2005 Team Update #4 posted

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by Joe Johnson

Bottom line, STAY AWAY FROM ROBOTS IN THE LZ.

More specifically, stay away from robots in their loading zone who have not yet acquired their tetras. It is imperative that teams do this to ensure the safety of the human players/field attendants. However, once they've obtained a tetra, the human player has returned to his pad (if applicable), and the team wishes to leave their zone, you don't HAVE to let them do so:

Example 6


Robot "RED01" is in the red alliance loading zone, is already loaded with a tetra, and is waiting for a path to clear to the center goal before moving in to the rest of the field. Robot "BLUE01" approaches the loading zone, and blocks RED01’s attempts to leave the loading zone and score on the center goal. The robots come into contact several times while BLUE01 blocks RED01. No penalty is assessed to either alliance, provided BLUE01 acts within the limitations of <G21> that prohibit pinning for more than 10 seconds. RED01 is not retrieving a tetra, so no violation of <G15> has occurred.

So as FIRST currently has defined it, the situation outlined in Example 6 is a valid defensive option for teams. However, I agree with Mike, you better be dang sure humans are safely out of the picture before employing it. If your robot contacts an opposing robot in their LZ that's disabled because their human player hasn't yet returned to his/her pad, you deserve every bit of that 30-point penalty.