Quote:
Originally Posted by RoboChair
Mecanum if done well, geared for agility, and absolutely programmed FIELD CENTRIC and then practice the hell out of it can be a very competitive drive train. Anyone that does not put in the effort to code and set up a mecanum drive for field centric is wasting their time. I have seen many teams drive mecanum like a tank drive with only the occasional strafe/rotation and this is a waste of time. You can dance across the field dodging defense all day if you can just move the stick and your robot moves that way on the field no matter where it is pointed. But if defense catches up to you that's it, you must be faster! Mecanum shouldn't really even have a tank style drive mode.
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I think that you are focusing on the wrong issue here. The issue with most team's mecanum drives is not whether or not it is field-centric, but whether or not teams have practiced driving it like a mecanum drive.
I agree that field-centric drive is awesome (and fun to code
), and I might even agree that it is easier for a new driver to learn. However, if, on the last day of build season, I can give the programmers the robot to make field-centric code, or I can give the drivers the robot to practice, I will choose the later without hesitation.
For 95% of teams, the limiting factor for their drive system is the driver, not the motors/wheels/gearboxes/code. I would argue that a well driven standard mecanum drive could easily hold its own against a well driven field-centric drive.