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Originally posted by M. Krass

I believe that, in some regionals, stackers will manage to survive. If they can get a multiplier that does something beside give them victory. . . that is, if they can get a majority of bins and make a stack . . . that will greatly help their seeding. But, I don't expect it to happen often. When they're up against a king-of-the-hill robot that's faster to the punch and stronger, though, there's not much hope for a good stacker.
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I think that its a big mistake to assume that a stacker is intrinsically slower than a KoH bot. Actually, it seems to me that it would be exactly the opposite.

Take us for example. We knew that we wanted to focus on stacking,so we wouldn't need massive amounts of pushing power. Gearing up our 4 motor drive did cut into our available torque, but now we have an unbelieveable amount of speed and agility. Robots like ours aren't going to win any direct shoving matches, but - unless an opponent you can go 13 ft/sec - we'll probably hit the wall first. Besides, the most efficient way to get onto the ramp is not to bully the other guy off, but to go around him.

(Another dangerous assumption to make is that a team that can play multiple roles will accel none of them)

The moral of the story is that a bot shouldn't be judged by what role it plays in the game. Each team will behave differently under different circumstances no matter what their intended purpose is.

Thanks for the clarification.

However, you obviously didn't attend the UTC Scrimmage. In 3 out of the 4 finals rounds that led to victory, teams 571 and 173 failed to get to the ramp first (mainly due to not yet having autonomous mode programmed in). We won because we were able to a)move large numbers of the opponents bins into the no-acore zone and b)outmanuever the opponents on the ramp.

I will agree with you that this would not be a likely outcome when facing a robot like 68 or 179, but it shows that losing the initial battle for the wall is not necessarily the end-all. (although its always nice to get there first).

Before I begin I'll make the consession that not many stackers have posted video or pics in match conditions. Saying that if you consider the difficulty stacking its very hard this year. more so then ever before. In previous years you could place balls in a relatively large goal. This year you have a large akward object to place on a small goal and this goal gets smaller as you go higher. I highly doubt there will be many stacks of more than 6 in the finals. Stacking is slow and can easily be destroyed by an enemy bot or a wrong move by a driver.


I am sure that the technokats ramp-dom will beat nearly all bots to the top of the ramp and will have more pushing power than nearly all the bots as well. Also by the definition of rampdom the only way to cross the field is under the bar.

Even though I think the best aliance is a fast rampdom and lowriding stacker and am sure such an alliance will eventually win. I am even more sure whoever hits the wall first will win 95% of the time.

All of my comments are for finals with constructed alliances. Trying to guess what will happen in qualifying is impossible because of the random pairings of bots, what would happen if 4 rampdoms fought.

No, I didn't attend the scrimmage (but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express? ;) )...I saw the video, though.

The one thing I am definitely reserving judgement on is the autonomous mode. I don't think the programming was in a state to be judged at that scrimmage.

Believe me, I don't think that king of the hill robots can't be beat. In fact, I'm banking on most of them getting creamed. But, overall, I'm just disappointed with the way the game's been playing out.

Rather than "descore" the opponent's bins, why not take them with you? By pushing them out of scoring position, you can manage to control the score, but all destructive forms of scoring lower the matches net QPs. The real winners are going to be the people that can keep the scores close, but do so by adding to their score while they're lowering the opponent's score.

That's my feeling, anyway. Or, it'll be a complete wasteland and bins will mean nothing at all.

We probably agree about more than you think. After all, our robots aren't too dissimilar.

This year will be the same as last year

Last year good ball bots could grab a goal and drive around picking up balls and the powerful bots couldn't get the balls or goals away from them. And thier strategies were very effective. Case in point, Teams 45, 233, 111.

Last year bad teams could pick up some balls kinda grab goals and sometimes have them stolen away by sneaky goal bandits (wildstang 2001 video reference).

This year will be no different, good robots will stack, bad ones will not, good robots will hold onto thier stacks, bad ones will not.

The only difference is that the percent of good stackers will be lower.

Also, yes King of the Hill bots will get push and trashed and beat up. My team built a KOH bot and I know that it can be beaten.

I commend everyone who has come up with an original design and not just decided to push boxes. Hooray for stacking!

Haha, yeah, they are kinda the same - with the small exception that yours is made out of aluminum and therefore doesn't look quite as jury-rigged.

Believe me, I would have loved to be able to move bins en masse to the other side of the field, but doing that - unless you have a robot the can push some outrageously large number of bins at once - simply takes too much time to be truly effective. Trying to engineer a close match is fine if your ahead, but if you're trying to play catchup because you weren't quite fast enough to the wall then simply winning the round will be the top thing on your mind.

Another problem with relocating the bins to your side of the field is that it is a tactic easily intercepted. If you can't move them over the bar in large numbers (something that I expect very few teams will be able to do), then it is quite easy for an opponent to ram you coming from the opposite direction (assuming that you have expanded your profile in order to push more bins).

But hey, just 11 more days and all our questions will be (for the most part) answered.

Two mentalities... strategy and mentality
 

Every year, the best strategy and method to play the game is not always clear at first. This year is no exception.

This thread has been very interesting, and it all really is about deciding a way to play the game based on strategy.

This is smart, but there is another reason that teams pick the way they "play". For lack of a better word, it is also the sort of "mentality" that a team wants to play the game that depicts their robot design.

For instance, team 47 usually comes up with a very smooth-running robot which is targeted at scoring points offensively (collecting balls in 02, scoring and descoring balls in 00, manipulating the puck in 99, etc.). Their mentality has mainly been to pick the thing that is difficult to do in the game and they do it.

Every year, there is usually an "offensive" and a "defensive" way to play the game. This year, stacking seems to be the "offensive" way to score, while playing king of the hill akin to playing "defense".

For us... we waiver back and forth with the mentality for how we play the game. 99 was defense, 00 was offense, 02 was offense, 03 is defense... from what I can remember, no one really wanted to stack from our team this year... maybe it was simply because we played offense last year. I'm not sure if this is true... but from my experience, it is really fun to play defense really well. I just hope that things work out like we planned.

Andy B.

I agree with the last pervious posts, in that a KOTH bot will be successful if it can do what it sets out to. My problem is when they start claiming they will prevent other robots from getting on their side in auto mode :)

My suggestion to KOTH bots is to play the match like normal then take the hill at the end. I would try to controll traffic accross the field during the match unless you are in a terrible losing position. This is, as i'm sure you all thought of (and probably what made that strategy so attractive to you), you can get 50 points from the top of the ramp, more then all the bins are without stacking.

Wait, I just told you what you already knew :) I can be very productive some times.

I think maybe the bar hasn't been discussed enough. A stacker robot that can go under the bar could "easily" take a stack from the winning KOTH team (HP stack of 4 probably) and drop it over the bar. Go under the bar, push those bins into scoreing position-- BOOM, instant 8 pt change in the game. Only the stacker team will probably have at least a stack of 4; so its really a 20 pt change.

I also see the bar limiting KOTH teams from having both robots on top of the ramp at the end of a match--- As both of them attempt to get on the HDPE to score 50 points, the sneaky stacker dashes under the bar and starts lowering their score. Oh no! So now to prevent this, only one KOTH bots can be on the ramp. Thats 25 points, or the equivlant of putting one bin on another with half of the bins in play.

KOTH bots really do depend on accomplishing a lot in auto mode. They NEED to

1) Get to the wall first
2) Knock most of the bins onto their side.
3) Anchor and let no robots past

Which I see being very difficult when there are 2 robots trying to stop that.

And then there's the issue of the KOTH's partner. What's he to do? Who will push bins into the scoreing zone? I know there will be at least 1 opponent robot still trying to push them up and over the ramp, probably destroying your score as well. So I see the following thing happen in a KOTH match:

1) KOTH knocks wall down and anchors.
2) Opponents push all of KOTH's bins out of scoreing position.
3) KOTH partner pushes all of Opponents bins out of scoreing position.

4) Score = 25 - 0 or 50 - 0. Wow, wasn't that productive? :)

This assumes no robots go under the bar, and the KOTH acts as a wall (which I don't think it will do). This means I DONT THINK THE KOTH WILL BE PREVENTING TRAFFIC OVER THE RAMP (I put that in caps so the next 3 posts don't quote me and tell me that I'm wrong because of the perviously mentioned sentance ;) ).

Wow that really didnt make much sense did it? Ramble ramble ramble...

Greg

There is such a negative feeling in here toward rampdoms. True they do very little directly during the match. They prevent alot of things from happening though. For the most part they prevent bots and bins from going over the ramp. Unless they have a trick up there sleave most bin-huggers can't get over/under the bar while they have bins so they need to get over the ramp well they can't very well do that with a rampdom on it. Its easy just to push crates over the ramp but thats impossible with a rampdom on it as well. So teams have to move crates only by getting them over the bar. There are a few non-lowriding stackers that willbe effectively trapped by the rampdoms, these will most likely be weeded out by the finals. Now if it was 2 stackers on a rampdom then the 2 stackers would win. However the rampdoms alliance partner can play a very easy game. They can selectively allow how many crates move over the bar and what the stack looks like on the opping side. If the plan is to control the score the a rampdom is a very useful tool.

As for dethrowing a rampdom I highly doubt the well built ones will get pushed off. I won't repeat the arguements for why you can't dethrown a good rampdom because thats been beaten to death about 50 times.

Before anyone tears me apart I'll concede that a bot that can carry a stack of 6 over the bar, WITHOUT letting go then placeing and gaurding that stack until the end could counter a rampdom. That relies on the rampdom alliance member not clearing out the human player bins though.

The rampdom isn't the endall answer but its a very powerful tool that paired with a fast/strong lowriding stacker will eventually win.

If we can get 6 consecutive 25-0 matches. I'd consider that productive, yes. I do believe we'd get chosen for the finals as well...

Remember folks: RAGE picked Beatty last year.

I'd have to agree with that. In both Cleveland and Chicago, my team was ranked about 25th, but we had demonstrated solid performance (albiet low scores) and got picked both times. Consistency is what wins. If you can show that you consistently win matches, you will get picked for the finals.

Here, I think, is where I fundamentally disagree.

I can't see how a single robot (save 68) can effectively patrol and defend both alleys on the playing field. ...especially when it's 2 vs. 1. Each alley, as you're aware, is 6' wide and 9.5' deep, never mind that they're separated from one another by a 12' wide ramp. Quickly moving back and forth between them doesn't seem plausible.

What, exactly, can they do that selectively controls the score? Unless they share a similar capability to move bins over the bar en masse, nullifying the efforts of at least one of the opponent's robots, they won't do much. Sure, they can possibly do a decent job of keeping the bins in the alleyway, out of scoring position - until they're overwhelmed (or buried, as the case may be).

If they dare risk crossing beneath the barrier onto their scoring side, they leave an alleyway wide open, and there's the potential to move many, many bins into scoring position at that time. Similarly, one robot on the opposing side could give that robot trouble, getting in its way, effectively leaving both alleyways open to the trafficking of bins.

See, it's like the ramp dominating robot is the U.S. government, sitting up their all tough and pretending to be in control. Their partner is the U.S. Border Patrol, trying to stop the movement of the bad stuff into the country, but, there's just way too much territory. ;)

How relevant all of that is, though, I'm not sure. I haven't seen a single team that claims its robot can successfully move bins over the bar on these forums. I know of at least two, however, via private conversation. But, in all cases, they seem to require the bins be stacked, and as we've already seen, stacking bins seems likes it's going to be a tedious and time consuming task. Making several stacks of 4, 5, or 6, depositing them over the bar, pushing them into scoring position and keeping them there seems as equally daunting as trying to stop it from happening.

Most stackers could drop a stack over the bar. Problem is it has to be a stack to do that :)

In response to the winnin 25 - 0 all the time would be ok, that depends on if you want to be picked or be picking. I would rather be picking.

Whats a winning allience going to be? A ramp dom / lowrider stacker probably. But things get interesting when more robots can get under the bar. If a rampdom is against 2 lowrider stackers, what will they do? They will have to activly bully them, as a team of 2 stackers can probably move 15 bins accross the bar in addition to their 8 HP bins. Stack 5, go push the rampdoms bins out of scoreing position and they win.

A KOTH robot is a valid strategy, but I still think good stackers will be less plentiful, hopefully making them more valueable :)

Greg

Greg

I want to see what people feel about this...

A lot of robots, particularly ramp dominators are adding skirts to their robots with the intention of lifting an oncoming robot. This could lead to a robot flipping over on the ramp.

Lets say this type of robot is sitting on the platform. Our robot is looking for a spot on the ramp. We aim our arm at your highest point and drive into you at full speed hoping to dislodge you. You may flip you might not. What do you think, legal or not?

I'm not going to say that koth robots can't stop the flow of traffic on the ramp, at least for a short while, but how do make sure the bins are where you want them? Unless teams can reach over, or even go over, the ramp wall and knock the bins over in the first few seconds, you've still gotta beat your opponents to the top. Unless you've got an insane gear ratio, many teams can potentially get to the top at about the same time. Then there's autonomous mode. From our experience, either robots will accuratly go up the ramp relatively slowly via line tracking, or inaccuratly speed up the ramp with dead reckoning, which can be foilied by cleverly placing HP bins in their path. Any bot can also be delayed by a limbo bot pushing them in autonomous mode by going under the bar.

The funny thing about this year is its like a glorified rock-paper-scissors game. Each tactic can be counteracted by another.

Greg