The 2020 competition season has officially started! On Saturday Jan. 4, Team 1816 held a kick-off event to view the 2020 season game launch livestream and begin preparing for the season.
FIRST released the 2020 Game Manual immediately following the game reveal on Saturday to teams worldwide. This year’s challenge, INFINITE RECHARGE, features a few changes from previous years. The autonomous period, where the robot is controlled completely by preprogrammed instructions, didn’t exist in last year’s challenge but will be included in Infinite Recharge.
But an even greater change to this year’s game is that there is no “Bag Day”. Instead of having to stop work on the robot after the six weeks of build time, teams are permitted to modify the robot between competitions. This allows teams more time to iterate and improve on their designs, leading to a higher level of competition.
FIRST describes “INFINITE RECHARGE” in the Game Overview as such:
“In INFINITE RECHARGE, two alliances work to protect FIRST City from approaching asteroids caused by a distant space skirmish. Each Alliance, along with their trusty droids, race to collect and score Power Cells in order to energize their Shield Generator for maximum protection. To activate stages of the Shield Generator, droids manipulate their Control Panels after scoring a specific number of Power Cells. Near the end of the match, droids race to their Rendezvous Point to get their Shield Generator operational in order to protect the city!
During the 15 second Autonomous Period, droids follow pre-programmed instructions. Alliances score points by:
1. Scoring Power Cells in the Power Port
2. Moving from the Initiation Line
In the final 2 minutes and 15 seconds of the match, drivers take control of the droids. Alliances score points by:
1. Continue to score Power Cells in the Power Port
2. Completing Rotation Control
3. Completing Position Control
4. Hanging from the Generator Switch
5. Getting the Generator Switch to the level position
The Alliance with the highest score at the end of the Match wins.”
After watching the game reveal, all team members were given an hour to read through the Game Manual. From there, they split into small groups for brainstorming sessions on strategy and robot design. These sessions lasted through Sunday Jan. 5.
“This year’s game looks really fun,” Andrew G., a rookie on the fabrication subteam, said. “ I’m looking forward to seeing where and how other teams are going to shoot the power cells (game balls) from their robots into the goal.”
This season, “The Green Machine” looks forward to attending two regional competitions: The Lake Superior Regional in Duluth, MN (at the DECC), and the Minnesota North Star Regional in Minneapolis (3M at Mariucci Arena). Follow all the action via our @FIRSTteam1816 Twitter feed!
-Bella B.