So far this season we’ve seen a large variety of designs and robot styles. There seems to be side rollers with a tilting tray, a dr4b that can grab stacks of 3 or 4 cubes, and reverse stackers, that intake cubes from the bottom and create large internal stacks. (Like 81k or vortex ri3d)
Are there other types of robots? Which type do you think is most effective? Which design do you think will prevail at early season tournaments? What about late season? Do you think design convergence will be a problem this season? Basically I want to hear all your thoughts on all of the robot designs.
I think a cascade lift or rd4b with a roller intake would be best, kind of like the “goofy” robot, but mounted on a rd4b. Accomplishes the same thing, I just dont want to make it a RIP off
Imo lifts will fade out as the season progresses. I predict rollers and tall claws early season, with reverse stackers and rollers late season. Intake speed seems to be the most important and rollers seem to dominate that field, but, rollers also seem like they might have a bad time with towers.
If you use an intake like 3018 had in round up on a dr4b, you would end up with the speed of a roller intake, tower capability of a lift, and the capacity of a reverse stacker, albeit the lift would take slightly longer to score cubes than the reverse stacker and would have a slightly smaller capacity.
Easier set than done tbh. I don’t think dr4bs are practical. In theory you shouldn’t have to lift above the height of the towers, excluding the central tower, imo not worth it, because the ideal robot would never have to even use a lift when stacking. I honestly think side rollers with an external tower lift is the best option. I even came up with the most genius and innovative passive intake ever seen so you could do towers on one motor.
Prepare to be amazed by the ingenuity and complexity of this mechanical marvel
I disagree that the ideal robot shouldn’t need a lift. By late season when all 66 cubes are veing scored each match, if you can only stack 18-21 then you are at a disadvantage. Also, in early season, if your alliance partner were to place one or two cubes in a goal zone during auton or before you get there in driver control, you would have to waste time dragging those cubes out of the zone so you can place your stack, whereas if you had a lift, you could easily stack on top of them.
I’m pretty sure the skills champions will usually end up as a reverse stacker because of their ability to create medium stacks quickly, and still scoring in the towers. Lift robots will probably end up as a strong competitor because of their ability to stack onto preexistent stacks and likely be able to create way taller stacks.
I didn’t say no lift, just not a high lift. if you have to lift high to make a stack that you could be creating from the bottom, your doing something inefficiently. you do still need a lift of some sorts if you want to score towers though.
In late season, you won’t be able to create stacks only from the bottom, because doing that with 12 cubes at once is impractical and if you can only stack seven high (what we’ve seen as of now), then you are at a disadvantage. Lets say your intake holds six and you want to stack that on a preexisting stack of six +2 in the case of cubes being already in the zones. You would still have to lift over 44in to accomplish that, so I think its best to intake two or three groups of cubes from the ground and stack them on top of each other in the goal zones.
Are you gonna have a 3-stage passive deploy? 10 in one stack without a lift seems impossible otherwise. Do you have plans if there are already cubes in your zone when you go to stack?
Maybe…
I plan on just intaking any stacks that aren’t tall enough to leave. I’ll make sure not to have any such stacks made though. If my partner can’t make tall stacks I’ll have them just make one stack in the unprotected goal zone.
I think it’s too early to tell what shape the robots will take. We haven’t even had one official competition yet to speculate about designs. After all, this is a game of strategy, not just brute cube stacking.
