Can a spybot start with a boulder?

[sanelss]

I can’t seem to locate the part where it states if the spybot can start with a boulder or not. If it can it would make multi ball auto a lot easier but not sure it’s allowed. Can someone clarify?

[FrankJ]

Yes it is allowed.

[GeeTwo]

Confirmed implicitly by Q763 (emphasis mine):

@Q763

• Q. Spy bots are allowed to have a boulder loaded at the beginning of the game.

Can they use the boulder to score on the Tower during autonomous since the boulder did not come from the Neutral Zone? If the spy bot was able to cross a defense during autonomous, would it be considered a crossing since they went from the Courtyard to the Neutral Zone? If considered a crossing, would the defense be weakened?

• A. Yes
  , the BOULDER may be scored. No ROBOT has caused the BOULDER to CROSS into the COURTYARD since it started the MATCH in the COURTYARD, so G40 is not relevant. A spy bot may CROSS the OUTER WORKS, however, in order for it to CROSS, the ROBOT must meet the requirements outlined in Section 3.1.3 (i.e. moving from the COURTYARD to the NEUTRAL ZONE is not CROSSING the OUTER WORKS).

[sanelss]

that’s good news! multi ball auto is a go then!

[Racer26]

Seems to me that the easiest multi-ball auto would be to start as the spybot, with a BOULDER, score that BOULDER in the TOWER, and then CROSS the OUTER WORKS via the LOW BAR, pick up a BOULDER carefully off the midline (avoiding the relevant penalty), and then returning to CROSS the OUTER WORKS via the LOW BAR and score the 2nd BOULDER.

Thereby scoring 2 BOULDERS and a CROSSING, in a way that is not dependent on the selected DEFENSES and could be dead reckoned.

I suspect more advanced teams will have multi-ball autos that allow them to start in the NEUTRAL ZONE, and CROSS arbitrary DEFENSES to score twice using a multitude of sensors to align themselves with targets after CROSSING DEFENSES may have upset the ROBOT’s alignment.