My Current Robot

My Current Robot is what I call a dumper robot. It basically has a long arm that is connected to a big shovel that picks up and stores the balls. The arm is on the top something I call the tower which is connected to my drive base. My base has one omni and one grip wheel on each side. An omni wheel is a multi directional wheel so it is easier to turn with it. A grip wheel is a wheel with rubber similar to the wheels on cars. The base has for motors on it (we have a max of 6) to power the driving. I also geared the base so the base has more speed but loses torque (power). The arm is powered by the other two motors and it is geared for torque so it can lift all its load. The field is covered with balls that my robot can either put in the low or high goals. The low goal is on the ground and is just over a small fence every ball there gets you one point. The high goal is a big bucket and ever ball in there is worth three points. My robot gets the balls its collected in the high goal by raising its arm and the balls fall out of the shovel and onto a ramp then into the goal. There is also a ramp on the field and a robot on the ramp gets you ten points. Since my robot is able to climb the ramp and score a lot of balls in the high goal I have qualified for worlds and nationals in April.

Robotics Update

Although I haven't blogged about my robotics competition it is still going on and a lot has happened. I designed a completely new robot that could score way more points for my state competition. The competition started off bad  with the judges telling me my robot was out of the size limit and I could not compete unless a fixed it very quickly. I was trying not to panic because I could fix the issue but then the robot would not make many points. Eventually I was able to find a piece that allowed my robot to stay in bounds and still score lots of points but just barely. After that was the qualifying matches in  which each match your team is paired up with another team and for that match only both teams work together and share the score. After ten matches like this it was time for the final matches. I was doing okay but not that great. For the finals matches the top two current teams get paired up then the next two teams etc. Then each pair has one match and which ever pair scores highest wins, I was in 3rd so I got paired up with the team in 4th who happened to go to the same robotics place that I did. Since we knew each other we had the advantage that we had practiced with each other but the top pair had better robots. In the match my pair did great but we still thought that the other pair could beat us. When it was there turn we thought they had beaten us but when it was actually counted we won 140 to 120. Since I won the state competition I am now qualified for the world event in mid April and I was already qualified for the national event which is in the first week of April. I am now preparing a slightly different robot for nationals and worlds.

Clash Royal

Clash Royal is a mobile game that just came out in America a few days ago. It was created by the same company that created the extremely popular game Clash of Clans. In Clash Royal you build a deck of eight cards consisting of spells such as a rage spell or arrows and/or troops like goblins, minions, giants, or skeletons. All of the cards are grouped into three categories: common, rare, or epic. Generally rare cards are better and harder to find than common and epic are generally better and harder to find than rare. You find cards by opening chests that you get by winning battles or just get for free. After you get the chest you have to wait a certain amount of time for it to open. The amount of time depends on how good the chest is. This is one down side of the game. Since it is free to play the game forces you to wait long periods of time unless you want to spend money. If you have a certain amount of cards you can upgrade them using gold which you also get from chests. In the actual battles them selves your goal is to get the most crowns. First one to three crowns automatically win but if you run out of time the person with the most crowns wins. You get crowns by taking down the opponents towers by attacking them with your spells and troops.You can also use your cards to prevent the opponent from doing the same to you. When you play a card it costs a certain amount of elixir which slowly builds up through the game. All of the cards do different things to games can be very diverse and with different strategies. Clash Royal is extremely addicting and fun to play with friends and anybody can try it.