Never enough 7/16th Wrenches

The 2007 Game - Rack n' Roll

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Our 2007 season presented team 694 with a multitude of obstacles on top of the already difficult challenge that year. However, even these grave threats were not enough to dissuade us from advancing all the way to the finals of the NYC Regional Tournament.

The Field and Scoring

The Rack 'n' Roll field consisted of a rectangular arena, with player stations at both ends and a single dominating feature in the middle of the field: The Rack.

The Rack

The Rack is an octagonal framework made of metal pipe ten feet high and eight feet in diameter, and from this framework hang three spider legs on chains, which extend all the way to the floor. These spider legs are disks of polycarbonate from which eight PVC legs extend. The chains allow the spider legs to move within the framework and the end result is a stack of three spider legs suspended on top of each other. At the top of The Rack is a platform with four light emitting targets, located at ninety degree intervals directly above the PVC legs of the spider legs.

Scoring

The twenty four PVC legs of The Rack serve as the scoring legs on which the pool rings are scored on. In the Rack 'n' Roll game, there are three types of pool rings: ringers, keepers, and spoilers. Ringers are pool rings made of translucent red or blue plastic with no other identifying features, and each alliance starts with eighteen ringers of their color. Keepers are similar to ringers, with the addition of a white band on the outer circumference of the ring and can only be scored during autonomous period, coming three to an alliance. Spoilers are made of opaque black plastic and each alliance starts with two. Points are awarded to each alliances based on the vertical and horizontal rows of PVC legs that are identified as being "red" or "blue" legs. Whether a leg is red or blue is a matter of the combination of different types of pool rings on each leg.

When the match is over, the horizontal and vertical rows of "red" and "blue" legs are scored depending upon their lengths. A single leg earns two points, a row of two scores four points, a row of three scores eight points, four scores sixteen, five scores thirty-two, etc. The longest a row can be is eight legs long.

The Alliance System

During each match, two alliances face off against each other. Each alliance, red and blue, are made up of three robots from three teams, who work together to score rows.

The Match

The Match consists of two periods, the Autonomous and Teleoperated periods, which add up to a total of two minutes and fifteen seconds.

The Autonomous period, which lasts fifteen seconds, is a period of time during which the robots of each alliance can only be directed by their sensor inputs and internal programming. At the start of this period, each robot is given a Keeper, which can only be scored during this period. Normal Ringers are also present during this period. At the end of this period, the player stations are activated and the Teleoperated period begins.

The Teleoperated period is a two minute period during which the robot is under the control of its drivers. During this period, robots may score using the Ringers but not using the Keepers they were given at the beginning of the match. In addition, during the final fifteen seconds of this period, known as the "End Game," robots of each alliance were not allowed into the Alliance Home Zone of the other Alliance, allowing the robots of the Alliance to score extra bonus points by having, at the end of the match, robots of the Alliance supported one foot off the ground by fellow Alliance members.