The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Hey guys! Chandler from Team 3556 here, and I would like to show you all our very first app now available on the app store. The app takes into account the 35 possible Alliance combinations and gives you the best point-maximizing play for the game. Be sure to rate, comment, and share with everyone. Feedback would be much appreciated to!

P.S. The app is only available for android devices currently, all you have to do is scan the qr code below to get it!

Update: the QR code is now a good-size for scanning.

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Would you mind including a normal link? For one thing, that QR code is too big for my browser window, and I'm sure I'm not the only one...

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

I'd also like to hear about your algorithm for choosing the "best" play for the alliance combinations. Are you guys using OPR? Scouting? Magic?

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Woah! Didn't even notice that, sorry about that. Here's a regular link. I'll work on resizing the QR code and put it in my signature.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/d...2014Pl aybook

Also, if you just look up FRC on the Google Play store, it should come up. It's name is "2014 FRC Playbook".

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Ervin, as much as I would love to say we were using magic, the only magic here is a little bit of coding and working together. We figured out that we have a few different types of robots, an "All" robot, "Shooting" robot, "Catching" robot, "Pushing" robot, and a scenario which exists if no robot is on the field for the match. More information on what each robot class is is detailed in the app on the about page, and there are a few assumptions made, such as a shooting robot should be able to pass the ball over the truss.

After we defined what each robot type was, we sat down and figured out "how to make the best, most-point-maximizing" play for each scenario, which would of course be a 3-assist over-the-truss pass and high goal shot. We do not account for defense in our app (we had a very limited time to finish this as our competition is next week). In our app, you simply just choose what each alliance partner is capable of and it will generate your play, which one of our members drew in AutoCAD.

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

I don't have a cell. Could you make a version that could be usable by people like me (an online version, for example)?

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Pretty nice App. Any reason why you didn't include human interactions outside of bringing the ball into play?

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Alexander, we currently have no plans to make an online version of our app, like I said, we had a very limited time to do this and it's our first attempt at app-building. We do, however, have plans to put our resources for various things (like coding) in a public dropbox folder for everyone to enjoy. I'll see if we can't get all the images from the playbook in there for you and others to see!

Do you have a mentor on your team, or fellow teammate who could download it in the meantime? It works on everything android, from phones to tablets.

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

IronicDeadBird, thank you! I believe we didn't add human interaction beside bringing the ball into play because it didnt fit into our "point-maximizing" scenario. Don't quote me on that though, I'll talk to our play-master tomorrow and get more information on it.

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

What wasn't included was having a robot shoot over the truss into a human player. I was curious to see if you had done math on this and chosen not to include it because of the math or if it just wasn't thought of during development.

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Thanks! I'm looking forward to seeing some pics! No, there's no one around me right now who has a cellphone (and even if there was someone with a phone nearby, most people have iPhones anyways!)

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

IronDeadBird, just talked to another mentor who was very involved on this. We did discuss it because that very well is a possibility, but we did make the assumption that every robot is a "push" robot, as it can push the ball around, and we figured that a pass over the truss to a push robot is just as easy to accomplish (if not easier) than a pass to a human player.

Alexander, thanks! We should have the link up here tomorrow, so be sure to check back and tell your team about it!

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Ah I understand the logic behind it now. I was talking more in terms of a robot that can shoot but has trouble with pickup, a robot that loads fastest with human assistance this would make sense. This devolves into all sorts of hypothetical situations and those go on forever.

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Indeed they do. Had we not had a very limited time to do this, we may have tried for those hypothetical situations. Next time.

Re: The Aerial Assist Playbook
 

Will do, thanks!