What did we learn - FIRST Scrimmages?

[GBilletdeaux930]

Through observation, we realized that if you are hanging, be sure you don't make your hanger go too high.

Unfortunately, the one hanging attempt at Sussex (Wisconsin Scrimmage) didn't go so hot... 2062, I give you major props for your hanger, it works magically. But they brought it too high at one point and didn't pull themselves up high enough to get points... Watch that.

Oh, and we learned that no one likes to shoot when we flap a wall in front of their face

[Kims Robot]

Originally Posted by jamie_1930

I saw this and was extremely pleased to see someone hanging out there, but the problem I, and 378, noticed was their arm to elevate themselves was hanging below the plane of the platform when they were finished. In accordance with the FIRST definition of elevated

It was not counted by our Ref that time, but they did do it again in another match and their arm did not drop plus they lifted themselves higher. 378 has a very simple & elegant system and I LOVED it

What I Learned:

• MANY robots got stuck driving up on balls, lots of penalties there
• Ball Control will be very clutch, robots that are good at it wont spend time chasing balls
• A LOT of kickers broke today, a lot of cool solutions, but a lot of them broke, reliability may be tougher than we thought
• We didnt get a chance to see it done, but 1551 had an AWESOME solution for suspending a second robot (I would encourage anyone who saw it to let them keep their secret until week 1) I now think there may be more suspensions before Atlanta
• Human players were doing ok, it wasnt too difficult to return balls without fumbles
• It is possible to "do it all" - 378 could go over the bump, under the tunnel, kick & hang!! WOW
• Saw a lot of mecanum drives done reasonably well, and they were able to climb the bump
• Even really low robots can flip over going over the bump!! We saw two 16" tall robots flip over and turtle(on their backs)!!
• Kicking balls 2 zones wont be as frequent as we thought, only time we saw it done it bounced off the back wall out of the field
• FEED YOUR WATCHDOG!! (how annoying to get halfway through a match and get unfed watchdog errors)
• FULLY Charged Batteries work best if you expect to make it over the bump!!!
• Saw several matches with more penalties than scores, and while I would normally say this would "clean up" after early regionals, I think a lot of it is due to ball incursion & kicker feet getting stuck out, which may not be as easy to fix

Well a HUGE thank you to all of the teams that came out to Rally, we hope you learned as much as we did, and it was GREAT to see everyone!! We love the Rochester teams See you all at FLR in a week & a half!!!!!!

[Bomberofdoom]

Last time I didn't feed our Watchdog(last year, my senior year as programming lead), he went crazy and died on us.
I killed the Watchdog. Dangit!!! (Inside joke)

[FIRSTgirl675]

We learned that:
1.) robots are not as robust as they may seem. One robot at the Fembot's practice snapped their hanging arm in half (which took them 2.5 weeks to build).
2.) Never underestimate the power of your robot, especially during autonomous. You might end up launching over the ramp and into an alliance member's electronics.
3.) Robot problems arise only when you are not at home.

[Mike Betts]

Originally Posted by darkember

I was a little surprised with how low the scores were. I did notice that a lot of the scoring was done by robots pushing the ball into the goal instead of kicking in. Also, I noticed that defense was a pretty big factor too.

Billy,

Low scores are quite normal for a scrimmage. Scores will increase as the season progresses.

Mike

[dtengineering]

Did anyone see a robot hang from another robot?

Jason

[KC1AJT]

Originally Posted by dtengineering

Did anyone see a robot hang from another robot?

Jason

havnt seen it happen Jason i dont think we'll see much of it until Atlanta either

[Koko Ed]

That alot of teams tha thought they were done still have a long way to go. Thursday will be long and lonely again for us in team que.

[waialua359]

wow,
a post at 4:53am.
At least we got 5 more hours until Monday morning when the sun rises.
We are trying to powdercoat right now, since the team decided to do an all-nighter and got permission to miss school in about 7 hours. It sure helps to have our own oven.

Then our programming team arrives at 8am to continue for the next 12 hours................