This has crossed my mind a time or two before
I think it would be somewhat straightforward for the robot to maintain location awareness, as there are probably enough stationary objects on the field to use as reference/triangulation points (think of using a map and compass to find yourself [if you ever have before]).
There are several tricky parts and stumbles to be had though
-maintaining tracking and location awareness of other robots on the field
-identifying friend or foe to coordinate a movement path
-detecting, tracking, and interacting with game pieces and scoring zones (think of Logomotion, and already filled pegs)
What happens if:
-A robot falls into pieces (We hit a robot so hard last year all 4 of their bumpers fell off and were then strewn about the field)
what will your robot to when it suddenly can see extraneous parts/unidentifiable robots?
-The robot gets into a position it cannot figure its way out (I would assume you would have a manual override)
I can foresee a fully autonomous robot getting a lot of fouls, especially one operating in some sort of defensive mode.
That all being said, It would be REALLY cool to see a robot that plays by itself. Maybe in the future there could be a fully autonomous regional (including pit crew
)