I think that a game without defense helps the students learn more than it does with defense.
The reason is, last year when designing the robot, after every suggestion we had to evaluate if we thought it could survive constant beating during a regional. This year, we had to worry about that a lot less, don't get me wrong it was still a consideration but it wasn't as severe as last year. In fact, we were able to be much more creative and even have a 5 foot arm sticking behind our robot that could pick up bins from the step without mining the landfill. Even if the same length/width rules were in place in a game with defense, we never would have been able to make that arm because it couldn't have survived being run into. FIRST is about the students, and I learned much more this year about engineering and programming than I did last year because of the creativity involved in this years game. Remember that the competition is where the students can go to show off what they've done, but the important part is what the students do up to that point. I would vote for the crappiest game ever if it means that the students on my team were to learn more. The competition is NOT the important part of FIRST, the students are the most important part of FIRST. The competition can help students build time-management skills when you need to fix something in the 10 minutes of pit time in between matches, and other skills, but the competition should never be the focus.
It's For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology not For Recognition of The Best Robot.
"To transform our culture by creating a world where science and technology are celebrated and where young people dream of becoming science and technology leaders." - FIRST Mission Statement
Thoughts?