recycle rush full strategy

[MrJohnston]

Originally Posted by sviridovt

For auto its probably unrealistic to expect to see stacks (especially being from what I understand from my reading of the rules, you only get the stack bonus if all 3 totes are stacked which is nearly impossible to be accomplished by only 1 robot and highly unlikely for all 3 robots to be able to partake). For this reason, the goal should really be to move game pieces into auto zone. To make the most of auto time it is advantageous to start getting the grey totes ready to be stacked, or go towards the center and start clearing way towards the middle barrier to get those cans.

I disagree.
One thing I have learned in FIRST is that they never give an "impossible" scoring opportunity. Therefore, it is very possible to stack 3 yellow totes during autonomous. (Honestly, I would be shocked if the GDC didn't already build robots capable of doing this so that they were certain they were not giving us an impossible task!) So, I approach the game with this mindset: Instead of deciding what can and cannot be done, I ask myself, of everything that's legal, what would I love to be able to do? Usually this leads to a very difficult task. I then ask myself, "How can I get this done."

After Kickoff, my team spent all day Saturday and Sunday brainstorming and a much smaller "Design Team" has gotten together Sunday, Monday and Tuesday evenings to solve these very challenges. We started building our base and prototyping our lifting mechanism last night. Tonight, the Design Team is going to attempt to finishing conceptualizing our tote/bin-gathering manipulator.

I **know** we will be able to do a solo autonomous 3 tote stack. The real question is: What else can we add to it? Can we also grab a recycling bin? Or Two? Or?? Can we also start grabbing bins from the landfill? Etc.