Hello, my team has a pushbot, we can’t launch or do anything with the high goals, but we do have good expansion and can roll the rollers. Does anyone have any tips for strategies against better launching bots for a UIL comp? We really have no strategy right now, just a good driver.
6865Z
What you are describing isn’t a pushbot. Don’t let that get in your head! Control all the rollers and expand, but mostly play defense. If a team is shooting, ram them! If they are shooting in against the low goal barrier, ram them and get them stuck on it! This video goes over some good defensive techniques- have your driver study it! FRAUD Refs Deny Defensive GOD | BC Szn Opener 10012W 10012P vs 6408N 1010X | VEX Spin up Commentary - YouTube
Just go and have fun, meet some new teams, talk about robot designs, maybe win if you can. But mostly just go to enjoy the experience and have a good time.
Being a good driver >> having a good robot
With that being said, of course you will be limited. If I was in your situation I would just control all the rollers the entire match. I dont know how good your region is / what robots your going up against, or even how good your robot is (how fast, are the rollers consistent, how much time are you spending at one roller … etc), but if its all you can do, just keep control of the rollers and do the best you can
try to play defensive against your opponents if your alliance partner is an offensive robot, and try to prioritize the rollers and try to use traps during endgame
A potential strategy that I have seen work well is to use the match loads and push them into the low goal.
So I would say for the first minute of the match or so, just push as many discs as possible into the low goal. Then around 45 seconds go fight for rollers until 10-15 seconds are left.
Then you will want to fight to get in position for endgame. Fire around 5 seconds to make sure it isn’t early expansion.
Firts build a robot that can do high disc because they are such a big source of points. But if your dead set on keeping a push bot jeres what i would do. First build a wedge so that you can more easy push opponents around the feild. This could also allow you to push your opponents up onto the barrier or pile of disc to try and get them stuck so that it b3comes a 2v1. Then its just pkaying hard dwfense. Sit around your low goal, thier high goal, and everytime a bot comes up to fire a volley nock then off target. Another strategy would to just follow around the better of the 2 shooters and keep them away from their hogh goal and prevent them from intaking ect… against cata robots bumping their ro ot right as they fire will result in them missing all 3 diwc so against alliances with 2 cata bots stayi g in yhe low goal and tapoing them everytime they come to shoot is extremely effective. Against flywheels the 2cnd strategy is provably a little better. For great examples of defens8ve driving watch 515rs kalahari finals matches and jackson areas wpi finals match. I would alsol consider adding an expansion blocker so that your not just canceling out thwir expqndio. With yours but you can instead block it giving your alliance most of all the expansion points. And make sure you own rollers otherwise the high disc point difference will kill you. I can tell you from expirience i have won matches agai s pushbots purley because i had high disc and they didnt even though thay had almoat all rollers and mot expansion.
Jackson wpi:
515r kalahari:
Play defense against other teams that can shoot.
The most effective way to do this imo is hit and pin teams near the low goal that line up to shoot.
Also make sure that you have the rollers in the corner you are planning on expanding at.
By playing good defense, obtaining most of the rollers, and having a good expansion, you will be able to beat most of the teams in your region and rank pretty high.
I’d suggest if you don’t already have 6 motor drive, then go for 6 motor drive. I’d suggest during matches you play defense against robots that are shooting until the last 30 seconds, and in that last 30 seconds, you should go for the rollers and defend 2 rollers then launch endgame. For skills, I’d put down match loads, seeing as you get 14 of them, and 2 preloads, so that’s 16 points, then get the 4 rollers, and do endgame. If you have any questions feel free to respond.
Hello!
I have a pushbot as well, and I have found some amazing strategies to use, my favorite being the expansion strategy. If your bot is pretty large, you can pin an opposing team with expansion against the wall in the last 10 seconds of the match. If you pin them right, their expansion should face outwards towards the wall. If they launch it, it will either bounce off of the wall or go over the wall, depending on how close they are pinned to it, resulting in less expansion points and a DQ if they launch out of the field.
Hope this helps!
IMO heavy persistent defense and roller play is the way to go if you cannot add a high goal scoring mechanism in time for UIL. While BCUZ did not win most of our matches at Kalahari we were able to use our defense to keep teams within ~60 points of ourselves and under ~110 points (with some of the teams scoring in the high 100s for the rest of their matches). We added side skirts and wedges the day of the competition and they allowed us to play effective defense.
If you can, a defensive endgame mechanism such as a blocker (like 2011D or 9364C) would be a nice addition to round out your robot (does not need to use pneumatics- can use a motor to “activate” the mechanism causing it to flip out via elastics or to mov it itself). This would allow you to still expand but negate any expansion points from your opponents.
If you cannot add it for any reason, I would practice defensive positioning during endgame to ensure your opponents won’t expand (either due to how they are positioned during endgame or because you are pushing them around the field).
Texas region 3 and we’re going to uil 5A on the 11th of Feb.
Y’all did really well last weekend at the Lamar Tournament! I would add that expansion blocker that you were talking about because that could really shut down some teams with good expansions. If there is anyone from your org willing to practice with you, if you can practice defending the two rollers in a corner to simulate the end of a match. Also being able to fix the rollers very quickly in the middle of a match would be beneficial. Just keeping on driver practice as much as you can would be my advice. I wish y’all luck at UIL!
-20002Y
Yeah good job as well to you on Tournament champ.! We are currently practicing with my brothers team, 6865D; and I am working on expansion blocker as we speak. Good luck at state and UIL
-6865Z
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