Amazing robot plays

[irishninja]

Just wanted to hear stories of amazing plays. In trenton, during one quaterfinals between mckee 522s alliance and robbes alliance it was so exciting. The first match, McKee had great autonomous and got all 10 balls in. During the second match Robbe changed their autonomous so they came and blocked McKee's balls. No 522 couldn't get balls at all, so everyone just watched as all the balls they could have just bounced off Robbe. My sympathies. During the third match, up comes 522, here comes Robbe to block, and then out of nowhere, comes some other robot, can't remember, on 522's alliance and knocks Robbe over on to its side. McKee was able to then score all then balls. Absolutely amazing.

[Rick TYler]

One of my favorite plays was subtle more than amazing. Top Gun was playing defense on a corner goal, against an alliance that didn't have any good center goal shooters. Top Gun drove into front of the goal, turned 180 degrees and then just sat there with its Victors blinking. A few seconds later, Team 360 (with a very good corner dumper, IIRC) had collected some balls and started moving towards that corner to score. As 360 started to move, Top Gun moved forward about six inches. 360 then spun around and drove off -- not even trying to move 1294 out of position. It might have been the brightest single moment in a mildly disappointing tournament, and I don't even remember if we won that one -- but it showed that a good team with a good 'bot respected us enough not to try to drive through us to the goal. It was one of those moral victories we mid-pack teams rely on to keep us going (sort of like scoring five times in three seconds in a match that was then re-run).

[Rick TYler]

My other favorite play was watching the Scallywags (#1359) driving up on the "wrong" ramp at the end of a match to increase the losing alliance's score. Smart strategy.

[Ian Curtis]

Once at BAE I observed a human player throwing a ball which ended up in the other alliance's robot and jammed their shooter. I don't think it was intentional, but it sure was an added bonus. I don't know which alliance won the match.

How can anyone leave 25 out of this? I personally loved the skill it took 25s drivers to get close enough to the goal to shoot nearly 10/10 in finals match 1.2 at NJ. Also loved 25s idea to save the autonomous switching idea for the last match.

While watching the Florida regional webcast I saw a team line up their flag with the oppositions shooter, and watched a few balls get deflected by the flag. Very amusing.

Personally, I'm holding out on Atlanta for great plays. How about we get to see another last-minute-503-cap-esque hail mary?

[Cody Carey]

What kind?


There is the "Brokeded" caption...
During one of our matches, we lost our left drive on the opposite side of the field. "Whats so special about that?" you ask?
Well, we made it, driving in gigantic arcs and loopdy-loops and other such
cursive-reminiscent patterns all the way back to, and on top of, our ramp. this won us our match by five points.

And the "last stand" type of play...
Another time we were the only functioning robot on our alliance, and we kept 3 GOOD shooters at bay ( they only got 3 balls in) for an entire one of our defensive periods.(in previous matches,each bot managed to sink about 6 of 8 balls shot)

The ever-popular Gracious Professionalism play...
We tore our robot to heck while saving one of the opposite alliances robots from tipping off of the ramp, and probably damaging their robot badly.

And last but not least... the "brute-force-we-shoved-two-robots-ten-feet-into-a-wall-against-their-will" plays:
We saw a dumper and a shooter lining up to score side-by-side and so we pinned the shooter against the dumper, and the dumper against the wall for the last 10 seconds of their offensive period, neither one of them scored a point.
I am proud of our pushing power

[JackN]

I have one sweet defensive play. In the finals of the Buckeye Regional Team 272 was able to push 2 robots at once. Neither could get a good shot because they would be spun or pushed out of scoring range before either could begin shooting.

[Rick TYler]

Madison told me about this one, I didn't see it. Near the end of a finals match, X-Bot (488) was guarding the Cheesy Poofs (253). The X-Bot's alliance had a pretty big lead, and X-Bot had been able to hold off the Poofs during the last period. With a few seconds left (I think Madison said 5), X-Bot headed for the ramp, leaving the Poofs unguarded. The Poofs managed to line up with the goal and sink enough buckets to win the match in just about three seconds. I think Madison said they scored 18 points in that period. Like I wrote earlier -- 253 built an amazing robot.

[Idaman323]

Well at the St. Louis Regionals.. I saw a number of nice plays. Once when we were against 1288, Raven Robotics, it was during all play. The last 15 seconds of the game. Our right side was not riding. We were trying to get up the ramp along with our other two bots. When all of a sudden, 1288 comes driving over with a loaded hopper and scored about 6 shots in a row letting them win the game 48 to 40.

Also, our very first game during the first "real" match day... we had just programmed our autonomous. Since the spot next to the goal (a dumping bot took that), the center spot (a shooting team took that), and we had nothing. So we programmed the bot to just run accross the field and ram the other teams shooting autonomous. It was Team 16, the bomb squad to be exact. Our autonomous went right across, nearly tipped them along with us... and knocked them completly off course. But then... we realized our robot was programmed wrong and our drive in one wheel didn't nuetralize. So we had a spinning robot of doom just randomly moving placs accross the field. Then later that day.. I noticed alot more team using this idea.

Okay last one... We later found out that we could aim our gun at the ground, and roll the balls to the far corner ground goal during autnomous fairly easily. We programmed it... and one team used the ram the other teams robot during autonmous strategy... and stopped directly in front of us. So we were firing 6 balls at a robot point blank range. So we try it again with another match. This time... our chain broke.. and our center teams battery died. So right as it started their robot turned left right infront of ours and we were shooting it point blank. Surprisingly... we still won.. with a dead battery on a robot and a broken chain on ours. SO THEN, we try it one more time we are partnered with the same team... same exact thing happens.. they turned right in front of us. If only we could have had a successful round.. It woulda been a huge advantage over other teams.

It was definatly an interesting regional.. thats all I gotta say.

[Ty Tremblay]

During the Quarterfinals at BAE, our team consisted of 3 different autonomous modes (our (319) center goal shooter, 562's lower goal dumper, and a defensive mover by 176). The other team had two center goal shooters and a dumper. The autonomous went like so...

The two shooters on the other alliance went for the goal and the dumper had a delay that was going to go for the lowergoal afterwards. 176 went straight out and pushed one shooter into another, throwing both teams' aim off. 176 then continued to push them into the dumper stopping their robot from scoring also. Our robot went up and scored all 10 balls in the center goal, and 562 dumped all ten of its balls in the lower goal. We won the autonomous part of the match 50 - 0.

[AcesPease]

Originally Posted by icdumbpeeps305

During the Quarterfinals at BAE, our team consisted of 3 different autonomous modes (our (319) center goal shooter, 562's lower goal dumper, and a defensive mover by 176). The other team had two center goal shooters and a dumper. The autonomous went like so...

The two shooters on the other alliance went for the goal and the dumper had a delay that was going to go for the lowergoal afterwards. 176 went straight out and pushed one shooter into another, throwing both teams' aim off. 176 then continued to push them into the dumper stopping their robot from scoring also. Our robot went up and scored all 10 balls in the center goal, and 562 dumped all ten of its balls in the lower goal. We won the autonomous part of the match 50 - 0.

Thanks to 319 for picking us. We had a blast at Granite State.

[EricH]

Some of the best play I have seen at AZ: a rookie team, with possibly the weakest drive at the regional (2 CIMs, 2 wheel drive, two casters, kit tranny), managed to keep 60 from shooting any balls at the center goal in the fourth period and forced them to go corner. I forget who won, but it was the craziest thing to see this veteran team get pushed around by one of the newest teams in FIRST.

[xtremehumanheat]

Originally Posted by irishninja

Just wanted to hear stories of amazing plays. In trenton, during one quaterfinals between mckee 522s alliance and robbes alliance it was so exciting. The first match, McKee had great autonomous and got all 10 balls in. During the second match Robbe changed their autonomous so they came and blocked McKee's balls. No 522 couldn't get balls at all, so everyone just watched as all the balls they could have just bounced off Robbe. My sympathies. During the third match, up comes 522, here comes Robbe to block, and then out of nowhere, comes some other robot, can't remember, on 522's alliance and knocks Robbe over on to its side. McKee was able to then score all then balls. Absolutely amazing.

See now what happened was that wanted to get to the other corner goal on the other side of the field. Since we were lined up in the middle position we couldnt score from behind our partners and thought wed do better aiming for the far corner goal. Our collision with robbie was not planned because our robot's drive train drifted to the center again after we thought we fixed it.

[Dan Petrovic]

Here are some stories boasting our own awesomeness

1) It was a match on Saturday morning of the BAE GSR. We were paired with 1138 and 1247. Our robot was build in the wider-than-long orientation so we couldn't get up the ramp. It was a fairly boring game cause there were few robots that could score until we agreed to have 1138 push us up the ramp.
1247 got up first, then we were pushed up, and in the last second of the game 1138 managed to find themselves on the ramp. The sound that erupted from our team was incredible. It was such a good feeling to be able to get up the ramp.

We would have tied had 1138 not gotten up the ramp.

2) A match on the Friday of the BAE Regional. We weren't feeling to good cause our robot can't score, plus we ended up going up against one of the strongest shooters. Our programmer said that it might not shoot, and that he wasn't sure yet. So, we angled our robot towards the path of the sharp shooter and collided with them in autonomous keeping them from scoring. Their plastic omni-wheels didn't help the situation as we then proceeded to push them all over the field.

3) Again, the BAE Regional. I forget all of the match details, and what teams were involved. We were queing for the match where we got on the ramp. through a series of odd and confusing events, five 'bots find themselves not in their intended orientation amongst the ramp on the red alliance's side. A picture was posted as "Great Defensive Strategy" or something like that.

[Uberbots]

Originally Posted by AV_guy007

in the quarter finals team 177 flipped 2 bots and about 6 or 7 3 pointers before flipping ourselves

That was one heck of a play, i must admit
as for amazing plays...

I believe that there was one match in the elimination rounds where we were causing chaos during the opposing team's scoring period. So while we (and Aces High i think) were doing this, 177 lined up on the opposite side of the Field to score a truckload of points without any opposition.
Great play.

Edit: Spelling.

If anyone saw 254 during the finals, they really showed what scoring meant. Though it hurts me a little to admit it (we were up against them next in the finals when they did this), they deserve the credit. Their bot was driven up onto the opponents ramp with a full (about 20 ball) hopper. From there, they proceeded to empty that hopper into the center goal in about 12 seconds, leaving them 80 points above the other alliance.

In the match against us, however, we didn't let them get enough balls, and so they could only empty about 15 balls into the center goal. It was still enough to seal the game, but not enough to completely level us.