[Ginger Power]

2 vs. 0 and 3 vs. 1

Having 4 robots in a courtyard in your hypothetical 8 seed vs. 1 seed match up doesn't seem like like it would end well for the 8 seed. Letting the top 2 offensive robots on your division drive free of defense doesn't seem like a good idea. The 1 seed would quickly put the tower on an endless loop and steal from the secret passage. There's no way 3 robots on the opposing alliance could keep up with a defensive robot doing its thing. I think most alliances will need a presence in the opposing courtyard to prevent close-looped scoring.

I suppose the 3 offensive robots could cycle back to the secret passage (they'll need to anyways when boulders run out) and prevent a closed loop that way. It's still going to be difficult to out gun 2 undefended robots with 3 lower quality defended robots.

This is also assuming that the top robot on a division will be an unblockable outer works shooter. While this is the likely scenario, considering the breach rate should be close to 100%, crazy things happen.