[Rick TYler]

Originally Posted by Kevin Sevcik

If they're on defense, they have every reason in the world to pin you or push you around on the platform. Likewise if they're an alliance of one pointers. The main point being that you're a sitting duck up there. A very accurate, high point scoring, sitting duck. Possibly with figurative "Push Me!" signs plastered all over you.

Yep. Let's say you have one of those legendary Midwest drive trains with six motors per side and six 6-inch wide, 8-inch diameter wheels with Griptanium treads. Would you risk the high-ground strategy? I don't know the right answer, but I think I'm starting to really understand the questions.

I don't think a robot coming up the ramp could easily pin one on the top of the ramp. We tried driving a 'bot up the ramps at our kick-off event, and the nose came really high before it tipped flat onto the ramp. Think of all those World War II movies where the good guys kill the big bad German tank by shooting into its soft underbelly as it comes over a berm. This was an '05 chassis, so it wasn't optimized for "ramping," but it was illustrative. You might run a really big risk coming straight up a ramp at a 'bot already on the top and ready to push you over backwards. A defensive 'bot already on top is another thing altogether.

One thing that troubles me is the idea of pushing back down the ramp and either going on top of the defensive robot, or pushing it over backwards and ending up on top of it. Either way, I think, your bot is going down sideways. Is self-righting going to be necessary this year?