[Joseph Smith]

While I believe that the Ri3D teams definitely affected the designs this season, I don't think it made a huge impact- I think many teams would logically arrive on these designs themselves after a few days of sketches and prototypes. What Ri3D did was prove that these designs can work, and that they can be competitive- from there teams are free to expand and improve the basic systems to infinity and beyond.

Also, I think Ri3D has a very positive impact on the level of gameplay for the younger, less experienced teams or teams with less resources. Where they may struggle to get a functional design together otherwise, now they have some ideas that they can play with that they know will work and allow them to be at least somewhat competitive, which is a boost for everyone else in FIRST when they get one of these teams as an alliance partner.

All that being said, I do feel like this year lacks much of the design creativity that I've seen in the past. I remember years when I would walk around the pits and have to stare at a robot for a few minutes before I figured it out, and times when I see a bot and think "wow, I never would have thought to do it like that." It just seems to take some of the fun and discovery out of it.