You are probably trying for too much this year. (this entire game is a trap)

FIRST
1

If last year was about not doing the trap, this year’s trap is slightly different.

Everything in this game is achievable (see ri3d), and you could probably design a robot to do everything.

Like every game (but especially in this game), it’s about cycle optimization. The cycles are so short that every second you save gives you an extra 1-2 cycles.

Can you do everything in the game in a fully optimized way? Do you have the design, programming, drive practice, fabrication, and logistics resources to do everything in this game and max the capabilities out?

There are 6 different ways to score points, and they all have slightly different ways of approaching it. Can you optimize every single one of those approaches well? They are all doable individually, though.

Are you able to stay in weight, have an insanely low CG, and drive the robot like you stole it?

Many teams will be able to do everything mediocrely, but when was the last time you needed to do everything to be actually competitive?

I don’t think I’m that good of a designer, but even trying to optimize like corral scoring in l1-l3 is already really difficult, and I’m struggling a lot. I don’t think I can manage optimizing everything else, either.

Historically, teams struggled to optimize significantly “simpler” games in terms of execution. I haven’t seen much that would signify there was a massive change.

2024 only had three primary actions (amp, speaker, climb)
2023 had 6 types of scoring which all were approached relatively similarly, but no climb
2022/2021 was launching a ball into a goal and climbing
2019 was hatch/cargo with climb

This year? L1 is more optimally scored horizontally, L2-L3 at an angle, and L4 vertically. These all have different “optimal” ways of approaching the problem.

Algae could be knocked off, then ground intake or picked directly off the reef; you can shoot the algae, place it in the net, or put it in the processor.

Oh, and there’s a climb, too.

If you can optimize every single part of the game? It’s time to win worlds, and this post isn’t for you, I guess.

200 Likes
2

One last thing, just because you made the choice to not pick off the ground doesn’t give you an excuse to do more things. If you can do less, don’t substitute it with something else, just do less.

Worst case? Robot gets done early, you get lots of drive practice, and you can catch up on school, get lots of sleep, and not be stressed for competition.

100 Likes
3

David is an adult now

63 Likes
4

Next post: robots, eh. I prefer long conversations and a good book

67 Likes
5

Thank you for spreading pph :saluting_face:

8 Likes
6

I was going to make basically this same post so I appreciate you saving me the work! This game lends itself to specializing more than most recent games. Teams are terrible at specializing… scope creep is a heck of a drug.

The teams who effectively limit their scope and optimize a few scoring actions will be the top performers. The cool part about this game is that it almost doesn’t matter what skills you pick… there’s room on playoff alliances for a large variety of well executed specialized designs.

35 Likes
7

So what I’m hearing is…

ZomboMeme 08012025123334

68 Likes
8

Hoo boy there is a lot to unpack here.

But allow me to break it down locally (MN here)

Back in 2024 we heard loud and clear that the trap was a trap. However, we found out later that the teams that could trap was a deciding factor in many events - looking at you 6147. In fact many in Mn that could do trap finished quite high in their events. One team that broke the mold on Trap but found their own niche comes to mind is 7028 - they finished on Einstein. They specialized in passing.

Ryan is correct that teams struggle to optimize a singular game play - specializing. But it isn’t that they struggle to optimize, it is a struggle to show WHY their game play is optimal. I will refer you to my team’s 2018 robot that broke the mold and was the best defensive robot BECAUSE it was also one of the best at owning the switches on both sides, deprived the oppositions game pieces, and could fill the exchange in short order. Sitting at 14” tall we could empty the stack in less than 60 seconds. We would then rush over to the opposition and steal all available cubes to deprive the oppositions game pieces at the same time steal their switch. We would then rush back to our side to gain control of our switch. Sadly, this was not recognized by our alliance partners in the playoffs and we would go onto lose in the finals in three matches where we never played. It wasn’t that our partners were wrong, we just were never able to convince them of our unique abilities.

All of that stated - I agree that most teams should concentrate on what they do well. I again refer back to Tonka Bots - seeded #1 at the 2024 MSHSL State Champs and won the event. I believe that they were the first team to Trap three times in a match and won their first event in Duluth and then a number of months later carried us to a state championship.

This game will start slow like all other games. Show what you do well. Specialization may not play out in the long run, but to get to champs you will need to do at least one thing better than most. Once that is accomplished, continue to the next thing that will separate you from the herd.

25 Likes
9

The two Quokka robots this week were designed with two totally different strategic philosophies.

  1. A strong alliance partner,
  2. An exercise in optimising capabilities with two degrees of freedom.

In their current state, #1 can score far better than #2 on their own. But if we had another week, although #2 could score more by itself, #1 would be even better at what it does. So who would an alliance captain pick?

This game is so cool because you don’t have to do everything. I’m almost concerned that too many people will have deep cage climbers, and alliances will suffer from it — especially if you have to compromise your robot design to fit it in.

Edit: Didn’t RTFM

I hope there’s a helpful story there. :slight_smile:

18 Likes
10

In my 4 years of robotics as a student, I don’t believe sleep was ever a priority.

30 Likes
11

Are you worried too many teams will have deep cage climbers because they don’t want to specialize (ex. do everything) or because they believe it is worth it to sacrifice other things for?

12
21 Likes
13

Not only scoring, I think you can very effective defense bot too. The rule seems to be not friendly for defense, but 3 bots in a small area, not to mention potential 9 Algae floating around, even if you bump them in and out would slow them down from either getting coral or scoring it.

1 Like
14

I think many teams will do this because they worry about the potential of a match where none of their alliance partners can climb, so the only way to get the endgame rp is to either foul or for them to deep climb.

Edit: it’s worth noting that 2 shallow climbs + a park will also give you the rp, but most teams don’t want to take that risk imo

3 Likes
15

The second one. More importantly though, if three robots have climbers that can only do Deep Cage, they ‘lost’ the alliance four points each. Therefore, I don’t think shallow cage is as much of a strategic concession as I hear people think it is.

Edit: oops lol

16

How do 3 deep cage climbers lose the alliance 4 points each?

3 Likes
17

doing shallow cage instead of deep cage means you have to hope that one of your alliance partners can also climb in order to get the climb rp, which is a pretty big concession(especially in areas where gameplay is usually at a bit of a lower level).

also the barge rp requirements might go up for DCMP and CMP

4 Likes
18

I definitely expect many poorly built/conceptualized/or otherwise uncompetative deep climbs. However I am interested in how the specific net loss of 4 points per deep climb bot was arrived at as well.

1 Like
19

I don’t know exactly but I’m assuming what was meant by this was that you can only have 2 robots do deep climbs because of the spacing of the cages, so 3 deep cage bots gets 36 points but only 2 can climb so 24 points will be gained, 4 points less for each of the three robots.

20

Poppycock

4 Likes