My students were exploring scoring scenarios and this one came up. I wouldn’t suggest it, but it might get made.
What would you score this? I got 65, but I could see a couple different possibilities.
I would give this 2 “Stacks in Matching Goal and/or Connected to Beam” for another 10 points. Thanks for this question. In addition to being a coach, I often act as a referee for our local robotics club events and I want to see all the possible combinations people are coming up with. The latest VEX rulebook update included a whole set of scoring scenarios from an Asian event sponsor that were super useful - the section on inverted pin stacks not “nesting”, and therefore not scoring the expected points with beams lying on the playing field changed my team’s approach to the game. They were going to invert 2-pin stacks and put them on the beam while not worrying about manipulating the beam and just concentrating on stacks. The VEX rulebook clearly states that stacks in the configuration don’t sit flush on the beam and therefore are not considered “nested”, and therefore don’t qualify for all the bonus points. I had hoped this would encourage more creativity around manipulating the beam but instead the team decided the “beam is stupid” and are just focusing on pin stacks. Here is the link with a lot of great questions from the Hong Kong event partner (kudos to them).
https://www.robotevents.com/VIQRC/2025-2026/QA/2664
It is very unlikely that something similar will happen, I really doubt it can be done, in addition to mentioning that the stacks must be up to 3, with the bean connected the right base would already have 4 stacked objects which is not correct.
I think that the beam might not count as being connected to either the standoff goal or the pins because it might be at a slight angle in which neither would end up being “fully nested” (see SE4) but if they are then the top stack shouldn’t be connected to the standoff goal, because to be connected to the standoff goal a stack has to either be fully nested with the standoff goal, or connected by a beam to a stack that is connected to the standoff goal, because there’s no stack that’s on the standoff goal the beam would wouldn’t be connected to the standoff goal and the top pin stack also wouldn’t meaning that this just gets counted as two 3 stacks connected to a beam, 5 pins, 1 beam, and 2 matching stacks, which is still 65, although the criteria for the standoff goal is only in with the matching goal and there’s actually no rule specifying the criteria for the standoff goal bonus in the manual