I’m also in the cube-only camp for this.
4766 seeded second and captained the winning alliance at Arkansas with a 2DOF + chassis cube-only robot. Even with a kit chassis, this design could easily compete at an entry level. Able to score cubes low, middle, and high.
Substitute Everybot for kitbot. Same result.
Fast forward to next year… Substitute KOPKit of Parts Base Robot for kitbot | Everybot. Same results.
The problem hasn’t changed for better or worse, BUT some teams will opt for the KOPKit of Parts Base Robot because it’s right there. Net positive results.
Now if we can just come up with a catchy name for the KOPKit of Parts Base Robot… too bad Dozer is already a thing.
What do y’all think a vision/other more advanced control system/auto on the Kitbot would or could look like if any?
Speaking of Dozer… will the new KOPKit of Parts bot be featured in the game reveal? It would be really cool to see an animated version of it playing the game.
I doubt it would happen, but if so would probably be a basic $50 Pi + camera + LED ring setup for reflective tape, or a setup without the LED ring for AprilTags.
1561 was pretty amazing at champs
I think cube shooters/pushers were really good this year specifically because there are not enough of them, If the KOP bot can’t do cones the teams that use it will be at a big disadvantage because they are likely to be paired with similar robots for some of their matches.
To be effective, I think the KOP will need to at least score cubes and cones mid.
We’ve had the pleasure of helping to start and mentor 9098, as well as getting to alliance with them at FOPC this year!
Phoenix is a truly incredible bot and we’re excited to see where 2024 leads them!
I think that cube chute robot you designed would be a good candidate here
As a teammate and mentor, I have always wanted to be part of a team that within their goals was to compete. I will say that, this is not fundamental to the goals of every team, and after years of doing this, I get that now. For many teams, fielding a robot is secondary to having an environment where the students can exercise their creativity to try and build something that may or may not function. Not saying I agree with those goals, but I do understand that for a decent chunk of the FRC team population, “competing” really is not high on their priority list.
That being said, there is another group that does want to compete, but views taking a simpler route unfavorably. I have personally witnessed this with the team I mentor where a couple years (2016 & 2019) in particular, the team would not agree to do a simpler solution that could have been exceptional, and instead chose a harder path that ultimately required more than we were able to execute*.
I bring this up as I also see it in industry. Instead of executing a simpler path well, folks stretch to do something more substantial, but ultimately the effort falls flat. I think there is a deeper rooted culture paradigm at work that is much harder to solve than just pointing out the analysis of alternatives.
A silver lining here: I suspect a KOP everybot will force teams to double-down on their mission and vision statement.
IE, if a team chooses a less-effective solution than the KOP bot, and see a bunch of those at competition, someone on the team is going to ask “why”.
And then, either there will be a solid answer that jives with everyone on the team… or the team gets to revisit their core values 
. The excuses like “well they were built by mentors” or “well they just know more than us” are gone.
Also to throw another answer out there:
Crazy simple, expertly driven, and could run circles around teams with 10x the complexity.
2713s collective favorite robot of the year:
My vote would be something similar to the REV ION Starter Bot.
I think a solution like this to introduce teams to FRC - level manufacturing, wiring, assembly, and software would do wonders for low-resource teams.
Bold choice. That scoring kit is about $1600. It would be interesting to see the target price point for this new kit design. They have already stated that you will need to buy some materials from the hardware store. I’m expecting a more modest design.
David
With just the ability to do cubes low and mid, there are 12 scoring locations open. Only the most elite teams could score that many pieces on their own. The middle of the pack was in the 4-6 game piece range, so a theoretical alliance with three kitbots with cube-only, low and mid only ability could max out their available scoring locations, but I don’t think that will occur frequently enough to scope up the design. Having to manipulate cones as well, especially for mid level scoring, is a significant complexity add.
I think the main issue (my team encountered this during competition) was that if your alliance can only score cubes you can’t get the links RP
This is true, but for a starter bot, I don’t think guaranteeing 4RP every match is or should be within the scope of the strategic goals for the design. Keep it simple, easy, fast, and relatively cheap to build; let teams design their own upgrades as they see fit.
It doesn’t make sense for the first year this is deployed, but in future years it could be cool if there were several ‘complexity/capability upgrades’ for a starter-level robot. Ex. for the hypothetical 2023 robot – adding a swerve drive, adapting a ground gripper to a cube shooter (with code examples), etc. Basically IKEA/LEGO-like instructions to add on feature sets that aren’t included in the default kit. Would help with educating teams that don’t know where to start how they could adjust their KOP robot. You could potentially give the vendors advanced knowledge of the robot/game so they could pre-develop specific upgrade product offerings.
But, if the KitBot+ were a decent cubes-only robot, that would make building a cone-only robot far more competitive for teams at the level where they can do either game piece well but would struggle with both, because you COULD count on there being a cube-capable robot in most matches.
[or swap cones for cubes and cubes for cones; same argument applies]
