[Greg Young]

I've been waiting for a week to find the time to write this up properly. It doesn't look like that is going to happen, so this will have to do. I'm assuming a two against two game, but it can be easily modified for other scenarios. This is just one element of a game, there would have to be other scoring methods added.

GeneF talked about some similar ideas a couple of pages back in this thread.

Near the center of the field are a set of pedestals 30 inches square and 72 inches tall. Half of the pedestals are blue, the others are red. The top surface of each pedestal has a one inch wide white border. The pedestals have a net of 3 inch square mesh 18 inches down from the top and extending out 12 inches from the vertical walls.

Each team builds two robots. One is the usual 130 pound behemoth. The second robot is built from the parts in the Robovation (I think that's what they call it these days) kit and must fit in an eight inch cube. The maxumum weight of this dozer is three pounds. The dozer is strictly autonomous, no operator control allowed. The Robovation kit would need added sensors for this to work. An alternative is to develop a narrow list of additional electronics that can go into the dozer.

At the start of the match the behemoth is carrying the dozer. At any time during the match the behemoth can place the dozer on one of the pedestals. The dozer is activated when released by the behemoth.

The scoring pieces for this element of the game are hockey pucks or air hockey pucks. The pucks on top of a blue pedestal are worth points to the blue alliance, red pedestal pucks give points to red alliance. One of the tasks for the behemoth is to collect pucks and put them on top of the pedestals. The task for the dozer is to push pucks off or keep them on. Keeping pucks on the pedestal may involve pushing another dozer off. The net will let pucks fall to the floor while keeping dozers off the floor where they might get crushed.

The behemoth can't hold on to the dozer and use it to sweep the top of the pedestal. A behemoth holding a dozer while knocking an opposing dozer off the pedestal would draw a stiff penalty. The only time a behemoth can contact the top of a pedestal is while placing or picking up its dozer.

Using air hockey pucks would reduce the chance of a dozer being damaged by a puck dropped on the pedestal. It would also increase the challenge of picking a puck off the floor.

Yes, it sounds a lot like robot sumo.

The idea is to increase the emphasis on electronics and autonomous programming. Making more of the main game autonomous has a certain appeal, but I don't want to go that route. One of the most interesting aspects of the competition is watching the field team adapt their strategy to changing situations on the field. Taking away driver time will necessarily reduce this aspect of the game.