Now that we are over a week into the build season I was wondering what most teams have come up with as the top priority in this year’s game?
Place Keepers
Raise One Robot
Raise Two Robots
Strictly Defensive
our goals for this year . . to make marked improvements over last.
but as for specifics we think that 60 points is a lot of points . .
60 points is the money, thats for sure. our team realized this from the beginning. however, its fairly obvious that 60 points is the money. from polls on these forums and other things ive hears, it sounds like a lot of robots are going for the 60 point bonus. that being said, a robot who raises two othjer bots doesnt really stand out. in the end each alliance is going to have one robot that consistently raises the other 2. this is why we decided to go for the tubes. we figured, being able to manipulate the tubes quickly and effectively, and be able to be lifted by other robots, will make us stand out. having a solid autonomous and great drivers who can place the tubes efficiently can get our alliance a chance at a big row. a row of 5 is 32 points, and that is doable with a good autonomous and solid driving (as well as some defense)
I totally agree.
I also think that the ability to score spoilers will be important. Just imagine three rampbots going up against three ringers. All it takes is a ring of tubes around the rack and bango! that team rakes in 256 points!:ahh:
Suddenly the bonus points don’t look so promising…
Personally I think it’s all in the strategy and a little luck with your alliance partners. Some matches, the bonus may make a difference; other matches, it could be that last-second spoiler. I think a bot that could score tubes well plus being able to lift both partners - that’s who could dominate.
Since we don’t know what game play will actually be like, we decided to set some generic goals. These are listed sort of in priority order, first on the list is higher priority.
Robot will remain upright for the whole match at least 98% of matches.
Robot will remain functional for at least 95% of matches
Score points reliably anywhere on the rack, and be able to move spoilers.
Roughly equal balance of maneuverability and pushing power (scoring/defense)
Lift for 30 pt bonus 50% of the time, lift for more than that 5% of the time
Sounds good in discussion sessions, but getting there is a bit of a challenge!
Let’s start with the easy ones:
-Ship a fully functional, fully coded robot
-Have it tip at most once or twice per regional.
-Have it malfunction at most once or twice per regional.
-Build the really neat control idea we had.
Gamewise:
-Be able to score keepers in autonomous, as well as ringers during the match.
-Be able to pick up ringers from the ground.
-Be able to pick up and move spoilers.
-Be able to climb any ramp we want to.
-Win?
-Guy
We’re planning to stay primaraly defencive this year with the ability to lift other robots up to get the 60 bonus points.
We do plan on attemping a lifting mechanism that will probably only reach the bottom two rows but it’s considered a secondary priority right now. We’re still having problems making wieght in our estimates.
If our Carbon Fiber composite ramps work out well we should have enough extra space to get the arm in under the weight limits. 
Is it off the shelf Carbon Fiber or custom fabbed?
will it fit within cost?
My team is going for the ramp idea to. But i personally think that we as a team would stand out more if alls we do is focus on scoring because then if we became sucessfull at it we would be wanted for alliences and that is what I think we should be going after not some 15-60pts. Because if every1 is going for the 15-60pts then that will ruin the rest of the match because this game is all about strategy and jus having one strategy isn’t effective. Its not that I am against the ramp but in my opinion we should be able to take it off depending on our match partners because flexability is the best advantage a team can have and it would also enhance the game strategy wise. I think that if we also focus on the scoring that that would include the spoilers to because if alls your doing is scoring you got to have some sort of defense and that is where the spoilers would come in to play which just makes the game all the more fun to play.
Well It will be partially custom as we have to vacuum bag and epoxy all the parts ourselves. Our instructor used to make solar powered racing vehicles a few years back with the same material so we shouldn’t have any problems there.
As for cost, we’re still looking for a supplier so we’re getting some mixed prices (Partially thanks to the US military buying out 90% of the stuff!), we believe we have a source that can get us a good price but nothing is final yet.
From what we’ve seen we’re looking at anywhere from $40-$60 per panel and we would use 4 of such panels. It helps cost a lot when you put it together yourself.
we were planning to do an offensive defensive strategy, using spoilers and pushing slightly…
This is a good question.
looking at our build space it appears as though we are finally finishing our build space, also there are various ramp ideas drawn and prototyped in various places.
Tube manipulation is becoming a headache. We would like to try auto for real this year. That means starting with a tube in a legal manipulator (have you noticed that a 30 inch tube is hard to hold from the outside when your robot can only be 28 inches wide?)
I suspect weight will decide what we really do this year. Just like it does every year.
Near as i can tell there are three ways to approach the game, lift robots, lift tubes, play defence. Pick 2 and do them well.
Besides 28" width, you have up to 72" height to work with for an outside tube holder…