We were just wondering it seems everyone is building ball shooters are there any wicked awesome goalies out there ? Are any teams building high goal or low goal blockers ?
It seem a blocking bot would be rather a sought after commodity ?
It seems like you could block the low goal by just sitting in front of it.
There are 3 entrances into each low goal. A good low goal defender will need to do far more than âsit in front of itâ
Our team has noted that most catapult and puncher shooting bots seem to only be able to hit the high goals and the top entry of the low goal . So we have concentrated on a blocker for these two areas . Has anyone else noticed this phenomenon also ?
During brainstorming someone suggested a goalie bot four feet long (possibly with a 20" extension that pops out at each end) by eight inches wide, 60" tall, and a drive system allowing it to speedily move sideways. Along the top would be a line of pneumatic pop-up blockers, which the operator controls with something like a piano keyboard.
Of course, this would completely block one driverâs view if it wasnât made see-through. This led to speculation about an anti-goalie bot whose main strategy would be to block the opponents view, and whether such a monstrosity would violate gracious professionalism. 
I think most people are over 5â unless the extensions somehow build a wall;)
Due to the rule about the 6 inch cylinder going above 5 feet i canât imagine how hard it is to be a good goalie. :eek:
Though if simbotics, robonauts or one of those other fantastic teams build a goalie that doesnât allow the opposing alliance to score they will obviously win. :yikes: 
Only time will tell though. :o
Sounds like it would end up on its side allot⌠definitely pushed out into open field to try not to fall over as soon as possible in a match.
I think you might want to re-read the rule on the blocking there is no height rule:
If a ROBOT is in contact with carpet in its GOALIE ZONE, and for only one ROBOT per ALLIANCE at a time, there is no height restriction; however, any extension or combination of extensions above 5 ft. may not extend beyond a vertical cylinder with a 6 in. diameter.
Our high goal blocker can zip up to 112 inches and can withstand the blunt force of the direct hit of the ball with out toppling over the robot. We are new to this being a rookie team .
The team just wanted to be good at one thing blocking shots.
In the hope that we were a valuable asset .
From my experience, being offensive wins matches more often than being defensive. Iâve found that acquiring more points for your own alliance is much more valuable than preventing the other alliance from scoring. The bottom line is that offense scores points, and defense does not. Teams like 1114 and 118 are aware of this, and may be too busy during a match scoring assists and goals, that they need not bother with being a goalie. I do see a possibility, though, of a high performance team choosing a good goalie robot â that ideally can also score in the low or high goal and can do controlled assists â as an alliance pick.
I beg to differ. See Super Bowl XLVIII.
Defense is unappreciated because itâs value is not directly apparent in the score.
Preventing or delaying a cycle is the same as scoring.
Being that each offensive team has only one ball, a good defender might be the winning teams mvr (most valuable robot). This year defense in a one on one matchup.
This is absolutely true! A perfect example of this (in FIRST) would be at the Pinetree regional. My team was selected by the top rank alliance 3467 and 2648. The matches were going well and we found ourselves in the finals. Match one went great (we won), then match two came along and just before the match started an inspector noticed something that was wrong with our robot that they had missed on the last two inspections causing us to have to sit on the field disabled for the match. Unfortunately this caused us to lose the second match and go into the dreaded third match of the finals. By this time we had fixed our bot and were back up and running. The third match came, we played our hearts out and came out on top for a well deserved title as the regional champions.
So moral of the story? Defense really does help. All 2386 was able to do was defense and score in autonomous. By us not being able to compete match two and losing by over 50 points (we were usually 50 ahead), showed just how valuable our defense was. We were quite pleased with how us not being able to play in match two, showed that we hadnât just won a lottery, but we actually greatly helped our alliance in getting to where it did.
Defense is totally underrated.
Defense is totally underrated. I can see that defense will be a major part of the game after the ball is passed to your alliance member. You will have nothing else to do while you wait for the robots on your alliance to score for the next ball to be put into play. So I can see defense becoming a big part of the game after these week 1 competitions coming up. 
My team put a LOT of consideration into the idea, but ultimately the mentors vetoed the dedicated goalie.
You can find an animation here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=408YXf6kGJ0
The idea is up for grabs if you can build it in a weekâŚ
PM me if you want a detailed .blend file.
Okay, this is something that we came up with at the beginning of build season but never used it (blocking is not in our strategy). The perfect blocker would be a large pole mounted on the edge of a lazy-susan turn table. When you wanted to block you have a motor turning the table and the previously small rod now takes up close to three ball widths (or more) Couple this with rapid robot movement and it could become a very effective blocker.
The table could look like this and you mount the pole on one of the corners. (the table would obviously be bigger).
Figured I would share the idea for anyone who wants a blocker. What do yaâ think?
Really creative design, I like it. If made it probably would have been one of the best goalies out there.
However, it would have suffered from the same Achilles Heel as every other goalie robot out there: counter-defense. All it would take is one robot parking sideways in the goalie zone to block the goalie from moving through the goalie zone quickly. the goalie would either have to push the counter-d robot sideways as fast as the shooting robot could re-position and shoot; or retract its blocking extension, drive around the counter-d robot, get back into the goalie zone, and re-deploy its blocking extension before the shooting robot could re-position and shoot.
This is why we did not pursue a goalie design. Defense is important, but a goalie robot is simply too easy to effectively counter.
Even though I donât think the goalie strategy is good this year, I like this design. Itâs quite clever and well thought out.
Unfortunately, it is against the rules.
G12
An ALLIANCE may not POSSESS their opponentâs BALLS. The following criteria define POSSESSION:
- âcarryingâ (moving while supporting BALLS in or on the ROBOT),
- âherdingâ (repeated pushing or bumping),
- âlaunchingâ (impelling BALLS to a desired location or direction via a MECHANISM in motion relative to the ROBOT),
- âtrappingâ (overt isolation or holding one or more BALLS against a FIELD element or ROBOT in an attempt to shield them).
A lazy-susan does not help much since you can not have it free spinning.
G12
An ALLIANCE may not POSSESS their opponentâs BALLS. The following criteria define POSSESSION:
- âcarryingâ (moving while supporting BALLS in or on the ROBOT),
- âherdingâ (repeated pushing or bumping),
- âlaunchingâ (impelling BALLS to a desired location or direction via a MECHANISM in motion relative to the ROBOT),
- âtrappingâ (overt isolation or holding one or more BALLS against a FIELD element or ROBOT in an attempt to shield them).