Here's my take on autonomous first.
I LOVE IT! The high reward for winning autonomous, combined with the new closer positioning of robots (no longer all the way across the long dimension of the field) has led to some of the most exciting autonomous gameplay I have seen. In 2003, you would see some interaction between the two alliances in autonomous, but primarily that was just two robots running into eachother on top of the ramp. In 2004, some interaction would occur when teams would go for the yellow balls to release the ball dumps early, but for the most part this was rare and wouldn't impact the entire match very much. In 2005 interaction in autonomous was zilch, none, nada. But in 2006, with such a large emphasis on autonomous, it has become an exciting and highly strategic part of the match.
Many examples could be found during the peachtree elimination rounds. At the start of our QF matches, both alliances autonomous strategies essentially mirrored eachother. 116/1533 would run to the corner goals and dump 10 balls. 1139/34 would dead reckon the center goal and shoot. 1369/1242 would try and hit the shooters to keep them from making shots. Here's where it got interesting. 1369 expierienced some errors with their autonomous, so they just spun in a circle. Both 34 and 1139 were never 100% accurate (they would either hit almost all their shots, or none at all, depending on their dead reckoning positioning). The first match, both 116 and 1533 sucessfully dumped all 10 balls. 34 hit 3 shots into the center, giving the red alliance the win in autonomous. Red alliance would advance to win the match. Match #2, 34 would miss all of its shots. 116 dumped all 10 balls, but 1533 only made 9 out of 10, giving blue the win in auto, and the match. Fearing the same result, the red alliance switched 1242's and 34's role in the next match. BOTH robots went directly for their own corner goal to prevent 116 from sucessfully unloading (Unfortunately, 116's autonomous failed anyway because it's stupid coach forgot to plug the drive motors back in after using their timeout to make repairs to the drivetrain
). Red alliance won the match.
During the Peachtree finals another outstanding example appeared. The #1 Red alliance consisted of 1261, 1414, and 1057. During most of the eliminations 1414 had run to the corner goal, dumped 10, and 1261 had sat in position 2 and fired balls into the center goal. But, because they didnt move, 1261 was an especially vulnerable target to opposing defenses. In the finals 1057 began "intercepting" opposing robots who were trying to slam into 1261, giving the #1 alliance an even more impressive advantage during autonomous (and allowing them to win the Peachtree regional).
Now onto the "starving" topic:
Starving may well be become a very effective strategy at the Championship event, due to some of the potential devestating shooter combos that may arise. But at the regional level, it has not been necessary thusfar. A vast majority of shooters need to be reletively close to the front of the ramp to shoot accurately. Because of this a "zone" defensive scheme has allowed for singular robots to block multiple shooters (even all 3 if the shooters can't fire fast enough). Running interferance has helped this some, but often it has only contributed to further traffic and less ability to get positioned correctly in front of the ramp. The most effective counter-measure so far has seemed to be having a robot than can score lots of points quickly in the corner goal to force the defense away from the front of the ramp.
By making the shooters miss shots you not only prevent them from scoring points, you allow any herders on your alliance (and their's) to grab the balls. Most highly effective shooters has been primarily human loaded (the exceptions being bots like 1731 and 435), thus when trying to stop an alliance full of good shooters, it is often to your advantage when balls are "loose".
Additionally, because of the human loading shooters, their reloading time is often the best time to play defense on them. Because of the field set up, with the ramp and the edge of the field, teams can be blocked into the area immediately in front of the human player. Many shooters prefer this area to load up, and even if they don't they are often near it when they are loading so they can be pushed into it. You can then seal them into this are (not even needing to pin them).