[JesseK]

At our offseason event this weekend, one of the matches ended with a leaning tower of totes. The tower was not touching carpet - only the white platform and the robot it was leaning against. The RC fell off when the tower tipped.

The stack was 4 totes tall, and the 3rd tote (1 = bottom, 4 = top) was touching the robot - obviously supported by the robot to an extent.

The question - are totes 1 and 2, the ones on the bottom, 100% supported by the platform?

We did not score the totes on the bottom, and in reality the 4 points did not change the outcome of the match or the event for the teams. The rationale used for not scoring them was a free-body diagram performed on the bottom two totes given some of the forces acting on the totes to keep them at rest. The totes would not stay at rest if the non-platform resting entity (the robot) were removed. In other words, the tower wouldn't stay leaning if we removed the robot.

Were we correct, or did we err?