[Tristan Lall]

I think <R43> is the more appropriate rule. (Requires direct pathways between speed controllers and motors.)

But in any event, why not just physically disconnect and secure the switch connections prior to your matches? If the switch is a part of the robot, but demonstrably incapable of controlling the robot during a match, you should be fine. (Call it a decoration, and get it inspected in this configuration.) After all, there's no way to penalize you for having a non-compliant robot outside of gameplay, and during gameplay, you are operating in the inspected (disconnected) configuration, with the motor controlled only by the cRIO and a speed controller.

Incidentally, <R17> only requires that robots be designed to not require power after the match; so that's no trouble.

Is this what FIRST intended? Maybe, maybe not. They didn't exactly make that clear.