[XaulZan11]

Scouting for defense is tough as there really is no good quantifiable measure. As stated above, you could compare the offensive team's average goals with how many they scored under defense, but with a small sample size, I don't think that is a good measure. There are also too many factors invovled (did the offensive team play offense the entire time, did the offensive team have enough balls to score, did the defender play defense the entire time, did the defender play defense on more than one team).

As a team that has picked two defensive robots as 3rd picks this year, we have focused on driving ability and drivetrain. For driving ability it bascially comes down to how well they do what they are trying to do. Hopefully, the team plays defense in the qualification matches so you can get a chance to see how they do it. If not, then you have to look at other measures of how well they drive. At midwest (which was a very shallow regional), we actually looked at how many goals teams scored, under the belief that you have to be decent at driving to push balls into the goal. Any team that had any questions/negative statements about their driving on our scouting sheets, were just about eliminated from getting picked.

For drivetrain, it is a lot more cut and dry. I almost always favor power over speed and manuverability. Obviously, you cannot be a snail out there, but if the offensive robot can push you out of the way, you cannot be that effective. My basic criteria is "Can a team catch and stay with an offensive robot. And once they are there, can they do damage?" Most of the time the teams that have traction wheels are best.