[Jaine Perotti]

While by no means is it true that ALL robots will look EXACTLY alike, I have been noticing "trends" similar to those already posted.

I think that the similarities in robot design will create a need for effective strategies - more than in the past (or at least the past few years). If robots are similar in design, how are you going to be able to beat your opponent? By simply outsmarting them!

I wonder if this was designed into this year's game intentionally, in an effort to shift FIRST teams' focus away from making an unstoppable robot design, to the development of an unstoppable strategy. This might be a way that FIRST is trying to level the playing field, because you don't need money or big sponsors to come up with a good strategy. In the past, if you had lots of resources for your team, winning wasn't quite as difficult (although it was still quite a challenge!) as it may have been for others - simply because you could spend more time on making a beautifully machined, perfectly functioning robot. By no means am I saying that it was impossible for the "underdog" teams to build a competitive robot under the game structure of the past, but I think the "underdogs" may have a better chance of winning now that the playing field has been somewhat leveled this year - in terms of getting a good, basic robot up and running.

The reason why this year's game will have a lot of similar robot designs is this simple fact: there is only one major way to score points - lifting and stacking tetras. While there are others, such as knocking down the hanging tetras, and getting the end-zone bonus, the way to win this game is by racking up high points totals with the stacked tetras. With only one highly effective method of scoring, most robots will have similar (with slight variations of course) methods of getting those tetras up in the air.

Of course, I may be completely wrong about all this, but it is still interesting to think about. Maybe FIRST didn't intend to do this as an effort to reduce the polarization between "have" and "have not" teams. But if they are, I think it will be interesting to see if their emphasis on strategy will help to level the playing field, and make the title "super bowl of smarts" more accurate.

-- Jaine