Thoughts? Our team has been arguing about this as our climber is far behind everything else on our robot. We are also pretty close on weight, so getting rid of the climber would give us some much needed wiggle room and also free up some time for us to practice and test with what we have. Based on my own analysis, it seems the most teams will TRY to climb and fail at doing so. With the lack of a playoff bonus for a triple climb leads me to believe that there is a place in an alliance for robots who don’t climb. My personal belief is that we need to take a step back and make the hard decision to not climb. What do you guys think?
Can you take the climber off while you finish it after bag day, then add it back using withholding allowance?
I agree, especially because of the presence of the Levitate power up. It shouldn’t be hard for the one levitated bot to score on one or more opponent controlled Switches or the Scale. This would net the same climbing points + 20(ish) points for the extra controlling seconds. I would just be careful during alliance selections that your alliance doesn’t get stuck with two non-climbers.
If its a weight decision, ditch the climber and better cube handling
Remember that each climb is 30 points, so even if there is no bonus for all bots climbing it is still 90 points (which can definitely decide the winner in close matches). I agree that levitate makes a viable reason for not having a climber, but if you are on an alliance with another non-climbing bot, you forfeit 30 points even if your alliance gets levitate. Ultimately the decision is up to what works best for your team, but these points may be worth considering.
I’ve seen a lot of climb help designs (Ramps/Lifts) on a lot of teams at Week 0. Not climbing is absolutely a viable strategy if your drivetrain is compatible with a variety of Ramps/Lifts, especially if not climbing allows for you to improve your cube abilities.
I think my favorite quote I’ve heard this year is “climbing is selfish.”
I’m a firm believer that climbing itself is a bit of a red herring this year. Very few teams will successfully climb while not blocking alliance partners from also climbing.
Finding a way to bring your alliance partners up is vital if you’re looking at climbs. If you don’t already have that figured out, you’re not giving away too much by not going after the climb.
There are a few ways that climbing can not impede your fellow alliance members, but they are potentially complicated. One option is to not use rung to climb, but instead to latch on to the sides holding the rung. This could allow room for another robot to climb using the rung. While the sentiment that climbing is selfish may hold true in many instances, it does not necessarily apply to all climbs.
there really are some possible positive scenarios even if you cannot climb:
- you are on an alliance with a ramp/lift (assuming your drive train is compatible)
- you are on an alliance with a single lifting bot or two climbing bots (that are compatible with each other) and you can take advantage of Levitate
you do still have negative scenarios:
- your alliance has only one climbing bot that cannot lift another, and you sacrifice that third climb
- no one in the alliance can climb and your only option is one single Levitate.
i guess the threats come down to unlucky alliances in qualifications as well as bad, incompatible eliminations alliances due to either bad scouting or lack of luck… but maybe scrapping a climb is a good choice. it removes some of your weight and gives you time to continue to improve the rest of your bot. perhaps if you have a great cube manipulator, you can sacrifice those climbing points and do really, really well with the switches, scale, and powerups…
there is nothing wrong with sacrificing the climb as long as it can be justified