[45Auto]

There is a popular opinion that a reliable 50 point robot is not viable if you think you can win a match all by yourself.

7 weeks ago there was a popular strategic opinion floating in the community that a 50 point robot would be a slam dunk to single-handedly win matches. Some people (read as: myself and I'm sure a few others) nixed that idea and tried to nudge their teams into analyzing their capabilities to produce the highest scoring robot possible. For a few teams that was a 100 point robot, a few more it was 70 point robot, a few more it was a 50 point robot, and for the vast majority it is a less-than-15 point robot (based on the first week alliance scoring averages).

Still, robots which accomplish the primary objective of scoring points (is there a secondary objective? maybe playing defense?) are highly desirable as alliance partners. Points are points, whether they're scored at the beginning of the game in autonomous or at the end of the game on the pyramid. A smart alliance captain will select his alliance based on the combination which he believes will maximize his alliance's scoring capabilities in relation to his opponents.

A robot which consistently scores less than 50 points is a likely secondary partner to a strategy, not a primary partner or alliance captain.