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2009 and this year were two examples of how the game design can affect this. The wheels presented a unique challenge that was new to everyone and frisbees have a relatively reliable path of travel meaning they are easier to work with. These two things created ripples in the norm and allowed many teams to fall and others to rise. The wheels brought the top down and the frisbees brought the bottom up; was there something wrong with either of these things? To me, no. The issue with 2009 is the year after things went back to the norm and the dominant stayed dominant the following years. I suspect next year will be much of the same. Is it the GDC's fault that the sea-saw of "who is great" didn't continue, no. The weight is not theirs to bare, but rather all of ours.
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Never put a ceiling on teams. Always look to raise the floor. Economics are usually the worst examples for anything, but there's a reason we have a minimum wage and not a maximum wage. Putting a ceiling only stifles creativity, innovation, and most of all, inspiration. Putting a ceiling only hurts teams who haven't been at the top for long. Those who have been at the top know how to creatively work around limits places on them. Teams like 118 can't be held by a ceiling (
), yet some of the newer teams that have emerged this year may be hurt. If FIRST outlawed swerve drives, teams that just recently spent 3 years developing swerve drives will have to switch to a tank drive, something they haven't done in 3-4 years.
Instead of limiting anything, raise the floor. Start a grassroots campaign to help the lower spectrum of teams rise. If you can find one additional engineering mentor for all of the teams that have none or only one, you will raise the competition level by that much without having to place a physical limit. The competition aspect will remain, and students will get inspired from a raised level of competition. Perhaps FIRST ought to start a campaign, entitled with something along the lines of "an engineer for every team"?