What are we doing wrong at MSC?

[safetysid]

Last year and this, team 2959 hasn't been pick for eliminations but have qualified for worlds on our own. Last year we were finalist in Archimedes and this year finalists at the Boilermaker Regional. But at state, we just haven't come up with how to get picked for eliminations (other than being a captain). Both years, our robot performed extremely well but our luck with alliance partners for qualifications isn't that great. For teams there, why didn't you pick us or possibly even think to pick us? Anyone have any suggestions?

[Nyxyxylyth]

For teams there, why didn't you pick us or possibly even think to pick us? Anyone have any suggestions?
You were thought of ;)

From my perspective: keeping control of the ball was paramount at MSC. Sometimes when 2959 was ready to shoot and took a hit, the ball would pop out. With the mad defense in elims, it'd be rough to get that ball back.

[Josh Fox]

You were thought of ;)

I'll echo this sentiment. You guys had a great shot and made some great finishing moves throughout the weekend, and were certainly on our list.

Sometimes it can be a matter of an alliance looking for different pieces to execute a particular strategy, sometimes it's a lack of scouting missing one of those "diamonds in the rough," but as someone who's also sat out MSC eliminations in his career, the best thing you can do is take this miss, find ways to evaluate and improve your performance, and show everyone they'd be foolish to not pick you again.

You also have to consider how crazy-deep the field was. There were another 5-6 teams on our list I couldn't believe didn't get selected.

Good luck, and see you guys in St. Louis.

[RonnieS]

Last year and this, team 2959 hasn't been pick for eliminations but have qualified for worlds on our own. Last year we were finalist in Archimedes and this year finalists at the Boilermaker Regional. But at state, we just haven't come up with how to get picked for eliminations (other than being a captain). Both years, our robot performed extremely well but our luck with alliance partners for qualifications isn't that great. For teams there, why didn't you pick us or possibly even think to pick us? Anyone have any suggestions?

In 2013 I felt the same way, how were we not picked for eliminations? We were a great FCS but then I looked into it. We were low and could have been blocked. But Hot was also short right? Yes they were but they also learned how to run cycles faster and they could climb and dumb fast. So what I am saying is yes, you will be mad but then learn from what you could improve on and make it better for worlds. Personally, I thought that us being a second round pick was way off par with what I believe we should have gone but I am not complaining. It was great working with rush and bees!
Best of luck at worlds!

[Adam Freeman]

You also have to consider how crazy-deep the field was. There were another 5-6 teams on our list I couldn't believe didn't get selected.

Good luck, and see you guys in St. Louis.

I think this is the biggest reason why, there were just about a hand full of teams that were right on the bubble of getting selected.

I know it doesn't help after the fact, but I very impressed with your performance whenever I saw your team on the field.

I think at the end of alliance selections things happen so quickly, depending on how the picks go, that sometimes teams get lost in the shuffle of who is still available.

I am confident in saying that if you guys are in our division at champs, I will be paying special attention to watch how you are performing.

-Adam

[XaulZan11]

I didn't watch enough of MSC to say why you did not get picked, but in general teams typically don't understand that sometimes it is better to be the 3rd best 'support' robot than the 15th best scoring robot. This requires a an understanding of which type of robot alliances will want with their 3rd pick, an honest and accurate assessment of where you stack up with the other robots, and the willingness to put your pride aside and play the less glamorous role (which can be hard as your team spent 10+ weeks working on being the scoring robot). This may or may not apply to your situation.

[IKE]

In the scouting seminar that Jim Z and I covered, one of the topics that we kept stressing was you have to scout your own team with as open of eyes as possible.
When I was the scouting mentor for 33, I would often have the "why didn't we get picked" conversation with teams, and they would often get very upset with me for telling them my perspective of the truth. The most common statement I heard from many teams is "we thought we would get picked earlier in the draft".... This tends to track with the "over-inflated" perception folks have about teams (I was just as guilty of this with 33 as the next team). The real thing is, it is easy to focus on your teams strengths, and shrug off a bad match, or dropped ball, or missed auton, or foul because you know the full story of what happened. Often scouts don't know the 100% story and thus that is relevant information.

I did not do thorough objective scouting at MSC this weekend, but watched a lot of matches, and know a lot of capabilities of teams. My guess (which aligns with earlier comments) was that 2959 was "on the bubble" for a lot of teams lists. I know this was true of 33's list last year as I helped make that one. Last year, you guys were awesome with the run and gun and pretty good with with the 10 point climb. You guys tended to shoot from the same "favorite" spot as 33 though which was a bit awkward in matches if the robots "got in sync". As was 314 at MSC and World's for 33 in 2013, but was edged out by other competitors (68 at MSC due to better defensive ability and 1519 at World's because they were an FSC with more height).

For 2014, 2959 was a really good machine with a pretty accurate shot. At least at Escanaba, your collector was slow*. I think it took about 3+ seconds to acquire a ball. Not sure if you put faster motors on for MSC (I believe it was window motors at Escanaba).
Also as others have stated, the pedestal style shooting mechanism could be bumped to cause you to drop the ball, and thuse require a new acquisition (see above). While this didn't occur often, it would occur anytime someone gave you a good hit, which in Elims is any time you get ready to shoot.

Other than that, it is like many others have said, the depth at MSC this year was great, and the parity of teams was quite broad as well. This meant that really another 5-10 robots likely would have been good picks (2959 included) to play in Elims. But as FIRST only lets you pick 1, that is all you can pick, and teams try to pick the ones that will work out best for them.

If you ever want objective advice on how to improve your robot, talk to the scouts of another team you respect after the event. During the event, they may not tell you all the details, but after an event, they will often give you a nice list of things to work on. The biggies are usually auto accuracy, piece manipulation, speed, traction, driving, defense, and strategic awareness tend to be the normal ones. By the back end of the draft, teams are usually deficient in some of these areas. Some years/robots, it is a specific design feature (type of wheels, long vs. short in 2012).

*If possible, for collecting a ball, you want the surface of your roller to be at 2X the ground speed you want to be able to collect at. IE for a 7 FPS drivetrain, a 14 FPS surface speed on the roller will really snap up the ball. You have to balance speed though with enough torque to do the action so that the collector doesn't stall. IE if you have a 15 FPS chassis, a 30 FPS collector is crazy fast and will likely stall.
Assuming a Window motor, and I think those collector wheels are around 4" diameter, the rollers likely spin at around 85 rpm. This would be roughly 1.5 revs/second which for a 4" roller is about 1.5 feet/second. The 2 foot diameter ball has to roll about 1/2 to 1 revolution to roll into a robot. This is 3 feet to 6 feet. At 1.5 FPS, collection would require 2-4 seconds to collect. If your robot was to intake the ball each of 4 cycles, the collection process would use 8-16 seconds of the match. If all 3 robots collected at this speed, 24-48 seconds of a 31 pt. cycle style of play would be bringing collecting. Possibly more if to pass you have to spit the ball back out the intake. I think your intake was faster than that, but still took a while to collect.

[safetysid]

Thank you for all your input! This is really going to help us, we really appreciate it. :)

[safetysid]

At least at Escanaba, your collector was slow*. I think it took about 3+ seconds to acquire a ball. Not sure if you put faster motors on for MSC (I believe it was window motors at Escanaba).
Also as others have stated, the pedestal style shooting mechanism could be bumped to cause you to drop the ball, and thuse require a new acquisition (see above). While this didn't occur often, it would occur anytime someone gave you a good hit, which in Elims is any time you get ready to shoot.

Once again, thank you so much for your input. After Escanaba, we also realized that was too slow for this game. Since then we put a different motor on so now it intakes a ball at almost less than a second. The next week we went down to the Boilermaker regional and that really helped us, we actually made it to finals with Argos and the Earthquakers. Other improvements include adding a bungy cord to the PVC to secure the ball better and a new kicker arm. The ball does move around a lot but I can assure you, doesn't fall out when hit. Times that it does, usually only when the ball hasn't settled in the shooter which happens to even the best robots. And the new kicker arm is a lot more powerful than our old piece of strut with a pool noodle on it. It has made all our shots with under inflatable balls accurate as well as a lot more powerful with balls verging on the edge of too inflated. But again, all these comments have changed the way we look at things and are greatly appreciated!

[Debbie]

Once again, thank you so much for your input. After Escanaba, we also realized that was too slow for this game. Since then we put a different motor on so now it intakes a ball at almost less than a second. The next week we went down to the Boilermaker regional and that really helped us, we actually made it to finals with Argos and the Earthquakers. Other improvements include adding a bungy cord to the PVC to secure the ball better and a new kicker arm. The ball does move around a lot but I can assure you, doesn't fall out when hit. Times that it does, usually only when the ball hasn't settled in the shooter which happens to even the best robots. And the new kicker arm is a lot more powerful than our old piece of strut with a pool noodle on it. It has made all our shots with under inflatable balls accurate as well as a lot more powerful with balls verging on the edge of too inflated. But again, all these comments have changed the way we look at things and are greatly appreciated!
You were also on our pick list.

[Mech-Mod]

I want to thank everyone who answered Sidney honestly. We are not looking to walk away from this post with hurt feeling, just the opposite; we are looking at hearing what stings. Our mentors and students alike, feel that last year we crossed that threshold from been an average team to the start of becoming a good team and it all started with a 5-10 minute conversation with a couple mentors from 33 Killer Bees at MSC last year. Sidney posted this after we had asked ourselves these questions, what did we do wrong? What did we do right? Where does our next 5-10 minute conversation need to come from? We are trying to walk in the footsteps of the great teams ahead of us like Rush, Killer Bees, Wings of Fire, HOT, Truck Town Thunder, R.O.B.O.T.I.C.S., Las Guerrillas, Mech Warriors and Bedford Express just to name a few. We are striving to be like them as both a team that builds a robot and as an organization the builds a community.