With respect to the act of triggering, here are some cases based on the way the rule is constructed in the manual:
- Hit the tower base, tripping the switch: false positive
- Push on the plate, tripping the switch and causing FMS to register it: true positive1
- Push on the plate, tripping the switch only momentarily (but long enough to send a signal), and the FMS misses or ignores it: false negative2
- Push on the plate, tripping the switch and causing FMS to receive the signal, but a bug prevents the FMS from registering it: false negative3
- Push on the plate with 100 N, bending it visibly, causing the tower to sway, emitting magic smoke, but failing to trip the switch: true negative4
- Minibot reaches the height of the plate, but FMS doesn't register it, so referee grants it: educated guess (could be either true positive of false positive, but the ref didn't have anything to do with that fact)
Some of these are quite perverse. I've left out field faults, but in some of the above situations, they're an additional complication that can perhaps restore some equity, if identified properly. (If replaying the match suits you.) I've also left out GDC intent—because although the high-level intent is clear, they have offered no substantial guidance about the actual sequence of events they had in mind for triggering the tower.
If you think this is crazy, don't blame me. I didn't design the game that way.
1 Which won't count toward the race if it wasn't the minibot doing the pressing!
2 The rules have no provision for a minimum duration. If the switch is tripped, an ideal system would not wait.
3 It's basically impossible to identify this false negative if the FMS doesn't throw an error code or something.
4 The force isn't part of the determination of triggering. And since sending the FMS a signal is an integral part of the act of triggering, if the sensor doesn't work right, you didn't trigger it. Doesn't that suck?