[etoleb]

I'm not going to say that koth robots can't stop the flow of traffic on the ramp, at least for a short while, but how do make sure the bins are where you want them? Unless teams can reach over, or even go over, the ramp wall and knock the bins over in the first few seconds, you've still gotta beat your opponents to the top. Unless you've got an insane gear ratio, many teams can potentially get to the top at about the same time. Then there's autonomous mode. From our experience, either robots will accuratly go up the ramp relatively slowly via line tracking, or inaccuratly speed up the ramp with dead reckoning, which can be foilied by cleverly placing HP bins in their path. Any bot can also be delayed by a limbo bot pushing them in autonomous mode by going under the bar.

The funny thing about this year is its like a glorified rock-paper-scissors game. Each tactic can be counteracted by another.

Greg