FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I am a seasoned FIRST electrical/computer engineering mentor. I had the luxury of attending the championship strictly as an observer. Unfortunately my observations are that in all certainty the wrong outcome was realized. Just review the Archimedes finals and pay attention to the scores and the fact that triple balances were the norm and compare that to Einstein results. As an engineer I am truly sorry for an incorrect result based on technology failure. That alliance could not have paid a higher price as there is no material chance they will all be at the championship and in the same division at once ever again.
FIRST does have options. Do nothing with a promise to do better next year is not the only one. I feel strongly that the FIRST board should step up and should review the videos and if their conclusion is the same as mine, issue a one time special recognition championship flag and trophy to that alliance both to recognizes the alliance but also to remind us that technology can and regularly does let us down and never become complacent in our blind faith trust in it.

Science is based on facts. The facts in the Archimedes finals videos are undeniable.

After two full days of thinking about this non-trival issue, as a mentor I find if I didn't post this I would be disrespecting the alliance and the FIRST philosophy.

UPDATE: Okay I realized this would controversial. If there were alliances in other divisions that could regularly score say 60-70 ball points and triple balance every time against high end teams AND lost out in their division due to unexplained dead robots, then this changes everything. If you know of an example, could you please post the field and a team # from the alliance so I can take a look and possibly retract my post.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

What about the other alliances on Einstein?

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Pat is right. There were 4 alliances on Einstein, all of which had some form of communication issue. To say that one alliance should get a "recognition flag" over all the others is absurd. Reviewing videos won't help--in that case, Newton and Curie need to be reviewed too, along with Archimedes and Galileo. But it still won't help, because you play differently against different opponents.

The better way to handle this, IMO, would be for FIRST to reserve slots at the Championship for all 12 Einstein teams for next year (though 1114 won't need to use theirs due to joining the HoF). That, at least, is not without an applicable precedent. Twice in the past, a finalist alliance at a regional has been given slots at the Championship because *something* got messed up pretty badly in the regional finals.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Yeah, not to be biased, but Pat is right. What about Newton? We triple-balanced just as fast as Archimedes did, and put up just as many balls. You can't say Archimedes would've beaten us, and you can't say that Archimedes could defeat the crazy defense that 16 played. I can't say we'd actually beat Galileo if given the chance. Don't make wild statements like that. While yeah, most people think it should've been Archimedes versus Newton and yeah, because of the strong northern bias of FRC they would pick the Eh Team when betting, the fact of the matter is that neither alliance could connect to the field. The best robots for this year's game (and all its unforseen field failures) were 25's, 16's and 180's. Saying otherwise is disrespecting the entire FIRST community and the FIRST philosophy (which we should be protecting in light of what the organization did to itself).

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I think this would be the best way to approach this matter.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Eric, I agree - with one minor change. I believe that FIRST should invite all 12 Division winners to the Championship free of charge.

Let those teams use the $5k they save on registration to help them prepare for a potential return to Einstein.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Dave, I can't even believe you posted that, and I'm not sure it even warrants me wasting my time responding. " in all certainty the wrong outcome was realized". Really? REALLY???? I'm glad you're so certain. I guess you didn't notice that the Galileo alliance could triple balance as well but rarely needed to because they were so far ahead in their matches due to Bomb Squad starving the competition of balls to score.
I've been pleasantly surprised that there haven't been more posts like yours; I think everyone understands that there were 4 good alliances and we would all have liked to had a competitive final 4 take place. Your post is nothing short of ignorant.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

All the analysis in the world won't give you a guarantee of who would have won. Let me give you a real-world FIRST example from Logomotion.

Last year at North Star, things did not go as people expected. We were the 7th seeded alliance, but we've been there before, and through good team work made it to the finals against the "super alliance". If you looked at all the video footage leading up to that, there would be no doubt in your mind who would win that match, and by a large margin. The first one went as expected, and we lost. The second one we did even worse, and they did just as well... but the super alliance made a mistake and got a red card (two red cards for two different mistakes, actually). That was something no one could have predicted, and was something that alliance hadn't done leading up to that point. So we go into the third match with lifted spirits and an air of determination... only to see our elevator break during autonomous. Our drive team didn't give up, and went on the defensive instead - the first time they played defense across 2 regionals. We ended up winning that match by only a couple of points, and the regional. Who would have predicted it?

So, since those regional finals went against what all prediction and analysis of prior matches would have expected, should we recognize those teams like you want to recognize those from Einstein this year? If you doubt my analysis, Just look up videos from North Star in 2011 and do your own.

FIRST matches are not deterministic. Robot performance is (sadly) not a constant, and neither is drive team or human player performance. Take a look at the NCAA Basketball tournament for a good analogy. Millions of people every year make their picks and enter them into pools... and millions of people every year are wrong. Even the experts on TV are wrong every year. Not necessarily about everything, but wrong about a significant number of outcomes of games.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I am also for giving the Einstein bids to CMP but then that also begs the question "What about teams with comms problems in the divisional rounds?" etc.

Also can we stop making a new topic every 3 hours about Einstein? There are literally 5 or more Einstein threads on the front page (at least in my portal config) and this easily could have fit into 3 of them :rolleyes:

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I think it's also important to recognize the alliances that did not make it to Einstein very possibly because of comm issues.

Like 341, 254, and 78 who put up the all time high score of 128 points in the curie semis, but were eliminated in the finals because of communication issues. (*edit, as stated below, this however was not the fields fault.)

Or what about 1717, 469, and 2471. They had (very arguably) the 2 best scorers from 2012 on their alliance but were eliminated in the semis of Newton after 1717 died in almost every match. (*edit, turns out this was caused by a bad cable that linked the crio to the radio of their robot, so not the fault of the field)

It's impossible to know if they would have won their division but because of communication issues we will never know.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Or regionals?

My thought would be that the Einstein teams get CMP slots (whether they get any sort of discount, including a 100% discount, is up in the air but would probably be a good idea). These are the teams with the most exposure of the issue, and the ones possibly hardest hit.

Again my thoughts: Divisional elimination issues (at least down to semis) get either a discounted registration or a guaranteed slot at a regional of their choice other than their home regional (and announced soon enough that they can raise the funds). These teams could have made Einstein if their comms were operational.

Anything below the divisional elims is going to get far too complicated to find and award.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Not to mention that it's very likely that almost all of the teams have earned/will earn that slot anyway and feels like an empty gesture.

2056 is more likely to miss the Championship Event than the world to implode tomorrow, but that's about it.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Do you SERIOUSLY think that the outcome of Einstein was "wrong"?
How can it even be wrong? Its the outcome of luck, talent, and well built machines.

This thread is very offensive. The fact that you stated you were a seasoned FIRST mentor just makes it worse. I hope you can realize exactly what was wrong about your statements and appologize to the Galileo alliance.

*editted to be less harsh

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Team 180 had comm problems and we worked through them. We lost communications in the last match as well. However, we were ready at a moment's notice to reboot the robot to get as much play time as we possibly could. We foresaw this potential problem and changed our strategy on the fly. Also, I showed some of the 118 kids how to reboot and what to look for in the event of a problem. I'm not sure if they tried it or not, but I wanted them to move almost as much as they did.

The reason our alliance played so well was that 16 could retrieve balls from our opponents and pass them to us. I didn't see any other team play such incredible defense the entire competition. One could perhaps even go so far as to say that that Bomb Squad could have been paired with any two good key shooters and come out extremely competitive. I'm sure there were a couple good robots that were individually better than any robot on our alliance, but the alliance teamwork is what made the difference.

We could also triple balance very quickly. I think the fact that we never had to shows more than actually triple balancing. I hope that hateful comments such as these aren't shared with the kids. This certainly doesn't help spread the message of FIRST. :ahh:

- Bryce

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

As much as I'd like to place blame, The Daisy Poof Strike Alliance was not eliminated due to the Same Comms issues that plagued many others. Look at Jared's posts in the other threads.

Basically, 78's radio came unplugged (Yes, a comms issue, but one that could've been prevented) and 341 had shooter issues and lost their backup coupon.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I appreciate the pride you have in your ability to overcome the adversity caused by communication issues that were out of your control, but this simply wasn't how the game was supposed to be played, and that's why people are questioning the outcome. Teams spent the whole year practicing with a strategy of a 3 on 3 game, and the variation created by communication related immobility simply wasn't what most (or any) of the teams on Einstein prepared for. You can't really tell someone they lost after making them lose at something they didn't prepare for (and frankly shouldn't have had to prepare for).

That said, I don't disagree with you, but I think it's obvious as a bystander that the matches on Einstein were not entirely legitimate, and don't really reflect what teams were asked to prepare for when the game was released.

I posted about this before on another thread, so I won't repeat myself, but here's the link http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...&postcount=183

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

No matter how you look at it this doesn't make any sense at all. Even if people believe the winning alliance did not earn their victory, it would be tremendously hypocritical to hand out awards that the other alliances didn't earn either. If we replayed all the elimination matches, it's very possible that none of the division champions would have made it to einstein. I don't believe the curie finalists played their best matches, if we replayed them the results could easily have gone either way. The galileo champs lost matches to two separate alliances. If their alliance had major com issues during their rubber matches, they could easily have lost. I heard from newton two very good alliances had comm issues at some point during eliminations. If they didn't it certainly is possible they could have beaten the winning alliance. And the archimedes champs barely defeated 67's alliance. They could easily have lost if their alliance managed the tripple balance in the final match.

All I'm saying is that no alliance is a sure bet to win it all. The archimedes alliance certainly didn't deserve to lose the way they did, but they don't deserve to be called world champions, or even finalists for that matter. They never earned that title. The only alliance that earned that title was 16, 25, and 180, just as the rules say. It wouldn't fix anything to take it away from them, and the title would be completely meaningless if it was given to another alliance. If FIRST wanted a fair fight, they shouldn't have played out the matches in the first place. They should have moved the fight to a different field, or a different time, or perhaps they shouldn't have played the matches at all. The time has passed where we can do anything about it. Handing out awards or taking them away would be just unfair, and replaying the matches would be awkward, especially if the winners aren't 16, 25, and 180. They have already celebrated their victory, and even if they were the best alliance there is no guarantee they would win, as I have explained before.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

From our copilot (who doesn't have an account as far as I can tell):
"that was the first thing we tried, in fact I know that I hit it multiple times, as well as an fta, we even restarted the DS in the middle of the match, but alas nothing changed"
So there you go. Thank you for suggesting it to them, it's sad that it didn't work.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I'm sorry to hear that was the case. We were expecting a tough match and were also completely side-swiped by the field problems. It bothered me immensely to see the defeat on the faces of some of the 118 team members after the second round of field problems. I don't think anyone on Einstein (not even the blue winners) were happy with the situation. We came to win fair and square. The Newton alliance was a formidable force indeed and deserved better than that - and Archimedes as well.

- Bryce

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

In 2010 we saw the "wrong outcome realized" when 469's strategy was outplayed. Just because many people expect one thing and something else happened doesn't mean that it was wrong. It just means we were wrong.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Just wondering, does any one know what HoF stands for?

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Hall of Fame.

HoF is the CD shorthand. The only way in is to win the Championship Chairman's Award.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

It's actually everybody shorthand. People refer to the hall of fame in sports as "the hof."

Back to the thread with you all...

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I think instead of going to the championship, we should have Dave review all the footage of the regional season. That way he can review all the facts of the match and tell us who should win the championship.

It'd save the rest of us a bunch of time off from work, school, etc. to come up with strategies and things like that during the competition.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Exactly. Or just use the predictive OPR calculator, figure out who's at the top, send them their trophies and call it a day. Much easier than everyone having to go to St Louis.... :D

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Another user mentioned in a different thread that he felt that the winning alliance would get a bad reputation as "the teams that only won because of comm issues". I agree that the communication issues on Einstein were terrible, but we shouldn't dismiss the fact that every robot there was a quality machine. Doing so would be extremely shortsighted and disrespectful to the teams that put countless hours of work in this season.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I'm not saying that 4334 did not have a quality robot, they did. They worked very well with 2056/1114, especially when it came to tripple balancing (which won them the matches that mattered the most). But I would say that since my rookie year in 2008, I've always thought the alliance with the best 3rd robot won the division. 148, won it all in 2008, and they probably had one of the best auto/lap bots that year. 971 was completely overlooked in 2009, even though they went undefeated at their only regional event. 177 I thought was an exceptional mid ranged scorer and had a very nice drivetrain. 973 was a steal and should not have been the second to last pick (I remember either the 111 or 254 scouters saying they were the 7nth robot in their depth chart). And 16? The robot ranked voted #7 best robot in the world chosen as a 3rd pick is completely absurd and really says it all.

I don't even understand the logic behind saying individually, the winning alliance members weren't that good. 16 won 3 regionals, 25 won a district event and were district champs, and 180 won a regional and was a finalist at another event. All as captains or first picks. You don't get much better than that.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

I have no doubts in my mind that the Championship COULD have ended up with 16, 25, and 180 as Champions regardless of the field issues.

Just as I have no doubts it could have just as easily been 207, 233, and 987, or 1114, 2056, and 4334, or 118, 548, and 2194.

It wasn't a fair fight. Yes, the field issues were pervasive and affected both alliances, but didn't do so equally, and thus each match was virtually assigned a winner by random chance, thanks to the unreliability of the field.

It is absolutely unfounded to blame the teams for what happened. A few of the teams that mysteriously started having issues on Einstein had no such issues at any point prior in the season. 4334 included.

In my mind: Inviting all 12 Einstein teams to CMP 2013 is not enough. Most of them are either already qualified as of right now (16, 25, 180, 1114), or have a reasonable expectation that they will earn their way in at a Regional event in 2013 (118, 233, 987, 2056), either through winning a regional, or RCA/EI.

Inviting all 12 teams to CMP 2013, with no Registration fee? That's better. Though I would actually prefer to see all 12 teams crowned 2012 Championship Winners (complete with the invitation to the 2013 CMP), and let them pay their CMP registrations. The game played on Einstein was not Rebound Rumble, so we will never know who the true Rebound Rumble champions would have been.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Every single thread regarding Einstein is exactly the same right now.

Everyone seems to think a different alliance would have won had there been no radio issues. There is, however, 2 things I think we can all agree on;

1. All the teams of Einstein earned their way there. Through one way or another, every single team on Einstein deserved to be there and was part of a very strong alliance.
2. There was in fact field problems. It's nobody's call to say who was more or less affected by the field. It's just how it is.

Now, what happened sucked, and I'm fairly certain that everybody wanted nothing more than a fair shot at the world title. With that in mind, I support and congratulate the winning alliance. Nobody should ever hold someone's accomplishments against them.

Now, there's pretty much infinite options of what FIRST could do to try to right this situation. They have already apologized and told us they would get to the bottom of what happened. The best and most reasonable option I have seen so far is an invitation to the 2013 Championship, and I would not be complaining if it was on the house. Now, what they do is ultimately up to them, and we just have to place what little faith we may have back into the system.

As I said in a previous post regarding Einstein, learn from the past and apply it to the future.

Also, although this thread may be controversial, everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Please respect that.

Mac

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Since it is so likely that most of the teams on Einstein will earn their way back next year, inviting them back to compete may be superfluous.

How about inviting the team members, including those who graduate this year, to sit in front row seats to personally witness Einstien matches where no dropped comms issues affect the performance of the robots. Of course this is after a season of faultess performance from the FMS where all instances of dead robots are shown to be truly due to faults in the robot. I think it is fair to say that the FIRST community holds all the teams that made it to Einstein in high regard and would be happy for them to serve as our representatives to confirm that the dropped comms issues have truly been fixed.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

Not necessarily true. Of the 12 2011 Einstein teams, 8 did not have prequalified status for 2012. Only 4 of these teams qualified for the 2012 World Championship. Teams as strong 177, 217, 968 and 1503 all did not make it back to St. Louis.

Re: FIRST does have other options re Enistein.
 

My apologies, Karthik. I had forgotten about examples such as 118 from across Houston who finally earned a seat at their third regional.

I do stand by my main point that FIRST has some "homework" to do over the next year.