View Full Version : The Aerial Assist Playbook
Hey guys! Chandler from Team 3556 here, and I would like to show you all our very first app now available on the app store. The app takes into account the 35 possible Alliance combinations and gives you the best point-maximizing play for the game. Be sure to rate, comment, and share with everyone. Feedback would be much appreciated to!
P.S. The app is only available for android devices currently, all you have to do is scan the qr code below to get it!
Update: the QR code is now a good-size for scanning.
https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/t1/1796705_10202515751827468_1740390912_n.jpg
Would you mind including a normal link? For one thing, that QR code is too big for my browser window, and I'm sure I'm not the only one...
I'd also like to hear about your algorithm for choosing the "best" play for the alliance combinations. Are you guys using OPR? Scouting? Magic?
Woah! Didn't even notice that, sorry about that. Here's a regular link. I'll work on resizing the QR code and put it in my signature.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=appinventor.ai_trantheiros1.FRC__2014Pl aybook
Also, if you just look up FRC on the Google Play store, it should come up. It's name is "2014 FRC Playbook".
Ervin, as much as I would love to say we were using magic, the only magic here is a little bit of coding and working together. We figured out that we have a few different types of robots, an "All" robot, "Shooting" robot, "Catching" robot, "Pushing" robot, and a scenario which exists if no robot is on the field for the match. More information on what each robot class is is detailed in the app on the about page, and there are a few assumptions made, such as a shooting robot should be able to pass the ball over the truss.
After we defined what each robot type was, we sat down and figured out "how to make the best, most-point-maximizing" play for each scenario, which would of course be a 3-assist over-the-truss pass and high goal shot. We do not account for defense in our app (we had a very limited time to finish this as our competition is next week). In our app, you simply just choose what each alliance partner is capable of and it will generate your play, which one of our members drew in AutoCAD.
alexander.h
07-03-2014, 19:35
I don't have a cell. Could you make a version that could be usable by people like me (an online version, for example)?
IronicDeadBird
07-03-2014, 19:40
Pretty nice App. Any reason why you didn't include human interactions outside of bringing the ball into play?
Alexander, we currently have no plans to make an online version of our app, like I said, we had a very limited time to do this and it's our first attempt at app-building. We do, however, have plans to put our resources for various things (like coding) in a public dropbox folder for everyone to enjoy. I'll see if we can't get all the images from the playbook in there for you and others to see!
Do you have a mentor on your team, or fellow teammate who could download it in the meantime? It works on everything android, from phones to tablets.
IronicDeadBird, thank you! I believe we didn't add human interaction beside bringing the ball into play because it didnt fit into our "point-maximizing" scenario. Don't quote me on that though, I'll talk to our play-master tomorrow and get more information on it.
IronicDeadBird
07-03-2014, 19:46
IronicDeadBird, thank you! I believe we didn't add human interaction beside bringing the ball into play because it didnt fit into our "point-maximizing" scenario. Don't quote me on that though, I'll talk to our play-master tomorrow and get more information on it.
What wasn't included was having a robot shoot over the truss into a human player. I was curious to see if you had done math on this and chosen not to include it because of the math or if it just wasn't thought of during development.
alexander.h
07-03-2014, 19:47
Alexander, we currently have no plans to make an online version of our app, like I said, we through this all together in about 2 days and it's our first attempt at app-building. We do, however, have plans to put our resources for various things (like coding) in a public dropbox folder for everyone to enjoy. I'll see if we can't get all the images from the playbook in there for you and others to see!
Do you have a mentor on your team, or fellow teammate who could download it in the meantime? It works on everything android, from phones to tablets.
Thanks! I'm looking forward to seeing some pics! No, there's no one around me right now who has a cellphone (and even if there was someone with a phone nearby, most people have iPhones anyways!)
IronDeadBird, just talked to another mentor who was very involved on this. We did discuss it because that very well is a possibility, but we did make the assumption that every robot is a "push" robot, as it can push the ball around, and we figured that a pass over the truss to a push robot is just as easy to accomplish (if not easier) than a pass to a human player.
Alexander, thanks! We should have the link up here tomorrow, so be sure to check back and tell your team about it!
IronicDeadBird
07-03-2014, 20:04
IronDeadBird, just talked to another mentor who was very involved on this. We did discuss it because that very well is a possibility, but we did make the assumption that every robot is a "push" robot, as it can push the ball around, and we figured that a pass over the truss to a push robot is just as easy to accomplish (if not easier) than a pass to a human player.
Alexander, thanks! We should have the link up here tomorrow, so be sure to check back and tell your team about it!
Ah I understand the logic behind it now. I was talking more in terms of a robot that can shoot but has trouble with pickup, a robot that loads fastest with human assistance this would make sense. This devolves into all sorts of hypothetical situations and those go on forever.
Indeed they do. Had we not had a very limited time to do this, we may have tried for those hypothetical situations. Next time.
alexander.h
07-03-2014, 20:28
IronDeadBird, just talked to another mentor who was very involved on this. We did discuss it because that very well is a possibility, but we did make the assumption that every robot is a "push" robot, as it can push the ball around, and we figured that a pass over the truss to a push robot is just as easy to accomplish (if not easier) than a pass to a human player.
Alexander, thanks! We should have the link up here tomorrow, so be sure to check back and tell your team about it!
Will do, thanks!
IronDeadBird, just talked to another mentor who was very involved on this. We did discuss it because that very well is a possibility, but we did make the assumption that every robot is a "push" robot, as it can push the ball around, and we figured that a pass over the truss to a push robot is just as easy to accomplish (if not easier) than a pass to a human player.
Great thinking with the creation of this app! I'm sure lots of teams will find this really useful.
However, I did want to point out that passing over the truss to a human player is REALLY easy. Watch!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WjSUAmLFnwY
Pi3th0n,
We most definitely agree that a pass to a human player can be a simpler route to complete a play. However it does not change the maximum score the alliance will receive per cycle. It may change the speed at which the cycle is performed, but we didn't allow for this variable in our app. The play is the same, whether your team chooses to use the human player or not for the respective combinations. We encourage teams to use our app as a starting point and make changes for their own custom plays as they see fit. Thanks for the input and please be sure to share the app! Good Luck!
alexander.h
08-03-2014, 16:45
Sorry for asking, but is the link up yet?
Alexander, here's the public dropbox link with all the images! :)
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/k5sswzjigakehca/KudWvOHis6
alexander.h
08-03-2014, 18:58
Alexander, here's the public dropbox link with all the images! :)
https://www.dropbox.com/sh/k5sswzjigakehca/KudWvOHis6
Thank you very much!
Make sure everyone downloads the update! In Version 1.2 we further optimized a few alliance combinations, and please continue to give us feedback!
IronicDeadBird
09-03-2014, 13:56
Me again whats up.
Anyway looking at it, this is just completely up to you guys I have no experience in designing apps and so the fact that you guys did this in 2 days blows my mind but I have an idea for The alliance member aspect. Could you somehow set it so that you could chose what abilities a robot has?
So when I got to select alliance member one I could go through check boxes one could be saying its a shooting and a pushing robot?
IronicDeadBird, that is a really good idea and we'll keep it in mind for future updates and apps. Thanks for the feedback!
For anybody that's interested in adding more variables, I'll mention that you're perfectly free to play around with numbers using a spreadsheet, pen and paper, etc. I played around with those numbers for a while during the build season and felt that it was a useful exercise.
Now that we have some real matches to watch, a person can put some realistic time numbers into the math. How many seconds does it take a good inbounder to control the ball? How about a poor inbounder? How many seconds does it take to shoot the ball over the truss with no defense? Etc. It would be a good project for somebody who has time on their hands and wants to get a bit of a strategic edge. Add in the time element, and you can do a better job of optimizing the strategies. Naturally, the specifics of the robots and drivers and human players will mess up the math and cause you to throw out the theoretical numbers sometimes. But it's still a fun exercise to see what the numbers say.
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