[eugenebrooks]

Once you get your autonomous mode working, there is more work to do:

Try and detect obstructions to success, and drop out of an auto mode for which persistence might damage the robot. You can do this with time restrictions placed on completion of state changes.

Shut down mechanisms, such as a feed back loop controlling an arm, once the last state of the auto mode is achieved. There might be 10 seconds left with the arm hung up in part of the field, in this instance the frame around the balls to tip, and the arm might be blindly inflicting self damage while pinned on the obstruction. This is similar to the issue above, but in this instance the robot needs to do the right things to protect itself when it finishes the autonomous mode.

Sometimes it pays to code several auto modes selected with a set of switches on the robot. You select the strategy that you find to work more reliably in the actual competition.