2016 Battlecry@WPI
From May 21 to May 22, 2016, Morpheus competed at the 17th Battlecry@WPI in Worcester, Massachusetts. Looking to improve from our fantastic performance at the Championship, we set a goal to get our high goal auto finalized by the end of Battlecry. We tweaked the PID after every match to get the high goal auto functioning better. Although we were working on it over the course of the whole event and almost got it up and running, we didn't get our high goal auto fully completed in time for eliminations. Even though we did not get our high goal auto finished, we performed fantastically in each of our matches. In one of our qualification matches, we scored 10 boulders by ourselves into the high goal! This was a new record for our team. After 78 qualification matches, we had 6 wins and 2 losses, which put us in 7th place out of 60 teams going into alliance selection. During alliance selection, we were chosen by Team 2877 (Ligerbots), the third seeded team. Our random pick was Team 1474 (Masterlink Militia). Only the top eight scoring alliances were admitted into the quarterfinals after alliance selection. In order to be one of the alliances moving on, an alliance was required to score 190 points or above in at least one match of the eighth-finals. During our first match of the eighth-finals, our alliance put up an impressive score of 187 points, but this was not enough to guarantee us a spot in the quarterfinals. In our second match of the eighth-finals, we put up a record high score for us: 212 points! This put us in second place going into the quarterfinals. During both of our matches of the quarterfinals, we scored above 200 points, which moved us into the semifinals. Unfortunately, we were eliminated by Alliance 2, which was led by Team 166 (Chop Shop), after two hard-fought matches of the semifinals. Morpheus had a magnificent time at Battlecry, setting several personal records for our team.
Morpheus Featured in the Concord Monitor Newspaper
Today's issue of the Concord Monitor features an interview with our team about our experiences at the 2016 FIRST Championship last month in St. Louis, Missouri. We also talked about how we solved a perplexing problem pertaining to Goatnado's intake arm at the UNH District Event. You can read the full article on the Concord Monitor's website here.
2016 FIRST Championship - Galileo Subdivision
On April 26, 2016, Morpheus members set out on a quest for the FRC Championship in St. Louis. After a long plane ride and a 5-hour drive, we arrived in St. Louis to compete in the Galileo Subdivision for the title of World Champion. We were blown away by the size of the Dome and pits and had to walk 15 minutes from our pit in order to get into the queue! One highlight of the competition for us was talking with Team 254 (Cheesy Poofs) and Team 1678 (Citrus Circuits), which are two of the teams that we admire most. Once we had unpacked our crate and set up our pit, we were ready to compete with fantastic teams from all over the world! Out of our 10 qualification matches, we won 7. In our final qualification match, we set a personal record of 8 solo high goals! We were thrilled when we ranked 7 out of the 75 teams in our subdivision! This earned us the Highest Rookie Seed award in our subdivision. Performing extremely well during our qualification matches, we ranked high enough to form our own alliance for the elimination matches. For alliance selection, as the Alliance 5 captain, we selected Team 2468 (Team Appreciate) as our first pick for their fantastic breaching and high goal capabilities, Team 1153 (Robo-Rebels) as our second pick for their great breaching and feeding skills, and Team 2907 (Lion Robotics) as our third pick for their shut-down defense power. During our first match of the quarterfinals, we barely lost with an impressive score of 192 points to Alliance 4's score of 194 points. Despite that setback, we were still hopeful to beat Alliance 4, which was led by Team 3539 (Byting Bulldogs), and advance to the semifinals. In our second match, our alliance was on fire. We set another new personal record of 9 solo high goals! Unfortunately, we barely missed a capture (only two robots on the batter), and tied with a score of 175 to 175. Due to tiebreaker rules, we ended up losing that match. Although we had just been eliminated, we were proud of our ability to compete at a world-class level. We had a great time working with 2468, 1153, and 2907 and hope to compete with them in the future. After getting alliance pictures and cleaning out our eliminations pit, we sat down to watch Einstein. Our team cheered on the alliances, and celebrated the World Champions. We had a fantastic time competing with all of the other teams in the Galileo Subdivision and hope to return to the Championship next year! As a rookie team, we had set a goal of competing at the World Championship, and we succeeded! We became an alliance captain, met teams that we admire, formed bonds with other teams, and won an award. Morpheus is proud of our accomplishments from the World Championship!
2016 New England District Championship
From April 13 to April 16, 2016, Morpheus competed at the New England District Championship in Hartford, Connecticut. We enjoyed competing with all of our friends at the District Championship. We are extremely excited to qualify for the World Championship in St. Louis, Missouri, which is two weeks away! At the end of the District Championship, we have 141 District Points, which puts us as the 27th ranked team in New England and the 6th ranked team in New Hampshire!
We Qualified for the 2016 New England District Championship!
At the conclusion of qualification events, Morpheus is ranked 14 in the New England District with 103 Ranking Points and has been invited to participate in the District Championship in Hartford, Connecticut, April 14-16. We look forward to seeing our friends for a great competition.
2016 NE District - UNH Event
We had fun at this event. Team 5813 was ranked 14 after the qualification matches. We were the first pick of the 4th seeded team 4909, Bionics. The third member of the alliance was team 138, Entropy. Our alliance made it to the semifinals and was eliminated by the eventual winning alliance led by our friends on Team 319, Big Bad Bob! We were also excited to receive the Rookie Inspiration Award. The matches from this event can be seen here: New England District - UNH Event.
2016 NE District - WPI Event
This was the first competition for our team and we were delighted to see that our robot and game play was competitive with the other teams participating at WPI. Morpheus was ranked 5 after the qualification rounds and we won the Highest Rookie Seed award for this accomplishment. We also won the Rookie All Star award. We were the first pick of the 2nd seeded team 126, Gael Force, and we gladly accepted. The third member of the alliance was team 2370, iBots. Our alliance made it to the semi-finals and was eliminated by the eventual winning alliance lead by team 839, Rosie Robotics. The matches can be seen here: New England District - WPI Event. Our favorite match was the third semifinal match where our alliance put up a competitive performance even though our captain's robot died with 83 seconds remaining in the game: Semifinal 2-3.
2015 Battle of the Bay
Today was Morpheus' debut as an FRC team. We brought our pre-rookie robot, Totenado, to compete at Team 319's Battle of the Bay in Alton, New Hampshire. During the qualification matches, we ran into a few issues with our robot releasing stacks onto the scoring platform. After observing what was happening, we quickly solved the problem. By the end of qualifications, we were placing at least one five-stack with can in each match and grabbing a can from the Step in Teleop. During Alliance Selection, we were picked by Team 125 (Nutrons) to join Alliance 4. Our random pick selected Team 58 (Riot Crew) to join our alliance. In the quarterfinals, our alliance scored two five-stacks in each match and advanced to the semifinals. Unfortunately, our drive base got stuck in the first semifinal match, and our stack fell over in the second semifinal match. Knowing that we would not advance to the finals, our alliance decided to have fun in our third match. Team 125 tried to make a ten-stack and we decided to make two solo five-stacks. Congratulations to the winners, Team 1519 (Mechanical Mayhem), Team 2648 (Infinite Loop), and Team 213 (The Dirty Birds)! During the award ceremony, we were thrilled to be presented with the Just Because Award! Morpheus had a fantastic time at our first Battle of the Bay! We can't wait to compete in the 2016 FIRST Stronghold challenge! See everyone at Kickoff!