[ttldomination]

There are a few of things that I feel my team seems to fall for almost every year.

1. The Importance of a drive train. Each year we try and focus so much on the manipulator, that the drivetrain is neglected and throw together. Ultimately this hinders overall design and performance.

2. It might not be a bad things in some cases, but the team becomes overzealous. It seems that we jump into development of prototypes a bit too early, and when those prototypes go south, we wonder why we didn't see very basic issues.

3. Not making a second robot. For the past couple of years, my team has not made a second robot, or one to practice with after ship date. This isn't because of want, but primarily because we have 2 designs we take all the way to the end, and we can't devote enough resources to developing two full, distinct robots and also creating a copy of one.

4. This one is key, but some people seem to under estimate what other teams will do. While brainstorming, some mentors/students immediately take the mindset that if we are able to score about 5-6 goals, then that's good cause barely anyone will get those. Had we stuck with this mindset, not only would it have sorely effected our design, but we would've had a rude awakening once we got to worlds where they were scoring 10+ goals almost every match!

- Sunny