[KenWittlief]

the reason defense is a risk is while you are busy trying to stop the other side from scoring 10 more points, YOU might be the one that ends up getting tipped over, having a cable ripped out, having your arm damaged, so when you try to hang or cap or whatever you do to score points, you cant

and you lose

our bot was designed to herd balls and to cap the goal as our 1 and 2 plan - we used the stock drivetrain from FIRST with a top speed of 5fps with custom triwheels

when you saw us poking along slow picking up balls we looked like an easy target - but when other bots tried to get in our face we pushed them out of the way, or drove right over them

if you did not build a bot that can outscore your opponent head to head, dont assume you can push them around either - and if you get frustrated and start ramming them you have a good chance of finding yourself disqualified for tipping or intentional damage.

BTW - our team played to score points - we were finalists at Pittsburg and semifinalists at buckeye.