Looking at most of the pictures and having most of the regionals already been done I have seen very little use of the mobile goals as a game component in this year’s FIRST Frenzy what do you all think of them?
I know our robot is best at the mobile goal. We are able to latch on uncap bring it under the ball drop for anywhere from 1-6 balls, then we bring it over to our HP where he drains all 6 (our 3 and the other team’s) Then we can cap and herd balls to our alliance’s HP for the stationary goal. When all is said and done we are capable of having tons of points (120 has been our highest in a mobile goal during qualifying). However I see other teams and with the mobile goal going untouched with maybe 1 small ball in it if the multiplyer has already been removed and the stationary filled. I dont really think they are being used to their full capabilities
Unless your robot is an amazing ball handler or is specifically designed to drag the Mobile Goal under the ball release, I’d say that the Mobile Goals are most useful for blocking the ball corral.
Our robot is centered around that small goal. we first bring the small goal to our human player, while we are doing that we are uncapping the small goal at the same time.(great communtication between the drivers) the goal hits the wall in front of the human player and we back away with 2X ball in hand. The human player fills the goal with the three balls we get and the three balls our alliance gets and fills it, in the mean time we are herding balls to our human player. Then we cap the small goal. and any 5pt balls left go in the big goal.
And by that time we are out of time. So I guess what i am trying to say is that the small goals are very very important.
I guess this question is quite dependent on what your robot’s strategy is. If you’re a robot like 836 or 303, you obviously view the mobile goal as being rather important. If you’re not a mobile goal handling robot, you obviously think that its best in your opponents ball corral.
I’m only basing this on the one regional I went to. From what I saw they were used more often for blocking the ball corrals. It basically comes down to the teams strategies and capabilities of the robots.
These goals were infinitely valuable in our playoff matches against 177. They had an awesome ball robot and shooter, and we knew if we allowed them to deliver any balls we’d be doomed. Blocking their chutes worked magnificently, unfortunately a penalty in the first match and our partner’s inability to hang in the second doomed us. However, now that you are allowed to push the goals out with balls I don’t know how efficient that stragegy will be.
I dissagree. We came into the game with the idea that we would cap/ decap, and hang. We then realized that by grabbing the 2x ball on the goal with our armwe can drag it wherever we please. We can also push it. We did it close to every qualifier we played @ the two regionals we went to. We do not have a goal hook, were not built to do it, but we still do. We had a 100 pt. goal and hung for 150 pts, by ourself, twice. It seems to be effective. I think the small goals are uber important.
I’m surprised that there don’t seem to be that many bots that can pull the mobile goal. All we need is put a small 2" stroke cylinder that extends to hook onto the mobile goal for us to tow. Blocking the ball corral against a bot that can tow the mobile goal is useless.
But for some teams (like us) wiegh in at 130.0 lbs. And that 2" throw cylinder may be needing an air supply if not already losing a compressor. What I am getting at is some teams would probably like to but, don’t have the weight. For it and it components.