[EricH]

Originally Posted by jfitz0807

Consider the case of a low bar robot with a large intake/shooter that can be raised high so it can shoot over a defensive robot. When the shooter is low, the robot has a low CG and when it is up, the robot has a high CG and is susceptible to being tipped. A defensive robot tries to bump it to alter the shot in the hopes of making it miss. If the defensive robot continues to push the shooter, it is possible that the shooting robot may tip.

If the shooting robot is about to tip, why is it not incumbent upon that robot to LOWER its shooter to prevent the tip?

For 90% of robots with a raisable shooter, the defender's drivetrain (including any driver reaction time) is a heck of a lot faster than their shooter's raising mechanism. For the other 10%, their reaction time plus transmission time evens it out to about equal. So maybe they're TRYING, but the defender doesn't give them the chance before they go over. You bet that they're not going to be happy that the defender didn't back off! (Read as: "I thought it was incumbent on the defender to back off!")

If it's actually an accident, you probably just hit them once. But a sustained push-through is a lot harder to class as an accident (and easier to class as intentional, thus, strategy)--and those accounted for almost all if not all of the tipping cards I was on a ref crew for!