Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

You know what confuses me about this thread? The timing. Didn't we just have our first climb+dump winner during week 3? 1806 was the #1 selection at winner at GKC (ahead of a team with a 7-disc autonomous).

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

Depends on your opponents and your allies.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

Not to sure what "matchmatical" is, but you may want to review your mathematics.

Last time I checked, 50 + 36 +12 = 98, and 36 +12 + 36 + 12 = 96.

Seems like 50 + 36 +12 > 36 + 12 + 36 + 12.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

Our Climb+Dump was more of a backup plan than our first choice in strategy. Not to mention we can only climb for 20 points.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

That would seem confusing, except that example is 1 Event out of 32 (although admittedly I haven't checked on the winners of all the events to see if that is the only one... but even if it's 2/32..).

I think a lot of us (myself included), thought that of the non-do-everything bots, the climber/dumper would be THE rockstar of the competitions. Now as people have pointed out, consistency seems to be what is failing the climbers and even the climb/dumpers. We've seen so few robots that climb for 30 every match. We've seen even fewer robots that can climb and dump even 75% of their matches (maybe only a couple?). Climbing is HARD. Much much harder than reliable shooting.

And I think that is what makes this analysis tough. We just don't have a lot of good examples of a consistent version of this type of robot yet.

However, I am wondering as teams improve their robots across the season, and as teams learn strategies to defend shooters, if this won't start changing. It is really really hard to defend a climber/dumper. Its much much easier to defend a shooter.

I'm curious to see if the average eliminations shooting scores actually increase or decrease as this season goes on. I wish I had time to run some of the numbers, as I bet there will be some really interesting trends. TBA is already showing the elims scores flattening, but we don't know if that includes improved auto, defended shooting, or improved climbing or what. I wonder what the next few weeks will show.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

I thought they had easily won the last match and if it wsan't for those penalties they would have had the blue banners.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

1806 had a shooter though. I think some (most?) of us are analyzing the original question as "why aren't dedicated climb and dumpers winning?" If you can shoot as well that changes the question drastically since you can score 18 in autonomous and break the 50 point barrier in teleop easily.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

What shocks me is no one played D on them. They just let them go get their colored Frisbees and go to the pyramid and do their climb and no one bothered to even try to get in their way.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

I tried to get our alliance to do it, but our drive coach told me that our alliance came to the conclusion that 4451 climbed so fast that it was pointless to try and block them from doing it. That, and they had one of the fastest drivetrains at Orlando.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

At FLR 1559 climbed just as quickly and 48 attacked them twice before they latched on to the pyramid to keep them from executing the climb. You can't just let them do it.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

You are correct. I made both a spelling and a mathematical error. Thank you for pointing that out.

So it would appear that both methods are extremely similar. Are the dumpers not getting their extra 20, or not climbing consistently for 30? Or are the shooters making more than 3 runs, or hitting more than 2 in autonomous consistently?

The FRC Miner data from Waterford is interesting. 1025, the only 30 point climber, has the most climbing points and an average autonomous. Their teleop score, however, is low enough that teams who shot well and had a consistent 10 point hang beat them. People who were scounting know that 1025 struggled to climb on the second day, reducing their climbing score somewhat. They still seeded 6th, proving that climbing robots can be competitive.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

There was no 7-disk auto available -- we already have a 7-disk auto, and 3928 uses the same 7 disks we do. It's unfortunate that they broke & weren't available for the 2nd finals game; it would have been interesting to see what they could have done.

1806 was a shooter; climb & dump was an option that they rarely used. As Woolly points out, it's a 40-point possibility, not a primary strategy. The few times their full-court shooter was allowed to roam free they racked up very high scores. When they were blocked, 1806 still scored from the pyramid. Not as much as a dedicated pyramid shooter, but when combined with their autonomous scores enough to make them a solid #1 pick. The possibility of a dump at the end was a bonus of their selection; it was a serious consideration but not the primary reason we picked them.

There wasn't a single game in elims that 1986-1806-2457 won where climb and dump points were the margin of victory.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

I watched 4451 come out of the loading zone and zoom around the edge of the field while another team was tasked to block them missed. This was during quals I saw this and decided then if I had to play them I wouldn't bother wasting the defense unless I had a very fast and powerful defender. So I think 233 could have blocked them (which is why we needed them - and to get them off of us).
I saw a lot of matches where defenders just sat in the middle of the field waiting for their target to present itself, which was just a waste. If my 3rd bot isn't a strong defender I'd rather have it out of the way and climbing. 20-30 points is points no matter how you look at it, and if we can get another rep in due to a clear alley then its bonus. Seemed to me that defense usually blocked up things for both teams and we needed more room to run. Hopefully we left all our gremlins in Orlando and the pink curse is behind us.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

How many more teams do you think would have attempted the 30pt climb (and/or perfected it) if the "climb in succession" rule had not existed?
[In other words, how many more teams would have climbed if they would have been allowed to grab on to something higher and pulled up.]

I personally feel like this is the single rule that makes the whole climb process so hard to complete.

Re: Climbing and dumping not winning?
 

There was a seven disc autonomous available, even if both can't be used simultaneously. Denying the opposition the chance to score those additional four discs is every bit as good as scoring them yourselves. Think 341 in Boston last year. 233's additional center bridge scoring didn't do them any good since 341 already scored those, but in picking them, Daisy removed their most significant competition for the center bridge, greatly reducing the odds that any other alliance would be able to hang with them during hybrid.