Who are the better shooters?

[Gearhead.]

From Long Island, the best couple shooters were 271, 358 and I guess 353. 353 has to be on the ramp to shoot, and are rather slow to shoot and to drive. Any defense can shut them down. 358, however, has a decent autonomous but an even better job at harveting balls during the match. They shoot from the top, making it tough to block. Camera is well programmed and it is not suprising that they ended #1 qualifying, and #1 after finals. 271 looked very similar to team 25, a large cylindrical top with a small chassis. Good shooting with camera rotating entire unit and scoring in autonomous. Finished 18-ish but were picked by 358 to win it all in finals.

In trenton, the veterans do shine. Team 25 finished in first place and chose team 103 as their partner. In autonomous, these teams scored an average of about 16 three-pointers. Team 25, just like team 271, only re-fill with human player. Raider Robotix did an incredible job with the speed and accuracy, making at least 20 balls per round with maybe 95+% accuracy. They shot four/five balls per second, but from about 20 inches off of the ground. Their speed was not sacrificed and once again, their speed on the field was only matched by team 102 and 103 at 14 fps.

Team 103, cybersonics, winner of last year's chairman's award, created a very adaptable camera which refocuses quickly and sets the turret into position. They can pick up off the floor and shoot two, maybe three balls a second.

Team 254, cheesy poofs, seemed to have the fastest shooter. At their regionals, however, I noticed the 'spaghetti' chains were not fasten correctly and MANY of the balls shot were deflected out of the scoring hoop. Cheesy poofs do not rotate and require dead-on shooting, but shoot five-six balls per second. The shoot from the top, can pick up off the ground, and have a large ball capacity. If their driving and strategy can permit them to unload for ten seconds, their hopper is empty and they win the match.

25, 103, and 254 will be involved with the finals of each division in Atlanta. You definitely want to befriend these teams as soon as possible. I haven't seen all of the match videos, but New Jersey seems to have some of the best robots every year and have the best, to my knowledge, robot in the entire competition this year.