[MrForbes]

There is no "perfect robot" for this game. Having a well balanced alliance is crucial, so good scouting is essential. Autonomous is very important, but not necessarily the ability to score--at Phoenix the key was to be able to adjust the autonomous defense to defeat the other guys' auto scoring! Reliability is helpful, although we managed to do pretty well in Sacramento with essentially a dead drive system for most of 3 matches in the semis and finals.

Since none of these other things is the key, then it must be the ability to adapt to changing circumstances quickly, and to take advantage of any weakness you can find in the opposing alliance. This is what the winning alliances did in the finals at the two regionals I attended.