What have we learned from week 1 ?
Many teams will go for the bridges during autonomous. Almost all teams will be able to balance in one way or another.
It’s not over yet.
- Sunny G.
I’ve learned (from watching streams) that there are a lot of teams that are struggling.
Well, week 1 just ended for my team.
Struggling is the right word. Teams were able to line up their robots perfectly during the build and shoot three balls in, but they didn’t realize that they can’t do that during the matches.
I learned.
(1) Strategy is so big. It’s so big it’s not even funny.
(2) Scoring is…big. It’s bigger than years before because in a lot of cases, the number of points doesn’t seem to climb over 10-15. So if you can score in autonomous and teleop and set yourself up with 15-20 TP points, you’re going to win a lot of matches.
(3) Bridge balancing. Obviously it’s important but teams need to play around with this. There were so many tipped over robots simply because of the lack of communication. You can’t simply do what works for your robot. You have to do what works for both robots.
(4) Scoring from the fender. I knew that scoring from the fender would be important, but the crew at Alamo proved just how valuable. Teams would just get comfy up against the fender and lay in 6-9 points easily. If your team that do that quickly, a match score of 40-50 isn’t hard to achieve.
(5) Finally, three bots balancing is difficult but not impossible.
We managed it 2-3 times in practice, but couldn’t pull it off in a match where it counted.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1452690/430028_2704886434169_1617000725_1863379_1714513763_n.jpg
See everyone in Week3,
- Sunny G.
I would have to say I think coopertition screwed up seeding making all of the alliances leveled.
Making it anybody’s game to win. I see no dominate bots really.
Strategy will be huge this year more than past years.
I am not in favor of the coopertition leveling the alliances It is too much ranking points.
If they made it 1 point then It would be better.
In eliminations, we’re finally seeing fender-scoring robots being defended against, and it matters quite a bit. I’ve been perplexed about the lack of defense on fenderbots for two days.
Exaclty how are they being defending? Preventing? Pushing?
What’s happening is that one team gets a nice 15 point lead, then a robot will break off from scoring to disrupt the other team the entire match.
I’ve been watching match results come in. There’s around a 40-50% chance that if your alliance can double balance, you can win a match. Endgame matters just as much in 2012 quals as 2011 quals. However, if you can’t pick up any points in hybrid or non-endgame teleop in the elims, start packing up.
Park against the fender, push sideways if necessary.
So what are the ways around this for fenderbots?
Find a way to stay still.
In 2006, our team built a system that dropped incredulously high friction pads all around the robot so we couldn’t be touched when we scored. If we were to have kept that subsystem on this year, that would have been something that could help.
As far as I can tell, unless you’ve anticipated it and built a robot to deal with it (a high-traction drive train and a sideways scoring mechanism, for example… or being able to score from both the front and the side of the fender), you’re going to have a hard time dealing with a defensive robot that can prevent you from getting to your scoring position.
I’m sure people more clever/insightful than I am can come up with other solutions, too.
Our bot is not capable of scoring at all… Or even effectively feed:( 
What about scoring…from the side? (into the middle hoops?) 
Yup. 
That works, too – though you’re limited to one side because of your opponent’s alley. (I’d be shocked if there aren’t other strategies/builds that enable fenderbots to circumvent or mitigate defense.)
All I know is front or side, 256 is just rocking those middle hoops like they’re nobody’s business. 
Anyone see a defensive or a feeder bot? From what I have seen, there was only offensive bots.
I would expect no less! 256 is a powerhouse for a reason.
yeah, david team 3325 is defensive.
alamo 1st seed alliance