Hi everyone,
I was curious about what sensors every one has on their robot. Please check all that apply.
The need for many sensors has shrunken now with human interaction. It is simpler to use a time operated autonomous and simply aim you robot in the right direction.
or aim your robot and click a “go” button
thats why we have buttons on our robot 
It may just be my but some how i see that as not right… A TRUE Autonomous should have NO human interaction unless its adding match loads… But the idea of point and go completely loses the sense of accomplishment and that extra skill need for programming…i hope that next year the rules change to counter this new strategy…
I find there is no definition of a “true” autonomous, also aiming your robot in the correct direction and pushing a button seems to be more accurate/precise than using an encoder to program the robot to turn in some direction. This year the is too much of an incentive to not use human interaction.
I actually can’t agree with you there. I don’t know whether or not is it just me, but I would much prefer to use sensors to line up the robot, I find that generally when I do it it misses the goal. I would definitely use sensors, if only I had a gyro…
~George
We actually don’t use human interaction in our in game autonomous modes (occasionally in Interaction depending on the circumstances). We prefer the use of sensors given their precision. Also, the gyro has been incredibly helpful. As have quadrature encoders and a potentiometer as usual.
well, worlds will have an elevated field…
so i guess we’ll see how that turns out for the “human interaction” autonomous’
Oh god. I just realized how annoying match loading is going to become… Perhaps I will find us an extremely tall person to be our coach 
While I do agree that rearranging a robot and letting it go is much “simpler” than using sensors, I do not agree that it is more accurate or efficient. Those teams who are just looking to have a working autonomous that runs each time can easily use the new rule to create a simple program, but those who wish to get the most out of both autonomous and programming skills are going to have to rely on more than just human interaction. I can also say from experience that it is possible to get the sensors to be incredibly accurate, as long as you use sufficient coding to achieve that goal. Also, does anyone know exactly how high the fields are raised?
Cmon Eric. Check the manual before asking questions :p. Given, it doesn’t say exactly, but if I recall correctly, the ones at Worlds were a full 36"
From the Vex Gateway Manual:
Field Height: At many tournaments the playing field will be placed on the floor. Some tournament
organizers may choose to elevate the playing fields by up to 36”. For safety reasons, no drive team
members will be allowed to stand on any sort of object during a match, despite the presence of raised
fields.
In Puerto Rico, all competitions are run with elevated fields. And it’s actually easier for human interaction, as you don’t have to get down on your knees. Now as for placing objects on a robot with the intake raised to 30", it’s a bit more complicated.
I’m not really fond of the new rule to realign, because it just seems a bit too easy. Our entire programming skills routine no longer has turns in it because we can drive the 2’ to the nearest tile and realign the robot in much less time it take for it to turn itself - nevermind trying to get the robot to turn precisely without a gyroscope.
Also, it’s not much of Autonomous mode anymore, if people are doing everything. In some routines (ours), there is a lot of physical, hands-on interaction with the robot. I’m pretty sure it’s not the best idea for us to reach into the field that much, especially with the gates.
I refer to your autonomous method as “robot juggling.” It looks really good, because interaction robots are always in a flat out race for the center goal, you can sneak in and score in the interaction 11.5" one.
One stratagem that has been working quite well in competitions is having simple sensors and just moving the robot instead of having lots of sensors to do basically the same thing. But still, I have seen some good autons. from highly sensorized robots…
Since I frequently build test bed robots rather than actual competition bots, I usually have almost all of the sensors listed on the robots I build.