Quote:
Originally Posted by Kevin Ray
There have been phenomenally manufactured robots who have been horrible on the field because the designers were thinking more about manufacturing than strategy. Conversely, there are numerous instances where middle or lower level bots have made it to divisional finals because they had the right strategy and made a robust bot albeit not a manufacturing marvel.
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I also echo everything Don Rotolo said, which I would summarize as "build a machine that plays the game and is easy to operate, and show up ready to play", which is easier said than done.
I don't think there is one single feature that separates the best from the rest (on the field). "Elite" or "powerhouse" teams, or whatever you call them, do a good job at everything (concept, prototyping, fabrication, maintenance, resources, practice, tactics, strategy, scouting, etc.). They are always looking for ways to improve as the season goes on, and they are able to do this year after year.
In general, I think that what a team does the first week or so after kickoff is most important. That's when you set the course for what to build and how to play. After that is mostly how well you accomplish what you set out to do, and how well you can correct your shortcomings from week one of build. It would interesting to record all of your discussions when you were speculating about what the game will look like, and then play them back later. It would be much easier to design a robot if you could foresee how the game actually played out, but nobody has that luxury. If you could improve your speculation and imagination skills, you would have a better chance of building the right machine for the game, and not waste limited resources building dead-end features that aren't useful.