Ok, so YOU design the 2003 game...

[pauluffel]

The main idea that has been posted on this thread is the idea of frisbees. It is not that frisbees are that important or revolutionary, but that they fly effectively. There were a few teams this year that launched soccer balls, but soccer balls aren't that aerodynamic. With the addition of frisbees there would be more of a three dimensional aspect to the game, which is much more interesting. Another way to add this three dimensional aspect is to add multiple layers to the field.

Say you have your floor, and then four or five feet above that you have a level of lexan or some other clear material so that you could still see what was going on below this platform. The scoring of the frisbees could all be on this second level so that robots could merely launch the frisbees to the second level.

Another factor that was missing from last years game was that two similar robots could work together effectively. I f there was a rule such as robots were not allowed to carry frisbees from the floor to the platform, two types of robots would most likely evolve.
A. A robot that would stay on the floor and collect frisbees, then launch them up to the goal on the second level.
B. Robots that would climb up to the second level and catch frisbees and put them in their goal.
When these two types would work together, they would be awesome, but two of one type would not do nearly as well.

Scoring
The goals would be similar to frisbee golf goals where there is a basket to hold the frisbees at the bottom and chains hanging from the top to absorb the impact of the frisbees and slow them down. Each team could have its own goal on the top platform and there would be retro-reflective tape on the goals so that robots could autonomously aim the frisbees at the goal. Robots could also get points for being completely on the platform (i.e. no part of their robot touching the ground.) This would simplify the game in that there would be no zones, which i found to be the hardest part to explain to new recruits.