What are the benefits of having Omni-Directional and Traction Wheels on the robot’s drivetrain?
Omni wheels generally are smoother and turn far better, but many teams put a single traction wheel on each side generally because it makes the robot harder to push.
There are a lot of resources on the forum and online that address the benefits of omni-wheels and traction wheels, such as in the Purdue SigBots Wiki.
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Traction wheels make you less vulnerable to getting pushed, but less turning speed, but better control, Omni wheels are meta, they can be pushed over, but have better speed, more turning control, but weak to being pushed (People often put traction wheels between 2 omni wheels to avoid that.)
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Omni wheels allow for smoother turning and strafing and traction wheels allow for higher grip, which is useful to resist other robots pushing yours. A combination of omni wheels and traction wheels is often used, where the front wheels of a four-wheel drivetrain are Omni wheels and the back two are traction wheels. This setup allows for your robot to have the turning advantages of Omni wheels and also the stability and grip of traction wheels to a pretty good extent.
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Omni for turning
Traction for grip
All Omni equals drift and easily pushed from side
All traction equals perfect for going forward and back but horrible for turning
Omnis on outer wheels and tractions on inner equals a comprise.
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