What has surprised you this year?

[Grim Tuesday]

I know it isn't over yet but this should give us something good to talk about while we wait for divisions!

So the question is, what part of Ultimate Ascent has surprised you? What did you get wrong in your initial strategy phase?

For me, I certainly didn't think there would be nearly the number of good full court shooters. I'm also ashamed to say that I horribly underestimated the importance of traversing underneath the pyramid.

[z_beeblebrox]

Like many other teams, we underestimated the difficulty of building a 30-point climbing mechanism and wasted a significant amount of build season trying to develop one.

[More comments to come if I feel more awake later]

[joelg236]

In short, the scores this year. I did not expect the 200 point barrier to be broken until at the very least MSC, if not champs or IRI.

[hiyou102]

I didn't think that there would be a robot that could both 30 point climb and ground feed.

[orangemoore]

I was really surprised by the way teams got Frisbees from the floor right side up. This year has been the first game piece in a while that requires a little engineering to make sure it is going to shoot right. You don't need to worry about that with a ball.

[orangemoore]

Originally Posted by hiyou102

I didn't think that there would be a robot that could both 30 point and ground feed.

30 Point ____?

Climb?

[Damiaen_Florian]

Something that I severely underestimated this year was how important robots with a ground intake would be, as in how well they compete in a regional and how helpful they are as partners. (Or how scary they can be as opponents)

[ablatner]

Originally Posted by Damiaen_Florian

Something that I severely underestimated this year was how important robots with a ground intake would be, as in how well they compete in a regional and how helpful they are as partners. (Or how scary they can be as opponents)

Not necessarily! Many teams, including teams like 118 and 1114, mainly scored using the feeder station. It's a huge bonus in autonomous, but ground pickups can definitely be matched by robots that get frisbees from the pyramid.

[NXTGeek]

I think Ri3D changed game from the start, with hundreds of teams copying their linear shooter. This lead to a higher scoring success than I would have predicted, leading to the decrement of the top-rung pyramid climb (versus hang). The attachment depicts a render of what my team had originally designed as a do-it-all strategy, climber and all- after our first regional we niched that strategy.
We ditched the 2-CIM corner climber for a buzzer-beater 10pt hanger.
This season taught me that I should design a robot around autonomous. Two frisbees at once, please!
I am surprised how optional the ground pickup was... I thought there would be more, just slow and inefficient, ground pickup robots.
If the ground pickup or climb ain't fast, then lose it. Also, human intakes still require a good design, even if the concept looks simple.
...hopefully that was mostly on topic, as all of the above were mostly unexpected.

[DampRobot]

I learned that everyone's hindsight is always exactly 20-20.

[Koko Ed]

I was surprised (and tremendously pleased) that the GDC hit a grand slam two years in a row!

[Zuelu562]

I was honestly surprised how little the smaller robot footprint seemed to affect us. Granted, we had to get a little creative with our electrical engineering, that said, it didn't really do much other than make us rethink a couple minor "standard" things.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

I was surprised (and tremendously pleased) that the GDC hit a grand slam two years in a row!

After seeing what I would consider to be a decline in quality after Rack n Roll up until Logomotion, seeing the GDC top their best game a year after it ended was quite an enjoyable surprise. Easy to explain, fun to watch at all levels, and manages to be strategically complex while stunningly simple and beautiful. Shrinking the load safe zone and making the scoring zone a 3 dimensional object really opened up ways you play both offense and defense and optional design constraints in ways you did not see in Foul-party 2011 or Rumble.

Come on guys, let's go for 3!

[Gdeaver]

Ether posted a chart of all the match scores for 7 weeks. What surprised me was the sheer number of low scores. I believe this shows that there is a widening divide between the average First team and the elite.

[Billfred]

Going under the pyramid proved to be far more useful than expected.

Full-court shooters actually dialing it in surprised me as well.

Probably the biggest surprise for me: autonomous was actually a highlight of our robot. Never happened in five years. Who knew?