Mock Kickoff - REEFSCAPE Variant... "REF-ESCAPE"

FIRST General Forum
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Watching the teaser (many times) and reading the chatter on here got me thinking: we haven’t had a non-deformable game piece for a while.
The 2017-2019 run is ancient history, and none of our current students have experienced that. So for 2025 prep, might as well read as much into the teaser as I can, and give my team a hard game piece challenge.

So I present: REF-ESCAPE

“Manual” link: here
Field CAD (Onshape) link: here

If there are questions about the game, feel free to ask. I probably don’t have an answer! I threw this together and have already spent way more time on it than I should have. Meaning I’m ready to leave it be. Anything missing form this game (like fouls, game piece holding limits, auto points, how many robots can ____, etc.) is something I just didn’t bother coming up with.

But my lack of thoroughness is your opportunity. Clone the game. Edit it. make it better. Let your kids have fun! We’ve already started thinking about how we can pick up with pipes, how we can put balls in the pipes. It’s a tough game.

Disclaimer

I have absolutely zero knowledge of the REEFSCAPE game beyond what the teaser video and FRC communications have revealed. Anything in this post that ends up being in the real game is completely by chance.

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Really good, change it from a tennis ball to a piece of AndyMark fuel and then you’re solid :rofl:
Edit: I do think that there is maybe a bit too much empty space though.

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this is going to be my mental picture of reefscape until kickoff. :man_facepalming: but nice work

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The bump is a trapezoid prism. It is solid. It is there to make your life a little harder.

I guess we can never escape the cable bump…

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I agree. But I ran out of ideas! Game design is hard.

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ancient history??!! those are like, modern games to my frc-rotted brain, i like watching videos of robots from late 1990s and early 2000s (those games were peak)

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The first time I looked at this, name “ref-escape” and the lack of barrier walls on the sides made me think the primary game objective was to evade capture by the referees :rofl:

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Here I thought it was called REF-ESCAPE because a hard game piece would be dangerous to the refs, and they would need to escape. Like frisbees

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So the “PEACE REFS” concept didn’t work out?

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image
It’s a me~! Mario!!!

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Looks great, good job, Tom!

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I like this game because the field elements look easy for teams to build and small enough to wheel into storage.

The pipe holder might be the only challenging field element to construct if you don’t have a laser cutter.

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Because of all the open area I propose REEFSPACE as an alternative name.

I think I’ll be using that to describe the area around the goal in the proper game too.

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No rules, no refs, no problem. 10/10.

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Two players enter, one player leaves.

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Screenshot 2024-11-25 10.32.03

I never got around to designing the ball hopper but it was a fun robot to design.

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I think if some of the things are spread out, it could be better

A similar field layout to 2019 maybe?

Personally, I’m expecting that the endgame of Reefscape would be a rope climb “ascending to the surface” on some tower maybe

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Does this concept follow the rules first has released so far?
Like only holding 1 of each, and 9 available in auto?

I’m guessing the tennis balls are the commonly available one?

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That looks sick!

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I thought about this. Our 2017 climber was pretty quick.

Not specifically. Likely because I didn’t really read the blog post thoroughly :rofl:
My initial thoughts were 1 pipe per robot, but unlimited balls. But I’d say going by the Blog post is a better option.