Ball or Bar

[Anthony Kesich]

The way i see it is you need to priortize. To be competitive, a robot must be fairly fast and manuverable, able to push balls, do the autonomous, and have ONE specialty which they do extremely well. Trying to grab the multiplier, grab the bar, put the multiplier back on, gather in a special way AND grab goals will net you with a complex robot that can do everything average. Which would you choose, a guy who can do everything, but not very well, or the guy that can push the balls around for the first 1:30 then ALWAYS end up hanging on the bar for the extra 50?

-Kesich

[kevin.li.rit]

Your definitely right, doing one thing well is extremely important. If you focus on doing too many things you won't be able to do anything effectively to win a match or be considered for drafting. If you do one thing well teams will probably look for two different robots each with it's own specialty or two robots that do the same thing very well for consistency.

[Anthony Kesich]

Exactly. That both destroyed us and sved us last year (yet another conundrum). WE had an arm that sucked, and we tried to use it, but it was just ignoring KISS. But we were able to take it off and become an awsome dozer with an autonomous that worked like a charm (except for when the older teams asked us to delay ours and then theirs screwed up.... uggh). But we learned that doing one thing very well pays off, when we dont runing it by adding more :-D.

-Kesich

[Korbin]

The way that I see things is this: A lot of people are going to go for the bar, and not do it well, like staking last year. but the most commmon robot will be a tank with wings that pushes balls around. so if you are looking to be a good bot to compliment others, and get picked in a good seed then you will need to consistantly be able to control the 2x balls, or always get on the bar. i am predicting that the good vets will go for the bar, and get it, and be in the top seeds, so they are going to want someone that can handle the 2x balls really well.

[Anthony Kesich]

I really think that the game is going to be won or lost based on the bar. I mean, look at the scores in the human games, they were what, in the 70-100 point range? And thats with people who can do what they want, pretend they have all the equipment and all the little gadgets on their "arms" and can throw a rope over the bar (fyi, with a max velocity of 10ft/sec (using it as initial velocity) you apex at just over 3 feet up (3 and 3/16th feet to be precise), so projectile are worthless anyways. But what I am saying is that inj this game, i believe 50 will be tremendous, like being on the ramp was last year.

-Kesich

[Korbin]

well that is what the team needs to deside when designing their robot, will the bar be like staking last year, or like king of the hill?

[Bcahn836]

Both, I have an idea and it just might be crazy enough to work.

[Anthony Kesich]

I see the doubler as more like stacking.

Bchan, could you elaborate? Unless its a probable team design, then by all mean, keep it to your team untill you can be sure most everyone has their plans set.

-Kesich

[Garrix]

I believe handling the large 2x ball can be more advantageous than simply hanging, but the score is dependant on your shooters. You can get alot of balls in your mobile goal if you push it up to the driver station, and have a tall human player to "lift" the balls over the station and into the goal. After that you can cap the goal off with a 2x ball to get a substantial score.

And you can use your 2x ball handling arm to disrupt the people who try to hang. As I see it, if the arm is underneath them, providing some measure of support, then their points wouldn't count.

[Korbin]

the shots are not hard to make, if the team can afford making a goal, and the human player practices then it should not be a problem

[Joe Matt]

IMHO, hanging will take time to happen. In that time many things can change.

Get my drift?

[Mike Norton]

If you look at it. Auto mode is very important. Get the 2X Ball drag the goal under the balls and then wait for the 45 sec to release the balls. Balls will fall into the goal nobody can touch the balls already in the goals.

About hanging. This was fun to watch a couple of years ago when we had to hang. I would say only 30% of the people could hang the rest tried but couldn't.

This year, it is a lot higher and harder to get to. I am betting a lot of robots are going to be flipped over. Once again when we had the puck only 25% could get up onto it fast enough to be able to keep other off.

Look at when we had to get a big ball and put it onto the goal that was on the ramp. Only a few teams that could do this fast enough to be good. I would say only about 50% of those teams could do this and only 10% could do it fast.

SO after all that I would say the best robot will in the auto mode take the 2X ball push the goal to were when the balls drop the balls will fall into it. Once they get control, to be able to get up onto the top platform and control it. Then cap the goal at the end and hang.

I can see that it will come to a lot of hitting on top of the platform. Make your robot to be hit and hit often up there.

[Garrix]

In addition to having a 2x ball handling arm, having a sturdy tethering type system to use and block your opponent's ball corrals could be a beneficial strategy if you have an adequate ally. Although this won't give you much by way of scoring.

For the human player, just recruit your school's Varsity point guard.

[abeD]

The shooting gaurd is probably gonna be better hehe

[Chris Fultz]

Originally Posted by Mike Norton

If you look at it. Auto mode is very important. Get the 2X Ball drag the goal under the balls and then wait for the 45 sec to release the balls. Balls will fall into the goal nobody can touch the balls already in the goals.

We need a rule clarification, but the book says small balls can only be scored by a human player. It also says small balls cannot be scored by a robot. There is no clarification of what happens to a ball that ends up falling or bouncing into a goal as it leaves the storage box.

It might be considered OK if it is unintentional, but not acceptable if a goal is placed so that balls fall directly into it.