Penalizing mecanum wheeled robots durring alliance selection.

[KrazyCarl92]

In my experience, I have only competed with 2 robots that stick out in my mind as having implemented a mecanum drive in a fashion that in some way improved their overall strategic design and were executed well: Team 230 in 2010 and Team 58 in 2012. Both of these teams had creative ways to use their mecanum drives to do something that a standard tank drive could not (or at least not as simply or with the same resources). 230 used theirs to strafe sideways once atop the bumps in the field so they could engage their hooks and climb the tower, knowing they were lined up as they did so and not having to climb as far. 58 used their mecanum drive to position themselves against field elements in auto, moving along multiple axes to ensure they were in the proper location to consistently score their 10 point autonomous.

I often ask a team with a mecanum drive in the pits what their drive train allows them to do that the kit drive train cannot achieve. If the answer is a blank stare or simply "strafing" for no well thought out reason, then I am obviously going to deem their drive as a disadvantage when I see them using it to no advantage on the field. This is because there are then plenty of things that an all else equal robot with a traction drive CAN achieve that this mecanum drive robot cannot. Even the two teams mentioned above did have their limitations owed to their mecanum drive trains, but at least their mecanum gained them something (hey look, points). I'm sure there are more examples of this, but for most mecanum bots I am left thinking that the robot would be at least as effective with a traction drive.

TL;DR consider the marginal gain of your mecanum drive. If one does not exist, why bother?