Is pushing the same as blocking and if it is will we get a yellow card? 
The drive team (mostly the coach and human players of the 3 teams) will have to keep a mental count of what’s on the rack and where the 4 spoilers are throughout most of the match.
I think the end game is going to be the biggest period of strategizing - should I bail from the rack now to attempt lifting or should I move one more spoiler to secure my row(s)?
I completely agree with this… these will be the main four types. There may be a few offshoots (not sure how) but besides that these are them. Personally I think ethier two or four will be the best because this year seems to be all about stratagy. If your a bot that can do most things required, you can change your stratagy a lot better than one that is, say, a lifting bot. It’s going to be really neat, I think most of the time, a lot of the winning will be place on who is put with who. Because like what was said before, the ideal team is two scorers and a lifter, but that won’t always be the case lol. I can’t wait!!
I think the end game is going to be the biggest period of strategizing - should I bail from the rack now to attempt lifting or should I move one more spoiler to secure my row(s)?
Just imagine a scenerio where the red team has 7 ringers in a row (the eighth spot is held by a blue keeper. Total for red 128pts. But now blue has the choice of running back an being elevated for 30 pts or placing a spoiler on the middle postion of red for no blue points but costing red 112 pts (now two rows of 3 at 8 pts each). Does red give up 30 pts of its own for not being lifted to try to prevent this? End game is going to be interesting.
to me, this challenge is more strategy than it is actually building a good robot. as long as you can get a ring on the bottom row, and quickly, i think you’re good. its more a matter of team strategy. i guess if you could lift robots up, and keep the other team from scoring, you could do quite well. i think the team that can get the most rings the fastest will win, unless the other team stops them by blocking them. as long as our robots can get a ring up and aren’t super flimsy then they;ll do well.
I would like to make a point that I believe we have missed. We’re all talking about strategy and how important that it is and I think we’ve overlooked an important factor. The rack is a cylinder. This means that the drivers, coach, and human player won’t be able to see the entire rack. Which means the robot and the drivers are blinded to what happens on the other side. Yes you can use the camera to target and make sure that the ringer you’re placing goes in, however how are you supposed to tell where putting a ringer will be most effective.
Yes it will be difficult to tell who won. You can’t see the other side of the rack.