On Saturday, February 28, the Tsunami Zone robotics team set off for Liberty High School to compete in the Oregon Championship of the Decode FIRST Tech Challenge! We are placed 26th in Oregon out of 150 teams. This is pretty good, but we are also going against some of the best teams in the state, which is an extra challenge for our team! We were very excited to go to this event and did a lot of preparation (even washing the minibus that we took!).
We spent a good portion of Saturday practicing for the judges session (and then actually doing the judging session, of course). They seemed to be really interested in our season and had a lot of good questions, and they continued to come by to ask us questions over the rest of the weekend, too.
On Saturday afternoon there were 12 Qualification Matches. Our first match was Qualification Match #5. We were allied with a team called Mostly Operational, and our opponents were Eagle Tech and The Apex. Our autonomous system successfully fired 8 artifacts. In teleop our shooting was pretty good as well! We won this match 138-100.
Our second match was Qualification Match #10. Our ally was a team called Scorpio, and we were playing against EMP and Error Code. Our autonomous system shot 6 artifacts, successfully landing 5 in the goal. Error Code unfortunately broke down for the second half of the match. EMP pushed our alliance around for a good portion of the match (a popular defensive tactic). Our robot’s lifting system worked, and we won this match 103-74!
On Sunday morning, our third match was Qualification #15. We were playing on a team with the Cougarbots, and playing against Lightning and the Capybearings. We successfully fired 4 artifacts during the autonomous period. Lightning also had a lifting system like us, but they had two legs instead of three. This was actually a really rough match because of how much everyone was getting pushed around the field. During parking our robot began to park but then took a graceful swan dive while we were lifting. The other alliance won this match 60-117.
Our next match was Qualification #23. We were playing with a team called Aurora and playing against Tech Tite and Rock Robots. Our autonomous successfully fired and landed 4 artifacts. We did not lift this round because of the fact that the round before our robot had toppled over. We lost this round at a very close 102-100. We did a lot in this round that made it so close. For example, our long-distance shooting was really good this round, which is a really good thing because a lot of teams don’t have long-distance shooting, so if we are able to successfully shoot multiple artifacts from a long distance, that means that we will get a lot more points!
Our fifth match was Qualification #25. We were teamed up with Lightning and played against the Cybernetic Elks and ReVamped Robotics (from our league!). Our alliance partner Lightning also had a lifting system, and we had decided that Lightning should lift this time. Our autonomous fired 5 artifacts and successfully landed 3. The Cybernetic Elks and ReVamped Robotics didn’t push around our alliance as much as some other teams have in the past. (In this season, we have decided not to be a team that pushes other teams around, because we have seen how difficult it is to fire while being pushed out of the way, and we have seen how much damage that can cause the robot.) Lightning successfully lifted, but we did not get full parking points. We lost this match 115-312. This is actually a really good score, but we were going against two really good teams, and by the end of the day these two teams even advanced to worlds!
Our sixth and final match was Qualification #31. We were playing on a team with Leo and were playing against Technical Difficulties and Rivets. Our autonomous fired 2 balls and 1 successfully landed in the goal. For most of the match, one of our opponents, the Rivets, spent most of their time pushing us across the field while we were trying to score. This was a problem for us because it stopped us from getting as many patterns which count for a lot of points. We still, despite the other team playing a lot of defense, won this match 60-75.
By the end of the matches, our robot had a lot of battle scars due to being pushed around the field and from a few swan dives from above the field. This probably contributed to some of our troubles in later rounds because it could have affected some of the sensors.
We unfortunately were not selected for an alliance for playoff matches, so most of our team headed home so we could get back to the school earlier in the evening. However, a few people stayed behind to watch the playoff matches and see if we got any awards.
We won the 3rd place Sustain Award! This award means that our team has a good plan for recruiting new members and we do well when it comes to planning for long-term success. (Paraphrased from game manual) The 2nd Place Sustain Award went to Chronobreak from McMinnville High School, and 1st place went to DWAI from Lincoln High School.
Our regular season is over, but we still have our robotics bootcamp coming up this month to recruit new students. Our team is so happy to participate in FIRST Tech Challenge, and we are excited to see what next year’s challenge has in store!
Thank you so, so much to everyone who has supported us throughout this year, including but not limited to:
Our sponsors:
Eugene Schmuck Foundation
Mudd Nick Foundation
Tillamook County Creamery Association
Our coaches and mentors:
David Hummel Sr.
Evan Solley
Kathryn Harmon
James Johansen
And thank you to our awesome Neah-Kah-Nie School District!
By Norah R, notes by Levko T
