Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

i agree whole heartedly with Paul here... at BAE we teamed up with team 40 another hurdler and team 134 who could carry the trackball but did not use thier arm at all during the elims... they had a great ball poker mechanism and did continus laps and worked amazingly... we couldnt have done it with out them!

lap bots will have a HUGE impact at regionals, but im not interily sure about nationals...

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

If the racecar averaged 30 points per match, even though I didnt see the regional play, I can only assume it had a lot to do with autonomous. Otherwise it did, an average of 15 laps during the match.
Most racer bots that I saw was not able to average 15 laps per match.
If that's the case, as a third alliance partner, I can see the rationale as being effective.:D

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

Not being able to hurdle is not an insurmountable deficiency.

IF your bot can...

Take down a ball and Cross 3 or more lines in Hybrid and Drive fast and stay in control, then you can be a contender.

If you are just 2 of those 3, then you are unlikely to be a top seed.

Taking down a ball is important, at the beginning of the match to bring balls into play, and at the end of the match to deny the opposition the bonus points. Just remember that you might end up giving the other team a hurdle...

Crossing 3 or more lines in Hybrid is important because you can start the match with a decent lead, 12 or more points.

Driving fast is OK, but staying in control is more important, to avoid penalties, Often there are traffic jams, with 3 bots and 2 balls all over one end, so being able to thread the needle and get past is a good thing to have. Ramming is penalized, whether inadvertent or not. Pushing is not a valuable characteristic this year.

IF your bot can hurdle in a reasonable time (our 15 seconds is FAR too slow), and gain control of the ball easily enough, then you can drop one of the above and still contend. If you do all four well, you're going to be in the very top.

Just some observations from the NJ Regional.

Don

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

Don,
I agree with this also. After watching the regional play all weekend and speaking with our team, we know that crossing 3 lines is good and knocking a ball down (at least one of our alliance teammates doing it). It wont take you out of the game, if the opposition has a good auto also. We know we can cross 3 lines, but our knocking the ball off is iffy, since we didnt have enough time to test.
Knocking balls down at the end effectively and quickly is important, and we realized that during the build season. We made sure our manipulator (arm) was not the device used to knock balls down. I saw a lot of teams that followed that concept also.

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

I wouldn't put it past 148 to do 15 laps in a match. We did 8 in a match at a local scrimmage; 148's top speed is almost twice our maximum velocity, they accelerate more than twice as fast as us, they pack all that power into a swerve drive, and they probably had more practice time. Their robot is also round so it automatically diverts itself around obstacles (or diverts obstacles around it, as the case may be). I have yet to see them in competition (via webcast or in person), but I suspect that 15 per match is not an unreasonable number for them.

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

They got to 11 at St. Louis. I expect them to get much better by their week 5 regional.

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

I would say that 1024 could take exception to that statement. They pretty much canceled out two hurdles by running laps in Hybrid and Tele-Op in the MWR finals.

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

Though we are a hybrid shooter/arm bot, we did a lot of laps in some of our matches. For those of you that could not see the whole field on the webcasts, one defensive strategy that came into play was trapping the opposing alliances ball in the corner so they could not hurdle.

With one or sometimes two of the opposing alliances robots holding balls in the corners, we were more than happy just to run laps because it was more effective than trying to fight for the ball and score no points at all.

As for the real question at hand, I think any racer that can get 3+ lines in hybrid can play a huge role in the game. Also, if a racer could add a simple device to do ball knock-off, they would make a great compliment to 2 hurdlers. However, it really comes down to driver ability with racers. If they can navigate traffic effectively and work with the other alliance partners, I think they will do great!

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

Which would you pick, given that you already have 2 moderately effective hurdlers, who are average speed.

1) A robot that can maneuver the ball moderately well, push it around and play keep away, they are quite fast and good drivers. They can knock off balls easily, but not hurdle.

2) A robot that can maneuver the ball just as well, is slightly slower, but can hurdle somewhat effectively.

3) A robot that can do it all and is fast

Clearly your choice should be the third one, but chances are that team doesn't exist in the second round of picks after 16 teams are gone. So would you like to see a robot that can hurdle if needed (say a malfunction in your robot) or would you like the speed demon. Speaking from a mechanical standpoint, and after watching what happened to alliances last weekend, I would pick choice 2. The two hurdlers on your alliance are not perfect, yes in the ideal world they are, but I doubt anyone can say that it's not possible for their hurdling beast to become handicapped after seeing the chaos on the field. So if you only have one hurdler left, what are the chances you'll win? I'd take a back up every time.

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

the only tough part of choosing your last choice is that there are really more choices than those 3. Not all arm bots are slow and there are varying degrees of their driving skills and based on their design. 1024 is an example of a bot that when compared with racers, could compete with the majority of them.
There are exceptional racers and average racers, much like varying degree of shooter bots and arm bots.
The disadvantage of a pure racer bot, unless its somewhat spectacular, is that it cant knock balls down, put balls back on the overpass and hurdle. These functions clearly account for high scoring which the racerbot must overcome.

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

Absolutely! The robot that I've seen this year that clearly demonstrated this was the robot of "The Riot Crew" from Portland, Maine, Team #58. At the week 1 Granite State Regional, this robot was the #4 scorer through the first 9 qualifying rounds according to the data collected by our scouting team. They scored a total of 292 points (an average of 32.44 per round) as follows:

• 0 hurdles
• 39 herds
• 20 robot-only laps
• 96 points in autonomous

They also dislodged quite a few opponent's balls at the end of the matches with their amazingly simple ball-dislodging mechanism which enabled them to dislodge balls while driving under the overpass at full speed.

They ended up as the #11 seed, and were the first pick by the #3 seeded team (1512) in the selection draft. The alliance of 1512, 58, and 1517 progressed to the finals of the tournament -- team 58 was a major contributor to that alliance's success!

The driving of Team 58's robot was a joy to watch, and once they acquired the ball, there wasn't much of an opportunity for other teams to take it away. It was a joy to watch and was well-deserving of the General Motors Industrial Design Award it received.

As to whether or not there will still be a role for such herders at the Championships, I don't know, but Team 58 and their herding robot was definitely a factor at GSR!

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

I know everyones been talkin bout 148's speedy bot and just to add to that

148 went 16-0-0 at the St.Louis Regional... i think that gives robots who can't hurdle a place in this compition... if they can lap good enough

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

What is interesting, from reading some of the threads regarding the regionals this past weekend - is how robots are adapting to play the game. That always happens but it is neat to read how quickly it is happening. What may be a robot that can lift or launch, is working as a lap bot for the alliance to strengthen it. Very cool. By the end of our 2nd week of regionals, I think we'll be seeing this even more, as more strategies and successes begin to surface.

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

Maybe in Atlanta, but you don't see that kind of depth of field in week one regionals, and probably not in very many other regional events (think about it: 24 decent hurdlers in a field of ~50)

Re: Is there a place this year for robots that cant hurdle?
 

I won't say specifically who, but did anyone notice that the bots who broke their end effectors during the match were a little too preoccupied with trying to get a hold of a ball and in those 15-20 seconds could have been running laps the whole time. I let this go during practice but they should keep priorities in focus and try to get as many points possible for the alliance instead of wasting valuable time trying to grasp the ball.

The same principle went for herding the balls. Granted, there were bots that were very fast and their main goal was to drive their way to victory, but there were other sluggish lapbots that I think could have been herding the whole time and gaining more points. A couple of times this was because their alliance partners need the ball for hurdling (or to try to hurdle) but other than that, there was a lot of wasted time (or time and laps that could have been used more effectively). Anyone have comments on this?

-Rastogi