There are some interesting comparisons to be made between this year's game and last year's.
In my mind, this year it was much MORE important to be on an alliance with other capable robots. Just like the scoring was exponential, so was the benefit from having capable partners.
Last year, if you had a robot that was able to score in autonomous, you could get a reasonable score even if you were missing one (or even two) teams in you alliance.
In autonomous, first you got the points that you scored (up to 30), then you got a bonus (10) and then you got to play defense which meant you had time to pick up more balls.
During the offensive period, the opposition could only use two robots to block you, and finally, you could score more bonus points if you were able to get up the ramp by yourself. (More robots were great, but they weren't "required"). A single good robot could end up with a respectable score.
This year, if you could score in autonomous you got 2 points, then all the opposing robots could play defense on you (which eliminated the real bonus of scoring the keeper) and then without a capable partner there is NO WAY to score a bonus. A single good robot didn't have much of a chance.
So, the randomness of the seed matches is a BIG deciding factor on how well you rank. eg: We ranked 35, but were the second robot to be picked during alliance selection. Thank goodness for scouting
Personally, I liked the way that last year's game enabled a technically proficient robot to lift an average alliance's score (inspiring and encoraging). This year is seems that a poor alliance canceled the impact of a proficeint robot (dissapointing and frustrating).
As a mentor, I appreciate the competition as a great way to demonstrate the engineering challenge, regardless of the final score.... but I have 25 years of real world experience behind me. It's easier for me to say "oh well, that's how it goes" afterwards
As a programmer, next year I'd like to see more importance given back to autonomous mode (as a stand alone event). This would encourage the rest of the team to start thinking about it right from the start, rather than as an after-thought. I'd like the Smart-bots to be able to beat out the Brute-bots
