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.
<G16> "Strategies with mechanisms that react against multiple sides of a Field Element in an effort to latch or clamp onto said Field Element are prohibited" "The intent of this rule is to prevent Teams from both unintentionally damaging the field and / or from anchoring themselves to the field."
Q: When a robot/mechanism reacts against only 1 side of a Field Element can this ever be considered anchoring?
It is impossible to give a blanket answer to this question that would address all hypothetical Robot designs and mechanisms.
Please see this related Q&A for additional "thought experiments" that can be used to determine whether a Robot has "anchored" to the field or not:
https://www.robotevents.com/VRC/2021-2022/QA/845
And this Q&A, which expands on why is difficult to objectively answer questions involving edge-case G16 calls:
https://www.robotevents.com/VRC/2021-2022/QA/919
If you would like a blanket clarification regarding a specific mechanism, please feel free to rephrase and re-post with a diagram or photo.