Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

You know... looking at the list of championship and thinking of legendary teams like 71,177, and 217 not being in attendance makes me sad.

... BUT! There is always IRI ... :rolleyes:

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Finally! I didn't realize there was a French manual provided this year, because it wasn't linked on the FIRST website, and wasn't obvious on the Robotique FIRST Québec site either. (Here it is, if anyone's interested.)

Of course, this means there are potential consistency issues between versions, mainly because the French versions don't incorporate the updates. After a quick look, apart from some relatively minor numerical glitches (SI conversions are worthwhile, but need to be rounded appropriately), it looks very well translated.

Hopefully this will continue. No doubt this makes explaining game- and robot-related issues in French so much easier, because there's no need to invent translations of terms of art on the fly!

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Two things I'd like to mention that I'm somewhat surprised that it hasn't been brought up yet.

Some of these team which could possibly miss just didn't perform as well as past years. One team which I'll specify as an example, 217 (because generally they are a prime example of how a team should be structured and a robot be designed, and we as a team frequently look to them for inspiration), just wasn't on their A+game this year. And it wasn't just me that felt this way, but multiple mentors AND students on my team as well as other teams I talked to in queue before matches during strategy. They had a few problems mechanically (which usually never happens) and there was a time or 2 where sitting in the stands, I wasn't sure what their game-plan was (when it's usually obvious since their winning by 20). Did they do bad by any means? Absolutely not. My team would've paid to do as well as they did this year (but that was our problem; we were underfunded). Any previous year, my team would have had zero chance of beating them in the playoffs. But this year it happened. The last time of which, I can't remember.

Chances are, they're going to regroup during the off season and come back next year better than ever. Good for them. I bet they'd rather take a year off and then win the Championship next year than have 2 year of getting eliminated in the division playoffs.

The next thing is in regards to St. Louis. As stated before, with FIRST growing, and there being only a finite number of teams able to be crammed into a venue, the allocation of teams is going to have to become more specific. I like how the District events do it, where a set # of teams will qualify regardless. Also mentioned is the excessive # of teams that buy their way in. But this is where I may differ with a few of you.

Things are starting to look up for my team in the coming year (financially, team size, organization), and we will probably be able to afford going to the Championship for the fist time since 2004 (and even then we went in debt to go). Only 4 of our current mentors have ever competed out of the state; none of the students. It would be nice if we could secure a spot before the season started, so we could worry about other things, such as build, community service, etc.

Now (don't get me wrong) I wouldn't mind fewer teams being able to buy their way in, AS LONG AS there are stricter regulations as to who's allowed to do such (maybe a "you MUST have missed X number of years to qualify", X>1). This ensures that every team will get the opportunity to go at some point in a 4 year interval without taking away from the teams who deserve to go based on team/robot performance. Heck, maybe even offer some kind of assistance to teams that have missed for a really long time, say 5+ years. That way, everyone gets to have a taste of the atmosphere at some point.

I know outside of the online streams, I sure haven't. And FIRST is more than about the competing; that's why the highest award has nothing to do with wins and loses. It's about community.
PS: Sorry for the long post everybody --> had alot to get off my mind.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

While I'd love if this were still true, it simply is not. This year, FRC has 2,343 teams. Not even accounting for growth, there is no way any venue we've ever been at could hold each team every 4 years (1/4 every year, 585/year). And in addition to not accounting for growth, this also isn't accounting for repeat auto-bids or any repeat qualifiers.

A procedure such as this would inherently take away from teams deserving to go based on team/robot performance. You've have to get down to the 70% mark to even fit in the current venue, and around...well, where we are now, to allow for even most of the merit qualifications.

Making the buy-in rules stricter (teams buy-in less often) would be nice, but why buy-in at all? Traveling is great, but there are other--cheaper--ways to compete out of state besides Worlds.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Ha; that's what I get for trying to do math at 5 in the morning.

So you wouldn't get every team going in a 4-yr period, but you would inevitably have more different teams. My main motivation here is, while other competitions are indeed cheaper and more convenient, no other even has the same atmosphere or scale as the Championship. Simply put, it is an event like no other event. More people should get to experience that, at least once in their career.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

While I agree that it is great for teams to go and get the experience, our growth is going to start impeding on those buy in slots. It was nice in the past few years to have the ability to buy in after years of not qualifying but as we grow with more regionals I would hate to see qualifying slots from state championships diminish, divisions grow to extreme numbers, or number of matches drop to accomodate buy in teams.

I'm not saying here and now this is a problem, I think we are ok at the moment, but in the next 5 years what will the expansion of the FRC program look like in #of teams, regionals, and district systems? What growth have we seen in the last 5 seasons?

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

I speak for all of team 125 when I say we are extremely disappointed our friends from 2168 are missing out on the Championship. Heartbreaking losses are something we are not unfamiliar with ourselves (Finalists twice last year after losing match 3 of the finals). They will be missed greatly in St. Louis. We are looking forward to playing together with them at Battlecry and the Beantown Blitz.

The same is true for team 177, who built another impressive machine. To see their run stopped at this point is unfortunate.

From a New England perspective, these 2 stand out the most for me.

-Brando

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Preface: I was on a team that went to the Championship from 2004-2010 on the open registration system and I do believe that it is a VERY inspirational experience for any student that gets to go regardless of the teams performance. That being said, I believe more often than not, teams like the one I was on actually dilute the CMP experience because they aren't 'Championship Caliber Machines'.

Here's an idea - it's not perfect - but it might help alleviate some of the issues with the current CMP model.

1) Move to a points system qualification method for the Championship Similar to those in MAR and FiM. These systems have both been shown to work as those teams with consistently 'good' performances are awarded spots at the Championship. The Winners* of any Given Regional would get an Auto-Bid to the Championship as they do now, along with EI, RCA and RAS. (MAR and FiM would continue to qualify as they do now)

2) Eliminate Pre-Qualification (Open Registration) for the Championship with the exception of HOF, Previous Year's World Champions and The Original and Sustaining teams from 1992. (If you look at most of these teams they'd qualify for the Championship anyway.)

3) Any Remaining Spots At the Championship after Spots are Awarded to those outlined in #1 and #2 will be awarded based on the points system (#1) to fill the Championship. This Should Come out to at least 100 spots in a 400 Team Championship if current trends continue for the foreseeable future.

4) Add an Additional 2 Fields at the Championship (Space becomes an Issue) and call it the 'FIRST Robotics Championship - Exhibition'. Any Team that would like to go to the Championship but has not qualified through #1, #2 or #3 could register for this event. This would be run separate of the traditional 4 Division Championship and would have more of a focus on interaction and inspiration than winning. This Exhibition would be over Prior to Lunchtime on Saturday to allow the teams in attendance to watch Division Eliminations and Einstein.

Here's the logic behind this:

Items #1, #2 and #3 serve to make the Championship 'A Real Championship'. These would allow the best of the best to go to the Championship and compete for the title of World Champion, Championship Chairman's Award Winner, Championship Engineering Inspiration, and Championship Rookie All-Star.

Item #4 addresses the teams who have no interest in competing to be World Champion or another award. A lot of the teams that pre-register now and do not qualify at a later point in the season go to the Championship as a fun trip, to travel, etc. These Teams would still be allowed to go to the Championship under #4, they would just be in their own event - which would prevent them from interacting with top-tier teams on the field, but is better than excluding them from the Championship at all.

Of course, this system wouldn't be perfect and has it's share of issues, a big one of them being space. With a system like this, we'd need space for something like 500-600 FRC Teams at the Championship plus FLL and FTC.

*Some people are advocates of only giving the Alliance Captain and their First Pick a spot at the Championship. I'm not sure if this is the right thing to do or not...

TLDR: Eliminate Pre-reg spots, except for HOF, World Champs and Teams from 1992. Take the now open spots and award them based on a Points System after Regionals are completed. Add an additional Mini-Event for those who want to go to the CMP but aren't competing for anything.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

List is up to 394 teams now, still no 4294.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Now up to 397. 4294 IS included.
There are ALOT of rookies going! 62 to be exact; more than 15% of all the teams.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Me want divisions.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Agreed.

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

Would you mind posting this breakdown with team numbers?

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

How long till divisions usually come out?

Re: Best Robots Not At Championship, 2012 Edition
 

I believe they usually come out 2 weeks before Championship? So perhaps they will be out this Wednesday or Thursday.