The Nanites like the HTK FIRST LEGO League International Open. The organizers did a good job in communicating almost every aspect that we need to pay attention to before and during the tournament. Their scoring system for the entire event seems reasonably fair too. Our team did not win any trophy but they were happy to be in the 12th place overall. We had very strong competition within our bracket in our strengths, e.g. team work and programming, so we did not get call backs. We were happy that Brothers Keepers (also in our bracket) got the call back as we bonded with them right from day 1. We also made good friends with other teams such as Some Assembly Required. We were fortunate to be in the same alliance with these two teams, along with Roboloco from Columbia. We did well enough as an alliance to be placed third (out of 16) in that event. We really like the concept of the alliance event and perhaps we can try a mini version of that in Oregon?
The kids visited all other teams and shared our brochures and collected giveaways from them. They played together with many other teams. They had so much fun that sometimes they forgot to come back to practice. I guess that is the spirit of the tournament - have fun and enjoy! Many teams visited us and took photos with us too.
The judges for research, team work and robot design were all very friendly and encouraging. Many teams were very friendly and showed the spirit of FIRST as well. It is indeed a very friendly competition as teams are helping each other. For example, Some Assembly Required offered us parts that we did not bring along.
As for our own team, the only low point is our robot did not perform there, The robot used to score about 390 points failed to score above 300 points in the tournament. Thus the kids have a good lesson.
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