[Adam Y.]

Unfortunately, I think we're already at a point where there are teams that don't feel they can compete with the elite few because they can't afford to purchase the parts or design a complex system that purchased parts would allow. I think there's a wider gulf between teams because of the ability to purchase such parts than there would be otherwise. There would be a more natural gradation as opposed to a huge step between the contending teams and the non-contending teams.

I think our team is one of those gradiation. Once we got our robot actually moving it was actually quite competitive for such a simple ball hearder design. We could beat teams that hung just because of our one design. That design had to be one of the easiest designs to build. Also, you are doubting the creativity of some of these teams. I saw robots which clearly didn't have the resources that other teams had but still appeared competitive. I remeber seeing one robot almost entirely built out of wood. They said it worked perfectly and could heard five balls and cap a goal.

I don't accept that herding small balls was easy. Without capping, your HP needed to make 10 shots to offset a hanging robot. Many teams thought they could accomplish this by simply pushing the balls around, but had trouble with it. The only ball machines that I saw make an impact were the catchers or gatherers. I would describe both of these as intermediate tasks

That was mainly due to the fact the way the balls and field were set up. My one advisor made the point that the balls were nearly impossible to push in there since they would squish up the lip of the opening and not go in.