Thoughts about the new FTC challenge?

[ttldomination]

This game has a lot going on. There are a billion and one ways to score, and I think that the team that best figures out how to optimize the ending bonuses will show their dominance.

As far as the challenge is concerned, it seems simple enough. You create a slotted intake that rotates. It can suck up tubes and score them easily as well. The harder parts are:

1. Balancing. You have to specifically balance on the bridges...which makes it much tougher than simply parking yourself up there. Gyro anyone?

2. Detecting the weighted tube. The weighted tube is a whopping number of points, but you can't tell where it is. Either your drivers are going to have to do a visual inspection of each tube before you score it, or there'll be a better way to figure out which one is weighted. I think this weighted ones will make all the difference.

I felt like last year's game immediately sung to me, and I really liked it. This year's game as a bit of an acquired taste, but I can't wait to see what people come up with.