst but most people weren't around for. First 15 seconds all 4 auto robots run full bore straight up a hill and into each other. End of the match is a straight king of the hill match with tons of high speed ramming... all with no bumpers. Robots were alot more solid back then lol.

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

In recent years, games with more defense were more destructive... and fun. This game i honestly didn't see much defense, and got kinda bored. And after championships, ill take about all the negatives in my view of the game. Sure, people would break their robot by dukes of hazarding them over the defenses, but thats where the majority of the damage came from. So no, I do not believe this was the roughest game by any means...(In fact, if you look at 2010 and 2012, the robots easily fell off the mounds and teeter and that didn't end well at all, 2013 robots could fall from the top bar on the pyramid and literally end their season. 2014, again a lot of robot on robot action. 2009, static electricity discharge onto the cRio). Thats my opinion anyway.

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

I agree that this was not the roughest game ever. 159 has caused some serious robot damage in games that allowed for more speed+defense, enough that (although this might not be true) we look at rules sometimes and say "Oh! that rule exists because of what we did to (insert team # here) in (insert year here)."

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

Not sure if it's been the roughest game on the robots of all time, but, as others have alluded to above, taken into account the damage that has also occurred to field elements (balls, original low bar), I think the total carnage produced by this year's game has to be up towards the top of the list. I think the best example of this was at the Suffield Shakedown. Because the event did not end up getting access to an official FIRST field, we were stuck with using wooden defenses for the event. I'm pretty sure that by the end of the day, there were more defenses in the graveyard than there were on the field...

I'd still say that Aerial Assist was a little more violent on the bots than Stronghold. The rules regarding defenses and the inability to use the full length of the field to rev up to full speed before slamming into another robot appeared to have made the potential for damage smaller. At the very lest, this year, it seems like damage that occurs to the robots can be more often attributed to the driver, not the effects of other drivers (not to say that the latter is never the case though).

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

Ever since this thread started I've been just waiting for someone to say this – but no one has – so here goes:

Welp, if Stronghold isn't the roughest game yet, it sure has the roughest terrain.

That is all.

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

Sorry, no. Breakaway had rougher terrain (both higher and steeper), but it did have an alternative (going under rather than over).

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

While not as great a decision this year as 2010, you could feasibly have designed a robot who could only go through the secret passage* or the low bar.

Edit: I'm gonna pretend this always meant for getting into your own courtyard.

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

:(

There was neither "rough"-ness nor "terrain" in Breakaway; therefore, I'll count my pun as still valid. :P

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

The secret passage is only valid for entering and leaving your own courtyard. If my recollection of reading past rules is correct, going under the low bar this year was more restrictive than going under the gaps in 2010, both in terms of maximum robot height and minimum required slope/ground clearance that the robot was required to navigate.

Re: Is Stronghold the roughest game yet?
 

It's a frequency of navigation thing. Many teams didn't cross the bumps 10+ times a match in 2010. Robots tended to stay in zones to play a role.

Add into that the fact that while the bumps in 10 were certainly bigger you could fairly easily design around them. Compare at this year with the variety of defenses.