I'm trying not to hate labview but...

[Kevin Sevcik]

In the Advanced framework, yes you do have to add a motordevref to the RobotData cluster for every motor you want to control. This is by design so you can initialize it in the Begin.vi, use it in the various other VIs, and close it in the Finish.vi. Adding the controls to the cluster isn't too complicated, though. Especially once they're already there anyways. If you really can't be bothered, you can add an array of motordevrefs and initialize that array and keep track of where you've put each motor ref, instead of using the nice labels in the cluster. In any case, you shouldn't need to set up default values for any of the data elements you add to the RobotData cluster. Leave them all at their default values, then initialize them in Begin.vi. Creating devref constants or otherwise avoiding calling ???? Open.vi for things can muck things up by not properly reserving resources.

That said, if you're having difficulties with the Advanced template, try switching to the Basic template. More or less everything is in the same VI, so there's no RobotData cluster to configure and carry around.