First Stronghold - Blog Posts

Robots Storm the Castle

After a year of watching robots playing forklift simulator in the FIRST Robotics 2015 game Recycle Rush FIRST has raised the bar with their new game Stronghold. Alliances will work to take over the opposing team’s castle with Medieval flair. Robots must break through opposing alliance’s defenses, launch boulders to weaken the castle, and climb its walls to claim it as there own. A unique aspect of this game is the modularity of the defenses. Outer barriers that the robots will be navigating through can be swapped between matches with the choice of a portcullis (gateway to be lifted up), Cheval de Frise (teeter totter), moat, rampart (opposing steel ramps), drawbridge, Sally Port, rock wall, rough terrain, low bar and platforms. Five of these defenses assigned with obscure french names will be picked before each match. For the first time in FIRST Robotics history there will be audience participation enabling spectators to choose one of the defenses. There are 10,000 different field combinations!

Creativity of Stronghold was manifested from FIRST’s new partnership with Disney Imagineers. They collaborated to carry the season’s Medieval theme through the game’s decorative field pieces and motivating the teams to create a standard, a sort of battle flag. Ample Monty Python and the Holy Grail references were scattered though out the Kick Off broadcast from FIRST Headquarters. I am suspicious that the Stronghold theme was solely conceived for that reason. The trailer like game hint was created to capture interest of folks outside of the FIRST world instead of “in joke” game hints like this. It seems FIRST will continue to release game hints with this a mobile game aesthetic style in future years revealing the years’ theme.

Already most teams have brainstormed a design and a strategy. A group called Ri3D (Robot in Three Days) has already built a fully functional robot. This robot can complete in every aspect of the game proving from my perspective to be worthy of a regional competition win. The idea of building a competitive robot in three days must give rookies teams hope.  Check out Ri3D’s final product: https://youtu.be/Kd1FaSNoDiM

This season my hands are off the robot and on the computer as a project mentor helping students write newspaper articles covering the build season and competition. Check out earlier publications by our group BlueDevil Press and online here.

HOW TO GET INVOLVED

If you are a strategy engineering feel you may enjoy reading the Stronghold game manual:

https://firstfrc.blob.core.windows.net/frc2016manuals/GameManual/2016GameManual-Full-20160112.pdf

Mentor a team or volunteer at a regional event: http://www.firstinspires.org/ways-to-help/volunteer

Find a local robotics team to donate to. Often local teams will have their own website with instructions on how to donate/ where to send a check to: http://www.firstinspires.org/find-local-support

Check out my old robotics team the Duluth East Daredevils: http://www.daredevils2512.org/