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The Q&A is closed for the 2021-2022 season. Any rule changes or clarifications pertaining to the 2022 VEX Robotics World Championship will be included in the April 5 Game Manual Update. Teams attending VEX Worlds who wish to pre-submit questions for the driver's meeting should have received a contact form via email; if not, please contact your REC Foundation Team Engagement Manager for more information.

Official Q&A: VRC 2021-2022: Tipping Point

Usage Guidelines All Questions

815: <SG3> Clarification of "Interference"

Nathan Allen (Event Partner)
9-Jul-2021

In the evaluation of SG3 the manual states the following:

A Robot which interferes with gameplay as a result of violating this rule, such as preventing a Platform from becoming Balanced, will result in a Disqualification, whether the interference was Match Affecting or not.

Additionally, in the definition for "Balanced", the following note was added in the latest manual update:

As stated in rule <SG3>, a Platform which is being contacted by an opposing Alliance Robot at the end of a Match is automatically results in a Disqualification for the opposing Robot and / or Alliance, regardless of the above criteria.

This raises the question of what counts as "interference" in the context of SG3? The new note implies that any contact with the platform constitutes interference, regardless of whether the Platform would otherwise be in a Balanced state. Is this correct? And does this assumption apply to all points of the match or only at the end of the match?

For example, if a red robot contacts the blue Platform in the last 30 seconds of the match while both blue robots are nowhere near the Platform and then is no longer contacting the Platform when either of the blue robots get near the platform, would this be considered a violation of SG3 and a DQ for the red robot?

SG3  
Answered by committee

In the Game Manual v1.1 update, the final paragraphs of rule SG3 were updated to read as follows:

Violations of this rule which do not interfere with gameplay, such as bumping into the Platform and then driving away, will result in the opposing Alliance receiving credit for one additional Elevated Robot at the end of the Match. (Alliances may still only receive points for a maximum of two Elevated Robots).

Violations of this rule which do interfere with gameplay, such as preventing a Platform from becoming Balanced, will result in a Disqualification, whether the interference was Match Affecting or not.

With this in mind, to answer your question:

For example, if a red robot contacts the blue Platform in the last 30 seconds of the match while both blue robots are nowhere near the Platform and then is no longer contacting the Platform when either of the blue robots get near the platform, would this be considered a violation of SG3 and a DQ for the red robot?

This would be considered a violation which does not interfere with gameplay. Therefore, the blue alliance would receive credit for one additional Elevated Robot at the end of the Match.