Hello, as you may know, our robot for gateway had the feature of being able to cap the 30" goals with a ball and a barrel quickly and reliably. Unfortunately, at worlds, robots we played against always played defense on the center goal, and there was never a good opportunity to use it later in the game. I expected this to some degree but it was still somewhat disappointing. (At worlds we modified our interaction autonomous to cover the high goal for 5 seconds, back up, score low, and head towards either the other low goal or the high.)
However, the strategies that I had worked out to work with this ability still applied to the game and performed admirably. The first strategy was called “Step 5: Win.” It was pretty much the same as the strategy that most teams ended up using, but with capping. First we would cap the center in autonomous and claim the low goal. Then we would score all of the available space and begin passing to our partner. Although the capping didn’t pan out, at worlds we passed or were passed to every match that we played.
The other strategy that I developed was a counter to this strategy. I designed it when the passing strategy was becoming popular, because I wanted a way to beat it, not just tie it. This strategy was codenamed “Sneaky Ninja,” and we used it in at least two matches. It involved starting in interaction and blocking the high goal, scoring low, and trying to get back in for high. then we would block the opponent from passing until they grew impatient and lifted the gate. At this point we would rush into their isolation zone and cap their high goal, which if they were using the standard strategy of filling center goals first, would not have much in it. This also worked without capping, because if each high goal is doubled any objects in it create a substantial point swing. Even if the opponent does not raise their gate, they will have to at thirty seconds, at which point we can still conduct the cap.
Strategy was definitely useful at worlds, and we would not have gotten as far as we did without it. Every team on our alliance (8th seed technology) was extremely strategy-smart, and we used this to our advantage in every match. When we lost, it was extremely close and came down to last minute drops and descores because our opponents, 1973D, 2D, and 10B, were strategy minded as well. It was an amazing experience and well played on both sides. I hope to see you all at worlds next year! Moral of the story: never forget strategy.