[Brandon Holley]

Originally Posted by Darkseer54

Yes, the left video is the new ball, while the right one is the old ball.

Catapults are finicky mechanisms. We went through a very intense and crazy design process with our 2014 catapult. When we started considering using one for this year's game (for consistency), we very quickly implemented two design rules based on our 2014 learnings.

#1. Pneumatic powered, no questions asked. This rule was easily accepted by having a nice small and lightweight game piece.

#2. Roll off the tips. This was a huge part of our 2014 design and something we jumped on right away for our 2016 version. By giving the ball a predictable spin we found it helped keep it on a more predictable trajectory.


When it came to diagnostics, slowmo video like you posted is mission critical. It's actually very encouraging to find a 'smoking gun' in the slowmo you provided. It gives you something to react to in your design aside from just adjusting things until it works right again.

This is my personal critique of what I see: Your catapult is stuck somewhere between a 'stay in the cradle' and a 'roll off the tips' design. It stays in the cradle for a while, but eventually does roll off, and the mechanism that is keeping it in the cradle for as long as it does appears to be the 'squishiness' factor of the ball.

If the boulders you are seeing on the field are consistently stiffer than what you originally tuned for, the solution is obvious - just retune your catapult to that ball. If you are seeing variation in the balls that are on the field between stiff and less stiff, then the real fix may be to adjust your cradle to either hold that ball in the cradle through the stroke - or to completely adapt 'rolling off the tips'.

Just my $0.02.

-Brando