Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

^^ The cool thing about that is, 'that Frank guy' and others at FRC do read ChiefDelphi. Our discussions here on things, as long as they're constructive, help make FIRST a better place sometimes.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

The original question was, "Why are we bagging?"

The short answer is: Because FIRST wants it that way.

This is despite all the good reasons people have given for eliminating the bagging requirement:
- less stress on mentors and students (this has been debated to death)
- money currently spent on practice bots could be better spent
- more time for rookies to become minimally competitive
- better quality robots at any given competition for everyone

A more useful way to look at this issue is, given that every year this same issue is raised and debated, why has FIRST not changed things? Why do they seem to be ignoring the expressed desires of many of the teams to eliminate bag day? They seem to be pretty responsive to other legitimate complaints people raise.

My theory is that FIRST has made a management decision that keeping bag day is more supportive of the long term interests and goals of the FIRST organization than eliminating it. To me, the most persuasive and least debatable point in favor is that being able to work on your competition bot until game day saves teams money. It seems to me that helping teams save money is way, way down on the priority list of the FIRST organization. If they wanted to help keep the costs down, they could do so very simply: reduce the budget allowable for the robot. FIRST, in fact, has gone the other direction, raising the budget in 2013 from $3500 to $4000.

Why would they do such a thing? Because it forces teams to do more fundraising to stay competitive. It increases the amount of community relationship building a team must engage in.

Everyone says over and over that FIRST is about inspiration. It's not about making things easier or less stressful or cheaper or even more competitive. It's not about the robot. It's not about the competition. It's about spreading the message.

Read through the criteria for the highest awards FIRST gives, Chairman's, Dean's list and Woodie Flowers. These awards are only peripherally about technical excellence and success on the field. They are given for communications skills and successful PR.

Think about that. The organization which hosts "the super bowl of smarts" gives it's highest awards not for technical excellence, but for excellence in PR.

So, when asking why are we still bagging robots, the question really is, "which is better PR, bagging or not bagging?" I think the answer lies in the line all our students and mentors deliver to everyone who asks us about FIRST. "We have six weeks from kickoff day to design, build and test our robot before it has to go in the bag." That line is PR gold. Why would FIRST ever give it up? To make things easier on the teams? To make it cheaper? To REDUCE the amount of community relationship building necessary to be top tier? I don't think so.

[Full disclosure... I hope FIRST proves me wrong and eliminates bag day. I'd love to be able to work to improve our competition bot right up until our final competition. But, I don't think that's going to happen.]

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

This. Especially in Québec, where at the moment we only have a regional, and the next closest is, notwithstanding districts, at a 4-hours drive from Montréal to the US, or 6-hours drive to Toronto (GTR-W, GTR-E, Oshawa), teams prefer to build a second robot to focus and be competitive for the Montréal regional instead of attending a second event, and IMHO, that's a shame. Stop build day, if there is one, should be as late as possible, i.e. the weekend before week 1 events. If FIRST is "not all about robots" as Dean and Frank often say, letting teams work on their single robot could shift money towards improving their robotics team, finding new mentors or giving students a chance to compete abroad and gain more experience.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Exactly. And I trust them to use that data in addition to internal discussion to make the decision that they consider best.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

The other angle though, is that more competitive robots = a more exciting competition to watch = more sponsors attracted from passers-by who happen to see a regional and go "Oh this is cool, I want to support this."

More competitive robots = more exciting competition = easier to sell to sponsors (both at the team level, and the HQ level).

More competitive robots make it easier to make FIRST loud.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

At the risk of further derailing this thread, for those interested in anecdotes of socioeconomically disadvantaged teams and robotics competitions, this is a great read: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.04/robot.html

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

@ Joe: :)

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

My team has built out of a garage for its entire existence, last year was our first year with a second robot. We do not have access to a water jet cutting machine or cnc machine, yet we still made a second bot and a very good one too. It only took us an extra few days to finish the second robot.This was made possible by planning ahead and getting the parts for the second robot during the 6 weeks when parts on the final bot were finalized. Granted our second robot was not perfectly identical, but it was very close. Bagging the robot should be used, because it simulates real world deadlines. Yes, it is an honor system, but all teams should be trustworthy enough to bag their robot.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I have two main points here to make.

1. I like the Stop Build method for one reason: it sets up a window in which you work on your robot. It enforces a challenging time limit to prevent teams with a huge amount of resources from designing and constructing for months. It helps level the playing field by imposing an even degree of difficulty.

2. Allowing teams to build and practice with a second robot breaks that level playing field. Like you say, teams that have the resources to do it, more or less, do not have that 6 week limit placed on them. Sure, they must do their building on a proxy bot, but the action of physical construction is where you iron out your unforseen problems.

The way I always saw Ship Day or Bag 'n Tag days was a way to ensure every team got the same amount of time to work (and as it has been posted before, that was the original intent of the rule). Now that teams continue work/training/debugging on a proxy bot they are breaking that limit of 6 weeks. The 6 week limit is a good thing, it is the same as having all Regionals on the same day and allowing teams to build up until that day.

FIRST shouldn't be removing the limit, they should be enforcing it strictly by disallowing work on a proxy bot. Basically, disallowing proxy bots. How they enforce that . . . I'm not sure. But the level playing field time limit has to be preserved.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

You got it Joe, we learned to make up our differences by maximizing our strengths and minimizing our weaknesses.

when you lose enough times you start to figure out how to win. The solution is not always money, although it helps. Human resources are far more important so we reach out to all for help, as you well know. :) We also post everything we discover in the hopes of helping others....

Thanks to all to have helped us, I can't say this enough!

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

A practice bot gives the teams that are struggling more time to come up with a better solution for their bot. Also keep in mind the withholding limits and the time it takes to make the adjustments at the tournaments. Its part of the game to work within those constraints. For us where we don't have the resources and the man power of the power house teams, the practice bot has helped level the playing field for us. If there are no practice bots allowed our chances would be greatly diminished.......We will live with in the rules

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Actually it is a lot more work when you don't have the resources, materials or the dollars to purchase said resources. We have cannibalized last year's robot to build this year which is a good use of resources, but not enough for two bots. Fortunately we have a couple great sponsors that allows us to get parts we need to build a robot that does the tasks it needs to, but we try to budget so we have money to start next year, so there is not a lot of fluff to work with.

We are a second year team and I agree with others on here that some of these rules need to be looked at. I don't get having a $100,000 budget for a team. I don't care were you are from. How is that in the spirit of FIRST? In our area local sponsors are already sponsoring youth football, baseball, traveling sport teams, soccer, performing arts and etc. When we come around we are just another in a long line of other non-profits needing assistance. I can't in good faith think about taking up that much money away from other local organizations. If you get the big corporate sponsorship, then I guess more power to you, but I think FIRST should evaluate budgets in terms of the spirit of FIRST and their actual goals and mission.

I think $4000 is too much budget for a robot. That is were we see some really sophisticated robots that other teams will most likely never have a chance to build based on resources. Scale the budget back and we can help a lot of teams be more competitive because the budget is more reasonable.

Here is one of the rules I don't get. I have seen reveal videos of teams that say look what we built in the off season and they are using the drive train for this years robot. We did what we were suppose to do. Get our kit of parts, put it together and build up from there. We used last years robot to learn programming, use it for presentations and driving practice until we had to start robbing Peter to pay Paul. In the spirit of FIRST I thought the rule was for you not to build components that would be used for build season. You can argue with me about the semantics in the rules, but I am sure in "the spirit of FIRST" that was the idea behind the rule. Not to have a jump start on the drive train or other pieces before build season.

What started out to be for kids to get interested in STEM is turning out to be almost commercialized in the fact as in life money becomes the deciding factor of who comes out on top unless you are picked to be on the winning alliance team. Life isn't fair and we have to deal with what we have to work with, but I also don't think FIRST is about helping promote that idea. If it is, maybe I don't understand why FIRST exists then.

I would like to see FIRST consider the following:

1) Have two or three drive trains that are approved and can be used, period. I have been impressed with the new one from AndyMark this year. Not that I have a lot to compare to from the ones in the past, but our team feels like it gives us a better starting point to be competitive.

2) Lower the budget on the robot, but extend the build season one week.

3) Look at starting an FRC Open class. Teams that want to go all out can. If you are not in open then you use a standard drive base and allowed to change gears. You could still run the same amount of matches and teams at a regional, just group them accordingly.

4) Add one week to the stop build day or at least for rookie, 2nd and maybe 3rd year teams. This would just help with programming. How many teams startup and really understand things like visioning. There are teams on the forums just asking some of the basics on how to use Autonomous. Yet, you see samples of very sophisticated code for visioning from years of experience which is great, but how does not always help a young team to get started in programming. The answers on this forum a sometimes vague and answered by people with a lot of experience in a way that a new team should just understand what they mean. Having an extra week could allow more experience teams that stop building assist new teams just get through their code. That seems to be in the spirit of FIRST. Helping others get better. Understandably so, that is hard when we are all in a 6 week crunch time.

We are all coming off of a 6 week build and for some of us a challenging one due to weather issues, but speaking from a young team, I would say it is time for FIRST to evaluate some of these rules to allow new teams to feel encouraged they have a chance. There will always be those who find the loop holes and loose interpretations and go beyond them. After all that is why have them to begin with. In the end it comes down to the people involved. Like basketball, the ball is the same ball for every team, but it is the coaching and the players that make the difference. I would just like to see FIRST be more about having each team use close to the same ball and let the rest be decided for itself.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Brian,
I can see your point........although not saying I agree/disagree with it.
Our program has the resources to build 2,3,4 or even 5 robots if we really wanted to. But we dont have the manpower, passion, or time to make even 1 practice bot at this time.
It also doesnt bother me that other teams do and have a lot more practice/refinement time than us. My body needs a break, my family needs me at home more often, and my day job needs attention after a long 6 weeks and all the preparations leading up to it.

I think the spirit of the build season is as you have described to create an even playing field with respect to time.
But the reality is, over the years, more and more teams have access to better equipment, better design support/capabilities, and more experience to do a second robot while competing in more and more events.

I think FIRST has to figure out how the rules should evolve, if any to either stop it, or support the reality of the changes that hundreds of teams now employ.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

But did you take into account what type of alliance they were on? I witness last year (our first year) rookies being on a winning alliance with two dominate robots. Were the two dominate teams that carried the alliance higher socioeconomic than the one rookie team? We finished 7th in qualifications as a rookie team and was the highest seeded rookies. It was exciting, however we got there not because we scored a lot of points, but because during qualifications we just go the luck of the draw with good alliances. We contributed 25 or 30 maybe 40 points compared to the winning alliance that could shoot all their Frisbees. One team was a rookie team on the winning alliance. That gives two rookie teams high scores. At least you did try to average it over 6 years. That should help level it out.

While the data is interesting, how they finish is not necessarily based on the build of the robot. I am not trying to take away from anyone and their building. Ours had a lot of wood and we really enjoyed were we ended up as a rookie team and we were fortunate to have the right alliances along the way.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

There's a lot I could say in response to Mr. Dibble's post, but I want to focus on one thing:

I myself have absolutely no qualms about taking money from traditional sports programs in favor of funding STEM-related programs. FIRST's founder is fond of pointing out that FRC is among the very few high school sports programs where everyone has a good chance of "going pro".

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

One way would be to not allow any extra parts to come in to the competition. "Run what you brung" for you bracket drag racers out there.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Excellent point.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

You don't have to think very hard to imagine what kind of problems this might cause. Drag racers aren't (supposed to be) colliding at high speed, getting tangled together, reacting against anything other than the ground. FRC robots get banged up. I doubt this is a rule change you'd be asking to make if, say, in your first qualifications match something causes your shooter tensioner to break, or a pneumatic cylinder to get bent, or your electrical system to short out.

I agree - I think that FIRST has recognized that stop-build (I still call it "Ship Day" even though I've never seen a robot shipped on "Ship Day" in my time in FRC) is more of a soft-stop than anything. Students, mentors, and other volunteers need a break, and this "deadline" of sorts encourages a rest. And as far as I'm concerned, this deadline helps speed up progress. There's a deliverable due on stop-build day, and that encourages completion of the goal in my eyes.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I don't see how either of these two make sense.

For 1, what do you gain from restricting people to specific drivetrains? What if a team wants to build a swerve drive, or a jump/H/octocanum drive? Our team likes to use 8020 and build a custom chassis, since it is so much easier to prototype and play around with frame geometry on 8020. If you want to use the kitbot (which is certainly a good drivetrain), then you are welcome to. Don't force it down the throats of teams that want to go the extra step and come up with something innovative.

For number 4, you could argue this would improve a lot of things, but it'll also be unfair for a lot of teams. There are teams that have been vets of FIRST for a long time that can't do what some rookie and 2nd year teams are capable of now. Allowing an extension for teams that have been in existence for only 3 years, regardless of their state of readiness, but ignoring those vet teams that still need help won't help.


I think this thread has derailed enough, and we should bring it back to the topic of discussing stop build day and the bagging rule.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I don't think that you understand what his graph represents. OPR is not a measure of how well a team finishes. In fact, it has absolutely nothing to do with elimination matches, only with qualification matches. Also, I don't believe he used a multi-year average. I think he just used the data from 2008 since OPR is generally considered to correlate well to robot ability that year. For more information about OPR, read the presentation referenced in this thread, especially slides 14 onwards. http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...&highlight=OPR

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

If you would like a more restrictive competition, they're out there. The way I see it, there may be more affordable, more restrictive, more "realistic" programs, but FRC is the high end "flagship" program. It is expensive, big, and flashy. It is not for everyone. It doesn't make sense for some areas to support FRC teams-- look at Iowa, where there are a few hundred FTC teams and (if I remember correctly) less than ten FRC teams.

If you want a cheaper, more controlled program, try FTC, VEX, or BEST. It may sound selfish, but I like the spectacle of FRC-- and so, I believe, do sponsors.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I thought that saying applies more to heads up drag racing...????

Run what ya brung, and hope you brung enough

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Bagging and tagging is part of the fun.
We used it as a means of celebration.
And then we had to high tail outta the school because it was midnight.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I don't know what teams you're looking at, but I can only think of a couple that might have $100,000 budgets.

Most of the ones I can think of? They have 2 or 3 FRC teams which they take to multiple events. The Robodawgs from MI, teams 216, 244, and 288, all went to two districts plus GTREast and Western Canadian regionals in 2013. That's $35,000 in entry fees alone, never mind travel expenses in to Canada twice, plus the cost of 3 robots.

What exactly about going to more events, building more robots, and reaching out to your community more doesn't fit with FIRSTs mission to Inspire and Recognize Science and Technology?

We maybe agree on this point. Except: I don't think I've ever seen an FRC robot that was particularly close to being at $4000 BOM cost, by 2014 accounting rules, which allow you to count any item in the KOP, in unlimited quantities, at $0.

I disagree that budget is anywhere near the top of the list of reasons why teams aren't competitive.

Where do you see this? It is definitely against the 2014 rules (and every year's rules back at least as far as 2003) to start building anything for your 2014 competition robot before kickoff.

There are definitely teams that work on various drive train prototypes in the off season to gain experience, but I've never seen anyone have a fully finalized design that they built before kickoff and then used.

You are just patently wrong on this point. Dozens of teams with little to no resources DO perform well and win events. Yes, there are several powerhouses that have big budgets and spend lots of money, but that's not required for success here, its an artifact of success. Those big budget teams? They got the budget by being successful and inspiring sponsors to give them more money by showing what they could do with it.

I agree that the AM14U kitbot is a considerable improvement over the C-Base kitbot it replaced. I additionally agree that many teams will find that the kitbot is their best starting point to building a competitive robot. What I don't understand is what you think limiting teams to it would achieve, besides stifling creativity.

I already explained why I don't think lowering the budget will change anything. Extending the build season by a week is a no go for many logistical reasons (for starters, FIRST HQ play tests games with team built robots at Week Zero events on the last weekend before stop build, and then often adapts the game field for function and durability before Week 1 competitions.), and extending the build season would only make the gap between the best and the average bigger, because the best (who are already more efficient than average at perfecting their mechanisms) get more time to perfect them.

There are too many reasons to list why this is a bad idea. If you want a more restrictive competition, go play in FLL, VEX, or FTC.

As others have mentioned, there is no simple metric like team age that correlates well with team success. Any system like this would give unfair advantage to strong rookies and unfair disadvantage to weak veterans.

The people involved are what makes rookie sensations like 2056, 4334, 4451, and 4814 happen. None of those teams started with big bags of cash as far as I know, and all 4 of them were hugely successful in their rookie years, because they all had great mentors that understand what this game is all about and how to be successful at it.

The #1 mistake I see teams make is that they try to do too much, and end up not being able to do anything well. Teams that are less fortunate in the resource department are best served by doing a single game function really well. See: 4334 in 2012, 2200 in 2009, numerous teams that only had a really good minibot in 2011.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Actually, the point I am making is that a team like yours DOESN'T have the resources to make two bots. Manpower is a finite resource just like time is. The old team I was on was large enough, and had enough skilled mentors, that we could work just as productively in tandem on two different robots. We had the money, the materials, and the manpower to do it.

FIRST's ultimate goal however is to create competent and impassioned students, and I am not sure that giving teams who have amassed "access to better equipment, better design support/capabilities, and more experience" an advantage is the best way to accomplish this.

To be fair, I understand that those teams who work the hardest and fight to become successful deserve that success. I think showing students that in reality hard-work brings access to better equipment, design, etc. is a positive thing. I don't, however, think that because they are so successful and large that they should get to continue testing and tinkering on-robot when everyone else is barred from that by their team-size, money, or other factors.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

We built our robot in a portable classroom that is used for school materials storage, girl's gym changing area and former elementary classroom without a bathroom that worked.

We have the sum total of: 1 drill press, 1 chop saw, 1 90 degree drill, 1 battery operated small rotary saw, 1 Dremel tool and accessories. The rest of our tools are classic hand tools like...wait for it....screwdrivers, hack saws and the like.

I think we had a great build season. I much rather would walk into a regional knowing my STUDENTS designed, built with sweat equity and actually knew how and why their robot does what it does than outsource all the parts just to keep up with the big spenders. Sometimes we do forget what this is all about. It's about having fun, learning some tech, learning how to operate in work teams, dealing with obstinate mentors (like me), and buying into knowing our robot may not be very "pretty" but it works, works well and does the following consistently: score, catch, pick up and can play "D" if necessary. Our mentors are wood working guys, and our robot looks it. My students walked out of the bag/tag on Tuesday with smiles on their faces knowing they'll be able to compete quite hard in March. We have the funds for 2 robots but neither the technical/mechanical/student numbers to do the second machine. We'll settle for our second/demo CRio and dummy electrical system to fine tune code.

You won't hear any whining from 3355. We learned a long time ago the old Darrell Royal adage: "You dance with who you brung to the prom". Buck up y'all. See ya' at the Dallas Regionals!

Steve Miller
Coach 3355
Purple Vipers

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Only used the analogy in response on how to strictly enforce a stop build day. It is obviously impractical for a mired of reasons.

And before I get taken too far out of context on my original post, my comments are from a 2nd year team/mentor that had challenges beyond just being a 2nd year team. We lost a week and half in terms of build days due to weather and school cancellations. We still managed to get a robot that can pick up a ball, pass a ball and shoot it into the goal or over the truss on limited resources. I am not saying it can't be done.

I also know in reality and in our area we will be challenged to have the fund raising opportunity and the ability to build two robots every year.

I by no means meant to offend veteran teams or any other team. I am concerned for teams in our situation that if FIRST raises entry fees, or budget for robots where will it leave many teams and how competitive can we be. I would hope FIRST would not make it cost prohibitive that teams would have to drop to lower costing organizations. There is a lot of good things going on here and we want to be a part of it for the long haul.

In the meantime we will work to be as competitive as we can with the resources at hand and like many teams will get better towards that goal each year.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Being a new team isn't about 'having a chance'. You're not going to end up at the Superbowl the first time you pick up a football*, expecting to do so is just silly. Being a first year team is about going out and giving it what you got, and seeing how the pros play. See what works, understand why it works, and what doesn't work.

I really think FRC would be a better place if we all learned from the top tier teams instead of complained that they always win. Don't ask for the bar to be lowered, try to raise it.

*There are exceptions, 4334 or 2056 for example. But, look at who was guiding them.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

^^^^ This is awesome!! I can definitely see some correlation between CD and the Team Updates

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Actually, the ultimate goal of FIRST is to inspire students to pursue a STEM related higher education, so they can become competent and impassioned STEM professionals...thus bettering the entire world.

Back on the original subject (ie; bagging) our team worked tonight and probably will be continuing our regular build schedule for practice, spare parts, iteration, etc...up until we atleast play our first district event. Then we will see what additional work is required to continue improving to obtain our goals. Bagging after 6 weeks or not, does not change the process we follow, it just make it more of a hassle to do them once on a practice bot then again on the competition bot.

For our team, we want to inspire through success first and foremost (inspiring through failure when we have too).

This process works for us. What works for you, is for you to decide.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

The point of the program is to provide a learning experience to high school students. When we get into the real working world we will have to face deadlines. Just like in the engineering field you have a project and a deadline for said project. Our project is to build a robot and have a well working team, while working with limited resources, by the time that deadline rolls around.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Just making this distinction again. "Hey, these people are great - how can I be like them?!" is much better for the community as a whole than "Those people are great - how unfair is it that I don't have that right this second?"

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Regarding the actual topic at hand of bagging: I vouch for all the posts here of people who are bone tired, whose real jobs have suffered, and whose families are at the end of their patience. I NEED stop build or I will go crazy. A bit of practice bot work, or light show coding, is fine, but low pressure.

Regarding the zombie topic of how the spirit of FIRST is being lost, I will ignore most of it except the budget issue. My team's budget has never been as large as it currently is. It is beginning to approach about 1/2 of the number that was tossed out as ridiculous. Guess what? We still cannibalized last years bot. We spend our money on trips to explore technology fields, hosting luncheons for young women who meet with a panel of women with careers in advanced technology, paying for our school's Science Olympiad team to compete, buying a spare cRio to share with another team in need of one, and providing the ONLY funding for our school's teen mothers support group. And, for once, the entry fee for a second regional. I'll bet that other teams with large budgets and major sponsors are finding equally worthy ways to spend their money, probably even better and more organized ways.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

To me, the real issue is that the current system is a mashup of the six-week build period and a vague unlimited one that, as far as I can tell, not too many people really like. Almost everyone seems to advocate for either a deadline or the absence of one, and the soft deadline we've ended up with seems to be the best way to keep both sides... at least sort of happy, anyway. Is this really a good long-term solution, though? Compromise is not necessarily a bad thing, but it can be when it doesn't end up helping anyone...

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

It annoys me when people use a statement like this essentially as a counterargument to anyone saying that FIRST can do other great things. Why can't it be both?

This may be a controversial statement, but here goes: Given the massive amount of time, money, energy, etc. put into FIRST, if all it does is convince a few students to switch their college majors, it's not a very efficient program. There's so much more FIRST can and should be doing, and just pointing to the mission statement isn't a very good argument to begin with.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Please don't interpret this as an attack but I feel you have made many statements in this thread without fully supporting them.
Every teacher I've ever had would give you at most half credit for not labelling your axises. To the best of my interpretation your sample size is 26 teams in a single year. Why did you choose Maryland? Do you think factors like years of experience or that individuals on those teams might be completely masking any meaningful correlation? (We've seen what team Copioli made in 3 days using some drills and extrusion.) Would you mind sharing your data analysis experience?

I'm for this study to be completed seeing as it has the potential to effect actual funding.


Do you not believe in diminishing returns? How much better do you expect 118 or 148 to get if the build season was lengthened?

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I've been through most of the discussion, but I haven't found anyone who has brought up the topic of international teams.

For arguments sake, if there were no bagging restrictions: From Australia, we must ship at least a week before the regional, as the robot is next to useless if it's not in the right country. When we attended a week one regional, we actually had to cut a few days off our build season, to ensure the robot made it.

In terms of resources, the vast majority of our budget is spent on travel. We prioritizes taking as many students to a regional, which means that a lot of [robot] options are closed off to us. For many international teams, the cost of attending a regional can be orders of magnitude more than the actual robot. The only viable solution [that I can think of] is to get enough teams to have our own regional, but that is still at least a year off [in Australia]

Up until this season, our mechanical lab has been no larger than a shipping container, even with this, last year we built a practice robot (although it was built almost completely AFTER stop build day), and in comp we came to three points from getting to the finals. I suppose this supports the anecdotal data that you don't need massive resources to build a competitive robot.

All said, I'm not sure what the best solution is, but it certainly is complicated...

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I did not say that every team should only do what the FIRST mission statement says. That is up to each individual team to decide how they want to pursue their goals. But it still is the mission statement or "ultimate goal" as stated in the post I referenced previously.

We follow our interpretation of it and set our goals for how and what we want our students to get out of the program. I think we do a decent job at it, both on and off the field.

If other teams have different priorities, more power to them. That is their choice as to what they want to emphasize.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

1) Eliminate exact replica practice bots

or
1) restrict modifications that can be made to competition bot, gained from practice bot from the period between "bag/Tag" and competition.

2) Restrict modifications gained from multi regional/district competitions

3) Systems specification (Mechanical/ Programming) : teams would submit a Robot Specification along with bag and Tag.

4) Restrict holdback to 24lbs. or 20% of robot weight.

5) extend the build for one week, programming/practice purposes only.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I was rushing to create it in a short break from my day job. I was merely trying to create a visualization of the data, and with the information I gave with it, its easy to figure out what the graph shows.

I agree a sample size of 26 teams is not enough to make a conclusive argument, but it certainly appears to be evidence that there is only a very limited correlation between socioeconomic status of a team's area and their success on field, which is all I was trying to do. I was asked for evidence of my theory, so I delivered some.

I used Maryland, because the person asking for the data was from there, and I know Maryland is a medium sized area for FRC (so I could quickly process the data). Choosing Delaware would have made the data useless (there's only 2 or 3 teams there AFAIK) and choosing Michigan would have taken prohibitively long to process for the time I had. I didn't use Canada because I don't know of any data for median income by postal code.

Certainly I think those factors impact the data, but there aren't many 2056s or 1114s in any particular area, and powerhouses don't seem to hail from a particular end of the socioeconomic spectrum, so I would say that with a large enough data set, it would have limited impact on the average.

While doing this exercise, I noticed that of the team numbers I recognized from Maryland as being successful enough teams that I've heard of them, many were from lower income ZIP codes. Hard to tell if that is just an artifact of my sample size though.

Certainly diminishing returns are a thing. My only really good frame of reference though, is watching 1114 and 2056. What I see there? Every year, 1114 doesn't make it to their practice matches much on the first day of their first regional, because they're busy toiling away applying everything learned between ship and competition on the practice bot to the competition robot. That tells me a longer build season would still benefit them.

To the other points being made in this thread, particularly the ones about raising the bar, instead of trying to drag down the superstars? The other really cool thing about FRC is that the superstars are for the most part eager to help. Go talk to them, and they'll help you to be more like them.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

On the side discussion: looking at a single event in a single year is a terrible way to establish a trend or lack thereof. It's not good data. How about this: Take a sample of teams with different global OPR ranks and compare them to median income of their home city. See what the general trend is. This data won't prove anything about the sturcture of FRC being flawed, but I bet you would get a nice linear fit. Don't pick a single state or region.

On practice bots: Anyone who wants to keep saying or implying that practice bots take minimal extra effort and just require money can go ahead and talk to my team full of exhausted students, teachers, and mentors. The extra budget (I'd guess $2000 more) is nothing compared to literally doubling your entire workload. Anybody who pulls off the feat of doing twice the build work in six weeks has earned it.

Don't get me started on how your team is "incapable" of building a practice robot, and thus you have to stifle anyone who worked their butts off to make one. First of all, you could always build two less capable, simpler robots. You would have a more competitive season than the single "do everything" doohickey you likely have now. Second, what's less inspiring then telling a team of kids "yeah, I know you want to work extra hard to achieve excellence, but we have to hold ourselves back to match other teams effort"?

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I intended to put STEM in that sentence of mine but, now that you mention it, I am fairly certain that FIRST's goal includes shaping professionals of all disciplines.

But to my point, proxy robot's are very useful, and they likely do a lot to help your team be great, I just don't think it conforms with the spirit of "build season" which has existed since FIRST's inception.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I'm sorry to "get you started" but many teams literally do not have the resources/money. It isn't always a matter of just putting in more hard work. And that last bit there is really making a lot of assumptions that are only going to apply to some teams. Working extra hard to achieve excellence has NOTHING to do with building multiple robots; you can put that energy into more prototypes, a more modular design, higher goals, etc. And the fact that you would be limited to off-bot work after Stop Build day engenders more creativity in the way you do that work.

I'm not saying that disallowing proxy bots is the objective better way in all situations to inspire students, I'm just saying that is has some really great merits and seems much more true to the spirit of FIRST. I think it would make the competition more of a factor of how well and how efficiently you can work in 6 weeks.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

An interesting discussion for sure.

My 2 cents:

Back in 1999 when Lassie was still a puppy we got started in FIRST with team 311. That year there were 8 Regionals in TOTAL. Not in just in one weekend and then Champioships.

The team signed up built a robot for “Double Trouble” and off we went to Philadelphia for the Regional.

When we got there we uncrated and started making last minute adjustments to our machine. That’s when we noticed many other teams taking apart their machines and installing different mechanisms. Being Rookies we realized later that they were installing upgrades based on information they had found out from attending a prior Regional.

Thinking back to that first FIRST competition for us, we did not perform well overall but we sure learned a lot about what to do and what not to do. 15 years later working with teams we still follow some of the basic things we learned on that trip and from very year since then.

OK enough ancient history.

Look at FIRST robotics, Bag & Tag and the differences between the “have” and “have not” teams as a reflection of real life:

There will always be teams/companies/people with MORE resources than you have. Aspire to be like them IF they are indeed good role models.

In real life not everyone that wins or is good at something is a good role model.

There will always be other with LESS resources than you. Reach out to them and Inspire them to learn and grow.

In both your personal and business life there will always be the have’s and have not’s . The answer to this is to make the best use of whatever resources you have.

If you want to build cars and be like FORD. Great, but it takes time. Nobody ever started at the top.

Just ask Elon Musk! ;)

Do you think Dean Kamen started where he is now? Do a little research and find out how long he’s been inventing, how he started as a teen in Rockville Centre NY. What he initially designed and built to fund what he REALLY wanted to do.

It’s OK to be frustrated when you think that life, or a competition isn’t fair. But instead of taking a stance of “let’s change the rules” as your only suggestion.

Take a line from another successful organization:

Improvise, adapt and overcome. *

In the end you will be better for it.





* USMC

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Sorry, but you're wrong. Championship has been around since at least 1995: http://www.usfirst.org/whats-going-o...rogramCode=FRC

And there were 8 regionals in 1999, plus the Championship for 9 events total.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_Trouble_(FIRST)

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Fixed! Thanks for the reminder. My CRS kicks in sometimes...

I like how YOU had to go to Wikipedia though. :D

Knowing where to look things up IS important!!

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Heh. To be fair, I wasn't around until 2003, so it would be hard for me to remember what the landscape was like in 1999.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I call it a tie.

Try not to use Wikipedia as a source.
That article seems to have errors and the source links are mostly broken.

Does anyone have first source evidence of any event in 1999 at
One was originally talked about, but I don't believe that it ever materialized.

Here's the FIRST website from the Internet Archive listing the events for that year.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

If your going to advocate for such extreme changes, at least try to provide your reasoning. Just writing down this list isn't really helping the discussion. I would be interested to hear why you think so.


I am still on the fence with this issue, but I will say this: just because something is more fair doesn't mean it's better. If a little bit of unfrairness helps FIRST to better achieve its goals, than it is a good thing.

How this plays into the issue at hand, I am still not sure. Maybe the unfairness of bag and tag (if it even is unfair) is deterring students from persuing STEM carreers. But fairness in and of itself is not a justification for anything in my eyes.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

+1

I would welcome some of the well thought out improvements from IKE in this post. Until then though, we have found a process that works for us and is a huge benefit to our students.

It also happens to be a lot of work (shhh, keep this between us, but I think the students working hard is the best part of FIRST ;))

-Mike

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Working backwards:

5) Low resouces teams often find themselves in a position that their robot is primarily complete but programming and testing is not. This is why I have seen many teams including ours not make a single practice round. There is very little help available at competitions, as everyone is very busy with their own robots. An extra week for programming and testing only, would provide the relief mentors need from the build and also provide relief from the highly stressful Thursdays.

4) Restricting holdback to 20% would prevent teams from major redesign's of major systems. I have seen many "bagged" robots that were not operable, only to go through a complete overhaul.

3) System specifications would keep everyone honest.

2) The major financial commitment that multi regionals require, prohibit many teams from going to more than one. This is a direct relation to cost/performanance. One extra regional and a practice robot would double our budget.

1) Practice robots are clearly an enormous advatage to teams that have the resources to complete them. Using an exact replica to practice with and revise, is no different than working on the one in the bag. Put a non-working bot in the bag, refine parts on your "practice bot" install them on Thursday. Teams could continue to use their "practice bot" for their intended purpose, PRACTICE. Driver traing, game strategy would remain a huge benifit alone.

If the rules require that these bots be built in 6 weeks, then let's keep it 6 weeks.

Where in the "real World" Do you get to manufacture a part or assembly, deliver that part to your customer and then in a few weeks deliver the one that works?

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I don't understand how so many people can complain about practice bots, but not about withholding allowance. A practice bot is just an effective way of using your withholding allowance to continue to develop components. You can't just ban teams from making practice bots, but keep a withholding allowance when you argue that practice bots are against the spirit of FIRST build season. Either be content in the argument that practice bots are a way to utilize the withholding allowance, or eliminate both.

EDIT: Fun fact, there used to be a time in FIRST where there was no withholding allowance. It was just 6 weeks, can't bring anything into competition except tools, and you couldn't even write code between ship day and competition day. It would be interesting to see if there was any data on average scores before and after withholding allowance was a rule.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

My interpretation of the withholding allowance is to help teams that don't finish their bot , finish them. You are assuming that every team that uses the allowace has a practice bot and is revising their systems. Some teams just dont get it done, the withholding allowance is a saftey.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Where in the "real world" do you have a safety net

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Not saying it is good for consumers, or acceptable, but almost every single video game with an online multiplayer component made in the last few years fit this definition.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I'm sorry but this is just absurdly ignorant.

Your point 5 is valid for way more teams than those who just have "low resources."

Your point 4 is alos bad because withholding isnt just for entirely new systems. If any team wants to create backup parts for alot of their robot knowing that it is very likely to be damage or take damage over time, they wont be able to because the withholding allowance you propose is too little; thus cutting their season short for not have a competition capable robot.

Your point 3 is just pointless.

Your point 2 is probably the absolute worst one you made. Limiting teams to 1 regional is a slap in the face to those students and team members who worked for 6 weeks to build a robot and however long to fundraise there travel/competition money to only be told that they can only go to 1 competition; you tell those kids that they only get 10 matches guaranteed a year and watch how quick the life drains out of their faces.

Your point 1 also emphasizes the fact that you really dont understand what a practice robot is. Most teams that I have known to build practice robots build the entire robot simultaneously with their competition robot. That means they bag the whole thing and just use the extra for driver/programmer practice. Also, you seem to think teams with enormous resources only build practice robots; I know for a fact that teams without enormous resources and tons of students build practice robots no problem. Like many others have said, it truly does depend on student drive.

Also, I guess you've never heard of Beta testing.

Why have your own interpretation when R18 and Team Update 2-11-14 clearly outline FIRST's intention with regards to the withholding allowance

Also, I never implied in my post that all teams that withhold have practice bots. I simply stated that practice bots are a way of utilizing the withholding allowance.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Unemployment Insurance benefits

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

The world does not exist on video games alone

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

You assume much about me and my experience and speak for a large group of other teams. I off no personal attacks, withdraw my post and cancel my account good luck to all.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

To this point.

So is attending more than one event. How would you address teams that build a Betabot for practice and attend only 1 event.

These Betabots aren't necessarily fully compliant and up to date with this years rules. Most are modified versions of prior year machines. The ones that are identical twins to the bagged machine are in the very very low miinority.

Remember, there is a very large contingent of teams that attend only 1 event.

Would you restrict teams to the number of events they can attend?

It's interesting once you bring up questions about how things are done that, after researching it a bit you find out that pretty much everything is a compromise.

This applies to many things outside FIRST too.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

You asked for an example in the real world. I gave you one.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

It seems that many people are missing the real issues here. It's far, far less about money than it is about two other things.

First the minor one: Space to practice. Yes, I know that some teams perform well having nothing less than a classroom with a low ceiling to practice in, but having space for a full practice field or even a full competition field is a huge advantage. In some places, this real estate is by far the greatest donation a team has. It doesn't make sense to build a practice robot or even have access to your competition robot if you have no space to practice with it.

But the most important "resource" any team has is MENTORS skilled and experienced in doing this robotics thing. Specifically MENTORS who have TIME. I would argue that this is most likely the single difference between "powerhouse" teams and struggling teams in terms of their performance on the field. FRC is a game of mentors. For some teams, it is a struggle to get 60 mentor-hours during the 6 week build season and then they show up at a regional. Other teams have up to FIFTY TIMES more mentor-hours starting well before kickoff and on through the competition season.

If you don't have the mentors who can spend the time away from their jobs/families/schooling/other commitments, it doesn't matter what your other resources are. In order to buy the time with a practice robot, you have to have the time in the first place.

I, for one, would like to see a "build one, bring one, no withholding" system, but even then, the difference will be the mentors each team has.

- Mr. Van
Coach, Robodox

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

^^^^

This

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Definitely going to 3rd this.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I'm a little alarmed at the hostility at which people are treating the minority opinion on some of these issues. Just because an opinion is not popular on Chief Delphi doesn't mean a large portion of FRC competitors feel that way. It's more important to understand why they feel that way than it is to attempt to convince they're wrong through vigorous debate. I don't mean to squelch the debate on this topic, but try to be more empathetic.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

<Cue comments about how CD is disproportionately heavy on teams and people that make up those powerhouses>

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I've been reading this thread since the beginning, and only have one simple thought:

I'd love to only have to build one robot, (and not be at a huge competitive disadvantage,) and spend the money previously allocated for a practice robot on travel for the students to outside regionals, championships, etc.

It's still about the students. I want them to enjoy the benefits of fielding a competitive robot, but I also want them all to see it perform.

-Nick

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

When the part you ship first is the beta version.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I'm not sure how I feel about the bagging. We just kinda do what FIRST asks of us. It seemed a natural evolution from shipping the robots everywhere so we could have regionals one week sooner and not press the ceiling on the Fedex sponsorship.

But I have spent much of my career in the "real world" designing and delivering systems (or modifications to systems) in weeks, not months. It is called quick-turn engineering. And sometimes we deliver a sub-functional product if that helps our customer work out any issues and pull their schedule in. Like my signature says "Fast, cheap or working - pick any two" - I spent most of my career in the working fast mode with less regard to cost. It happens.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I suspect... whatever changes are made (or not made) to the system won't significantly change the "gap" between "powerhouse" and "not-powerhouse" teams. I believe the gap will shift, but not to any major extent. 67 will still build a powerhouse robot. 1114 will still be a "Vegas odds" favorite to win their division. 254 will still build a machine which stands above others.

However, I do believe that the overall quality of machines could decrease if we limit things more in a significant way, as some have suggested.
Imagine if FIRST said "don't work after 6-weeks... don't build a practice bot... if you do, you're cheating.":

I suspect teams will attempt lower-performing robots which they know they can finish during the 6-weeks, instead of relying on the 45-lb safety net to catch them if they fail spectacularly.

I suspect more teams will over-reach, and have no means to finish the machines they do attempt. I imagine these teams will fall-back to defensive play as a strategy which requires only driving. We'll have a lot of such teams playing.

I suspect great teams will continue to build great robots, but they won't be as great as they could have been. (If we're only allowed to use plywood, 254 will build a very cool plywood robot... and be very grumpy about it.)

However, I agree that mentors will burn out less. I agree that students will burn out less. I personally, would get more sleep.

My opinion, is that this would be good for individuals, but bad for the program.
I am one of those people who believes that exciting robots, and exciting matches are good for this program. I worry about the impact any of these changes would have on the overall gameplay at the elite level (which, I personally believe is important to the viability of this program).

I watched a bunch of old matches the other day with my students. It is surprising to me how badly these games have aged. Robots are slow and clunky. Things which I remember being incredible now seem ho-hum. I personally wouldn't want to go back to that level of performance.

Everything involves tradeoffs. Everything requires balance. Nothing is black and white. Shifts in one thing will cause other things to also shift; some of these shifts will not be predictable.

-John

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

So are they powerhouses because they are on CD or are they on CD because they are powerhouses? :confused:

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

This is one of the major benefits of the district system.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Seconded

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Yes.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

well said - I concur and we are definitely not a "power house" team

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Howzit!!

As an outer island team we have no other option but to crate our robot. Yes in its' bag..
As a small team with 3 volunteer mentors, burnout is one of the hardest thing to avoid.

This year was especially difficult. We had numerous supply issues. We started ordering aluminum stock as well as drivetrain parts in early December. Just to have it all delayed until the end of January.

When we did finally did get our stock we had the misfortune of our competition frame warping during welding of the upper structures to it. Sadly a student clamped the parts far too hard before he welded it...

Tough learning moment, and as it turns out, we are turning it into a practice shooting bot.
We decided to withhold our shooter system for it. We now have plans to repair the frame and turn it into a tee shirt cannon during the off season. An ideal moment to turn a negative into a positive!

When our transmissions did arrive, they were not complete. VexPro did come through and ship us the missing parts in record time, thankfully.

All these “setbacks” caused us to have to complete our robot in a little less than 3 weeks.

We helped maximize our build time and reduce the “burnout” by working in shifts.

Even so, we are quite spent… Not to mention we have other competition during this time taxing our students as well…

That said.. I think the tag and bag is a good end to the build season. It gives completion to the process.

Yes I would of just rather crated it and ship it off, since we have to do it anyways, but with the bag process it gives us a few days to properly load what is needed in our crate prior to shipping.

The first year or two, for us, the stop build day was a stressful event. Just to get everything tossed in the crate and make the robot fit as fast as possible was crazy.
The bagging process reduces a lot of packing and shipping stress on us and THAT is a good thing.. We get about a week to properly gather the correct spares and tools needed properly crated and safely secure our robot.

I like the idea of district competition but out here it is not feasible yet. There just isn’t enough teams locally. Even if there was, half of us will still need to ship our robot to the venue. If the competition is over multiple weekends that would be costly to do, even if the robot was stored at the venue for the weeks of the competition. The costs for travel and lodging would not make it feasible for most of the teams here. Shipping is the biggest killer to the teams in Hawaii. Everything is either boated, takes a minimum of 11 days from California, or air freighted which is super expensive and still take 3-4 days at best.

If Hawaii was added as a district competition, with all the additional travel and time, it would sure add to the mentor burnout..

Sorry for the long winded post. Good luck to everyone this season,

Aloha!

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

We just bought a half field of carpet from Home Depot that's reasonably close to field spec for about $300. We just lay it down outside whenever we want to practice, and roll it up and put it back into our shop when were done. Maybe $300 is a lot for other teams, but when you consider all the seasons you'll use the carpet for, it's a really great investment.

This too.

I don't know, they seemed to be pretty psyched about Skystalker...

What most people don't understand about powerhouse teams like 254 is that even if you took away all their resources, money, and facilities, they'd still be quite good. It's their insane drive, experience, and belief that nothing is good enough that make them so amazing on the field. If you believe that lots of resources, funds, time and practice robots are all that's necessary to make a winning team, there are tons of great counterexamples, including 100.

Why do we bag? Because it's part of the challenge. I'm not sure that removing bag and tag would result in more competitive robots, but it probably would reduce the cost of being competitive, at least for some teams.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I'm sorry, you think this is a bad thing?

grumble grumble California sun grumble grumble.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Hey, it's not all fun and games here in Northern California! We had to wear jackets at the practice field ship weekend. It was almost 55 degrees!

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

It must be so hard on you guys. I've been wearing sandals for weeks.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I don't know what you would wear for sub zero temperatures! And even 20 below. I feel SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO bad for you.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

As a matter of fact... it's not even a problem with bagged robots. 71 and 233 are legendary for their demonstrated ability to come out of their crate (or bag, lately) with a pile of parts, either from the crate/bag or brought in, and make semis or higher.

Not for Torbots. We have to break out the lights to practice at night--our outdoor practice space is also used as a parking lot, but is poorly lit at night. (During the day, we use solar lighting.)


Oh, and with regards to practice robots: ours was running around by Week 2 with rough prototypes fully added by Week 3. It helps when last year had a similar drivetrain, and similar lower frame design, AND a practice robot that is functional again. We'll also be bringing quite a few spares of one of our key items in the withholding. (And quite possibly some dead weight--we're a smidge under.)

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

As far as I remember 1717 has come in with little more than a bagged drivetrain the past two years to LA, and won both times.