[Tom Schindler]

Realizing this is a REALLY old idea, i would love to see bowling pins be in the game at one point or another.

People recognize bowling pins, which would make the game a lot easier to explain to people new to FIRST. Robots could have to set up certain pins in certain areas, while knocking down certain pins in other areas...

Also,

Bring back the torroids! Anyone around in '97 remembers these awesome game elements, we had way too much fun practicing for human player that year...

Enough about game elements,

an ideal game to me, would be one where the members of an alliance are FORCED to work with eachother. Such as having a barrier that teams are not allowed to cross, and moving game elements (Bowling pins, torroids, balls etc) from one side of this barrier to another will score points. This could allow for completely defensive, completely offensive, or mixed matches. Many gameplay strategies...

And my final thought is, as a game element, use dippin dots! they are readily available at many of the competition venues, especially the nationals! When the match is over, the field reset people get a treat!

--Tom "where's my dippin' dots" Schindler