[EricH]

The #1 most important thing to do in design is to figure out your strategy. Strategy, Strategy, Strategy. Good strategy + good implementation = good robot. Lousy strategy + great implementation = sitting on the sidelines on Saturday afternoon.

To go along with that, what one element will win the game? Can you beat it? Now, how do you beat the beating method? Repeat.

Good idea: Play the game, as closely as you can, with humans as robots. Slow them down if you have to. Do this as full-scale as you can (or grab an empty FLL table and make scaled-down "robots" of cardboard). Just play--use washers or poker chips or racquetballs or whatever you have lying around the shop as game objects. What wins repeatably is probably a good strategy; now come up with a way to block it.

Understand your chosen strategy inside and out before you build anything other than the Kitbot. Then design your robot to play the strategy.