Robot ideas

[Bongle]

Drivetrain
Seems that the highly-maneuvarable (mecanum) drivetrains will be back in fashion, as you'll need to move laterally in order to accurately place the ringers on the rack. Either that or you'll see more side-mounted game manipulators. It simply doesn't make sense to have a manipulator on the front because you can build the front-back and up-down functionality into the manipulator, while lateral manipulator movement is more difficult.

Lifting - Obviously a ramp to drive onto won't really be feasable: there won't be enough space for another robot AND whatever manipulator you have. Plus it would be very risky for both robots involved.

I suppose if you engineered your piece-manipulator to be extraordinarily strong you could use it to lift robots as well.

If a team could get a large number of collaborators together, they could design a hook and clasp system where all robots have a standard 'handle', and anyone that wants to design a crane to lift them can do so. Actually, that might be a useful 1lb addition to any robot, just to make sure your robot is crane-able. A crame system wouldn't be terribly difficult to add to a strong maniputor, just have a cable on a pulley and a winch mounted down low (for balance). Or if the up-down mechanism for the manipulator is suitably powerful (worm gear), just have a rigid hook mounted to the manipulator.

Edit: If any box-on-wheels team doesn't include at least a handle, then that would be a serious flaw. If you've got a 50lb robot, flaunt it. That's like 30 free points right there.