Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I keep reading these threads, and people seem to think this game is terrible.
People are saying this game is 'worse than 2003', 'fouls decide too many matches', 'if you have one really bad alliance member, you will lose'. This negativity is just terrible for FIRST. I feel like most people never gave this game a fair chance, just because it is a little different.

1) 'Worse than 2003': I wasn't around in 2003 for the game so I may be incorrect, but from what I've heard, what was bad was that it was nearly impossible to score after autonomous, and robot parts were on the field after almost each match from poor field setup. In this game, scoring is possible after autonomous. This is clearly evidenced by the scores that are being put up after autonomous. Also, the field is well set up, with no field elements causing damage without the fault of a team.

2) 'fouls decide too many matches': While in Week 1, teams may have drawn fouls which decided some matches, that has been fixed. If teams are drawing fouls, they should be more careful, and READ THE MANUAL. Also, if you notice that your future alliance partners are getting fouls, tell them what they are doing and how to stop. When you are scouting for eliminations, a good thing to rank on MIGHT BE to make sure they don't get many fouls. There is a reason Technical Fouls are 50 points. THEY DONT WANT THOSE THINGS HAPPENING. Don't do those things. Also, fouls decide games every year.

3) 'if you have one really bad alliance member, you will lose': No. This is how most team sports work, so why should it be different here? It should be a team effort. In football, you cannot have just a good quarterback who carries the team. You have to have receivers who catch the ball. In baseball, you cannot have a good pitcher who holds the tem to one run, if your hitters cannot score.

Honestly, I think this game is one of the best. For once, you can be a 6, 7, or 8 captain, and not abandon all hope once you are set there. Upsets happen more often, defense is a viable strategy, and spectators are entertained. I would like to hear a legitimate reason that this game is bad.

Sorry if this seems ranty

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I love this game.

Point disproved.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

On the subject of fouls, I would check out the elims at Waterloo. I'm certain they have all read the rules, but the fouls were out of the teams' control.

Personally, I enjoy the concept and the idea of the game, but it is also quite frustrating as to how subjective this game can be.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I love this game on the game side but the fouls and inconsistent reffing are driving me crazy. The "new Thursday rules" were reffed seemingly completely opposite on Friday and Saturday at the Wisconsin regional from my estimation, giving teams an incorrect idea of how they would be called in eliminations.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I agree. The game itself is great and is a lot of fun to play and watch; the issue is the rules, which give a ludicrous amount of penelty points and put far too much pressure on the referees with its subjectivity.

I am not sure that everyone would call the game horrible, but it is important to contrast it with previous games which did not have many of the issues faced in Aerial Assist.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

But in football, your team has control of those factors. A top level football team can ensure they have the best quarterback AND receivers. With the alliances of First, you bring the quarterback and someone else brings a receiver, and they play together. This ties into your second point as well. Sure I may know all the rules, but maybe my partner doesn't. Their fouls are mine because they are on my alliance.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I was chatting with one of our Alumni on the way back from our event today and we agreed this game is a lot like watching college basketball. Watch a good match up and its an elegant display of coordination and strategies that adapt and flow over the course of the math. Alternatively it can be a jumbled mess of that doesn't appear to be accomplishing much at all.

After watching the progression of our regional event this weekend the more I look forward to district play and the ability to give my students more time behind the glass in a competition environment.

Not my thought but one of our team member's parent likened some matches to small children playing soccer, all the robots in a herd around the ball with no real coordination or play calling.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

This game is fun to play. Watching it is pretty boring if you don't a lot about the game. Also, if there aren't good teams playing a match, I could fall asleep. If good teams are playing (like Waterloo Regional elims), it's edge of your seat excitement.

I would agree with the statement that fouls decide matches. Every event I have watched so far, fouls TOTALLY swing matches.

I also don't like how much you have to rely on your alliance partners to win. I get FIRST's love of working together but if one robot loses comm. or breaks, the match is basically over. This happened in Finals match 2 at Waterloo. Don't get me wrong. I do like the coopertition idea.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I'm really enjoying it too. And if anyone has a right to complain, it might be me. I think the game is fun to watch and challenging to play, and that there are lots of different paths to victory.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I won't deny that fouls are still frequent, but I believe most of our matches (especially in Elims) have been foul-free.

At Kickoff I was hesitant to embrace this game, it was a different game, that would require more reliance on our partners. I wasn't sure I would like it.

I love this game.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

While that's fine and dandy, my human player's super rule reading abilities can't stop our alliance partner who did not read the rules from drawing fouls. One bad seed on your alliance in the form of no show, dead robot, nonfunctioning robot, brick on wheels, non rule believers, ect is a shot in your alliance's foot. Thus, qualifications are basically meaningless this season. Your top few will most likely be the good front zone scorers, after that qualifications are really just a rank randomizer.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I dont remember the match or teams involved, but at wisconsin, the outcome of an elimination match was changed by 100 points in fouls. In my opinion for there to be 100 points in fouls, there should be no doubt in anyones mind what happened. For 100 foul points there should be a fire, a bloody finger on the field, or something obvious. The reality is 3 kids in the question box wondering what the hell happened. That sucks.
This game could have been one of the best.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I'm sure there are 5000 posts that have said this on CD over the years, but it seems appropriate to once again point out that unless you are top three, qualification wins and losses really don't matter. Who cares if you have a partner who fouls a lot? Do you think scouts will actually blame your team? Just play your best, win when you can, and know you'll make it to elims if you've got what it takes.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

For one thing, if you have an alliance partner that is incapable of possessing a ball, is dead on the field, or does not show up for a match you are then at a huge disadvantage because you cannot get three assists and those 10 extra points per cycle that the opposing alliance might be able to get, AND it makes it easier for the opposing alliance to play defense on yours if you only have two scoring robots, because they'll have to exchange the ball somewhere.

Also, there are a lot of complaints about the fouls in this game, and while I agree that the value for a technical is a bit too high, my main problem with fouls is that they are inconsistently called not just between different regionals, but even in the same regional. I've seen too many times where a team is called for a foul that another team also should have received but didn't. This is most likely attributed to the fact that the referees have just too much to keep track of, and it makes it difficult to see and/or call everything.

While this game was designed at enforcing teamwork amongst an alliance, and does so, there is a lot of improvements that could have been made to this game.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

The opinions expressed below are mine, and I take full ownership of them. They do not reflect the opinions of other members of Team 20 (in fact, some of them are quite fond of this year's game and try to turn me around), or any other entities I'm associated with.

If I'm interpreting Andrew Screiber's tweet correctly (found here, and assuming the usual Twitter caveats), that's pretty insane. Assuming the assumptions and conditions hold for a one proportion z interval, we get a 95% confidence interval that the true proportion of all FRC matches decided by fouls is in between 16.785% and 19.165%. Even though I don't have a baseline from previous years, the idea that nearly 1 in 5 matches are decided by fouls is crazy.

I theorize that most of this is due to game design. Teams are rewarded and punished for accomplishing the same tasks: possessing a ball could give your alliance a 10 or 20 point boost, or a technical foul. Similarly, catching a ball is 10 points, or a technical foul. The only difference in these tasks are the color of the ball.

Additionally, I've yet to see a ball pickup that doesn't go outside of frame perimeter and is effective. This leaves robot subsystems vulnerable damage from hard defense (addressed in the G27 update, but still an issue), and opens up a Pandora's box of G28 issues.

In the case of a dead robot, it does halve the amount of assist points your alliance can generate, and potentially costs time in a dead ball card, the win margin (via defense), and completely changes the strategy for your alliance -- and while that's something that every alliance should be prepared to react to, most aren't.

Robots that have a propensity for drawing fouls are just as distasteful, but are even more likely to swing the outcome of a match.

So yeah, I'd say that a bad robot can really spoil things for the rest of your alliance, who are punished for choices they didn't make.


My theory for why all the upsets happen is related to my previous point. In district events with ~30 teams, the 2nd pick by the #1 seed is generally a robot that minimizes damage to the alliance, not expanding the horizons of the alliance. And that robot can really ruin things for their partners.

There's been a number of execution things missing from the game. Hot goal timing and when robots were disables was messed up at some Week 1 and 2 events, but seems to be mostly fixed now. Today, at the Southington District Event, I saw some pretty obvious pedestal issues where the pedestals would light 10 seconds or so after the previous cycle was completed. And while competing at Tech Valley, we had to quickly modify our intake to not stall while sucking up balls that were over-inflated (within the scope of ambiguous rules; they were 26.5 in or so, as compared to the non-official spec in the field videos of 25 in -- the inflation guide is incredibly subjective, and the ball's volume, pressure, and other properties varies with temperature).

And, I can't tell you how many grandparents, parents, and spectators have come to me asking about how this year's game is scored. And that explanation is not as short, concise, easy to understand, or as intuitive as it should be.

My major complaint is that the level of inspiring gameplay is relatively unattainable by most teams; I've only seen it in Waterloo eliminations. They way I think the GDC intended the game to be played is only doable (currently; I'd really like to see this change) by the god-tier teams of 254 and 2056.

But all of that aside, I think the major reason that people have a hard time with this game is because the previous year's game, Ultimate Ascent, is widely considered to be the best game ever. There was incredible design parity, many different ways to accomplish tasks (floor pickup, FCS, climb, cycle), fair fouls, game pieces that were impossible to be oversized, have density discrepancies, or be improperly inflated, and incredible alliances that capitalized on each other's strengths.

And after that, who would be satisfied with a lesser game?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

But what about the teams who's goal is be a captain? To seed first? What about the team who seeds 8th but could have been 3rd if it weren't for one foul?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I completely agree. I don't remember high speed ramming being called once all qualifications, at least not in the matches I watched or played in. And then suddenly there were 10+ throughout elims. What constitutes high speed ramming? What if two robots moving at "high speeds" hit each other? Who do you penalize? Should a robot moving at a "high speed" be penalized for an opposing robot moving into it's path? Too much left up to the refs to decide.

Besides that I love this game. The strategy is so much more fun than essentially playing a match by yourself, just making sure not to get in your partners way. This does not however make quals any more fun. You really have to prove your worth to those in the top 8 if you want to ensure a spot in the elims. But once you get there the strategies you can plan out with your alliance are so much more fun (and usually more successful).

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Care to explain this point?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

If a team has their intake out, a team cannot just run into them and draw a foul.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

The lack of an end game is also an extremely notable point. The vast majority of people outside of FIRST I know who watch the matches as a spectator were disappointed by the lack of an end game for this year, even if the qualification and elimination matches they watched were pretty nifty (Canada has the best regionals :p )

In 2011, I enjoyed the minibot. FMS issues aside, it was a quick yet dramatic buildup to the towers lighting up, and watching the minibots race was really exciting. Then the game was picked up a notch into my personal favourite end game with the balance bridges the following year, and the still amazing and, to many, the more exciting "pyramid" end game.

These end games were exciting; they kept you on the edge of your seats, wondering if by some huge drama, the game would flip the tables in a few moments' notice. It gave teams another function on their robot, which allowed for more innovation, more opportunity to shine and some attention from scouts instead of having a bunch of one-trick ponies shooting to the human player, goal posts, over the truss, etc. There's variety for sure, but it's still relatively linear in that shooting and passing in the same capacity (as in you can just set one type of shooting, like going far away, and do anything in the game with only that mechanism) and you miss out on some really interesting methods of getting the game done.

Making more matches exciting not only helps keep spectators watching, but it gets them, the players and the other team members pumped up for the competition.

This year, as a fellow 781 team member said it best, the end game exists as fouls. Other parts of the game were already touched on before I posted here, so I'll just leave this as it is.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

More power to you. Is this year really that much different in terms of these goals than previous years? Watching Waterloo, I saw lots of matches with one great robot, one that struggled and one that barely moved in alliances where they won by a wide margin thanks to strategic play from the great bot. The best robots in Utah seeded first and second. And if your bot went from 3rd to 8th based on nothing more than a foul caused by your alliance partner's poor play, do you think the scouts in #1 and #2 don't know how great you are?

I'm not saying that rules and human error in reffing calls aren't deciding some matches; clearly they are, and they've changed my team's fate in our first regional. But I've been doing FRC for 10 years and have seen that happen before, in almost every year's game. That's part of what happens.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I like it. It's fun, it's challenging...it can be frustrating because the match schedule can decide who is picking whom...but in the elimination rounds, the teams get sorted out, who is the best.

Fouls were not an issue at Arizona.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Here is an example of a foul that just baffled us this weekend. A robot on the opposing alliance rammed our alliance partner and got caught on them. Our partner backed away and got a 50 point foul. The referees agreed this is what happened, but said because they were caught on us and it pulled their bot when our alliance backed away it was "against the spirit of first".

Another example from this weekend. We had 2 bots on our alliances that had issues. They barely moved the entire match. The other alliance's ball landed on one of the unmoving bot. We ended up with 170 foul points that match (holding and extended hold).

It isn't so much the fouls, it is more the amount that the fouls seem to effect the outcome. If they weren't 50 points a pop it might not affect the game so much.

The other thing wrong with this game is the scoring seems... off a lot of the time. The referees are so busy watching for fouls that they miss little things. Like auton points. We had a match where they didn't count any of our autonomous points. We sent a member to ask about it. They went ahead with one or two matches before talking to him and just told him "we don't have a record of that".

It is difficult to play a game when the rules are so interpretive.

That all said, the game itself is actually growing on me. It is fast paced and fun, but they need to fix the foul issue.

Just my two cents.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Fouls seemed to not be a big issue at Arizona. There were a couple human player ones early on but very quickly the fouls became pretty rare in the matches. Part of it is that compared to the regionals I've watched on webcasts in previous weeks, it seemed teams were much more focused on scoring than defense. It also sucks sometimes in qualifying when you have 2 immobile robots against an alliance with decent passing robots though I don't think this will be as much of a problem by championships. All in all the game is actually pretty awesome in eliminations but falls short in qualifying due to adding more emphasis on getting a good schedule as opposed to previous years.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Anyone who says the fouls aren't a problem in this game need look no further than 1114.

22 time regional champ. Second most winning team in FIRST (behind 254). Have won 3 regionals in the same year a whopping 5 times. On the #1 alliance, they were eliminated in the semifinals at two events by a technical foul. At ONTO, their partner accidentally caught the opponent's TRUSS shot. At ONWA, they were damaged in a collision which left a part of their robot hanging >20" outside the frame perimeter. The robot that caused the damage only got a 20pt Foul for that action.

The fouls and field problems are breaking this game. Generally speaking, you should not be seeing matches decided by fouls during eliminations. By then the teams ought to have figured out what not to do. Anybody have stats on what percentage of elimination matches are being decided by fouls, compared to past years? I'd bet it is much higher this year than most previous years.

The game concept itself I agree is among the better ones, it just seems like its lacking polish.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I forgot the exact number but the its around 5 times.

Arial Assault is a broken game and, with a plethora of new rules updates the GDC seems addicted to making it worse. Here the 12 step program:

1. Lower all human player penalties to regular fouls.
2. Stop making strategy changing rules updates the day regionals start.
3. Get an apple I or comadore 64 for field timing so the hot goals turn on at the right time.
4. See #3 and replace hot goal with robots being enabled and disabled.
5. Make the inbound an assist. No more having to hold the ball for half an hour to get the 1st assist.
6. Develop a system of immediate rematches for when things go wrong.
7. Create a proper inspection protocol for eliminations.
8. Remove refs ability to retroactively DQ a team or alliance due to an inspectors mistake.
9. Remove penalties that hurt offensive plays under heavy defense.
10. Make ball tracking and assist crediting ether all electronic or the job of 1 ref per alliance.
11. Remove rules that can not be enforced evenly throughout different events.
12. Inject some common sense into penalty judgement.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

The game itself is pretty cool. It's like a robotic version of Rugby or Australian Rule Football but the rules are too invasive and are deciding too many matches.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

^^^^ This

FIRST has always used the concept of the "luck of the draw" in qualifying to help level the playing field.

I think the game is fun and really no different a challenge than we've seen in past years. But then again onf of MY all time favorites was in 2001 when it was 4 v 0. THAT game was where Coopertition and sharing among teams really started.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I like the assist idea even though it can be frustrating in practice. My biggest complaint is that we go to all of the work to score assists and then don't get the points for them.

It would be a much better game if every single team had a functional collector that can quickly pick up and eject the ball.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I was speaking about this point with other mentors on my team: the term "assist" completely misled you about how extra points were gathered until you had a grasp on the wording and rules (I had to explain to multiple people how it actually worked). That, among with other issues already addressed in this thread, has made this both my favorite and most hated game in my 7 years in FIRST. To be honest, I was ok with no end game, primarily because the "buzzer beater" truss or score was just as stressful, edge of your seat action.

I have a lot of thoughts on this game. There are a lot of positives to take away, and nearly as many negatives. One thing I can say is that the strongest robots will win. The question is, how many strong robots look alike? Not. Many. And THAT, is my key takeaway this year.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Honestly, I am a junior this year, and this is my favorite game, with rebound rumble following in second behind ultimate asscent.

I think what is nice about this game is it is less about shooting, and more about ball movement, strategy. I mean there is still a fair amount of shooting but I think teams are finding its pretty easy to score undefended.

I felt like an ultime asscent most games would just be a shootout instead of an actual game. There wasnt a lot of room for defense.

With regards to bad alliance partners losing the game, I mean isn't that kinda like everygame? If there is only one robot scoring on the team then its pretty $@#$@#$@#$@# easy to know what robot needs to be shutdown. On the Lacrosse field, if one kid is scoring all the goals, who do you put your best defender on? It shouldn't be anyother way.

We have also found that with a skilled robot, you can carry a game on your own if necessary, not ideal but against some matchups you have to.

Disregard any spelling mistakes I am typing on my phone :D

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Just returned from Waterloo. I have been reflecting on what the most important thing, the one thing I would put on the feedback form.

Here it is:

It's practically impossible to predict how a game will be played by 50000 smart people, young and the-young at heart. Even if you recruit Neil deGrasse Tyson (as an example) and put him onto the GDC.

So, what can be done to continue growing STEM better through FIRST?

Engage the 50,000 smart people in participating the evolution of a game in structured way. Leverage the competition experience of teams like 254, 469, 33, etc; the less experienced teams; and the rookies and pre-rookies too.

Turn the problem on its head.

Don't fix this game (yes, you heard that from me here... :-) )

Invest our time in enhancing the process of conceiving, designing, testing and deploying the game. Transparency will lead to understanding, engagement will lead to acceptance; and openness will lead to willingness to forget about the imperfect aspects of the system.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I don't love this game. I don't hate it either.

2004 and 2013 for me are the reigning great games for me. 2004 for was a culmination game of previous years. 2013 was a reinvention year for games.

Here were are in 2014. They chose to emphasize assisting other teams in the spirit of GP. I saw a lot of defense but I'll call it cycle defense. Two robots work to assist. As soon as the first robot has handed off, they went on the offense to block either the other alliance from scoring or to protect their alliance. That can be rough overall. At Virginia which many claim is the Defense capital we The only massive damages I saw were arms pop rivets snapped and one set of swerve drive wheel brackets snap.

Not the best game they've made but there are elements that will work it's way into the next culmination game.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I wouldn't say that I "hate" this game, but there are two things in my mind that are go against it and make me grind my teeth when watching.

First is one game piece per alliance. I can't tell you how many times I've watched a team pick up a ball, only to have it die on the field and effectively lose the game right then and there. Took them what seems like ten seconds to pick up the ball, another ten to figure out their shooter isn't working, and another ten to realize it's stuck and get another ball in play.

Second is qualifications. In years past 2:3 or 1:3 matches could be won by the powerhouse teams, but this year when your alliance partner's bumpers fall off and they get disabled after autonomous, you effectively lose the match right there. I would love to see some sort of strength of schedule correlated to seeding, and that correlation compared to OPR vs seeding. My guess is this year has more to do with luck of the draw than any other year in recent memory.

Personally I am loving this game. What has been said multiple times about the match list deciding your fate, I think is not true at all. This is the second year 3548 has been at Royal Oak and we are doing extremely well. At our first district in Southfield we did have some pretty good alliances but we were still a major part of the scores being put up. We ended up being 5th seed at the end of quals. At our second district at Howell our alliances were mostly teams ranked in the 20s and below and we were the top seeded team on our alliance most of the time but we still managed to play with the big dogs all day Friday. Yes things started going wrong Saturday morning and knocked us out of the top 8 down to 13th but the number one alliance knew all the hard work we put in to get there and chose us. I do not believe that the match list decides a teams fate, it gives an opportunity to show off how qualified your robot really is. Scouting this year is one of the most important things you can do and it can change the outcome of the competition for you more than fouls. (My alliance for elims only had one foul, and we still won that match)

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Very good observation.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I have to say that at first I did not like this game. After watching week one, it became clear that even though it was different from past games, it was a game that was going to evolve as weeks went by into a very good game. Your alliance partner getting fouls is just part of it, after all you are paired up in the qualifications at random. Human players are a big part of this game, and can cost teams matches. We lost a match this weekend, that was so stacked that is was almost unfair, yet one of the human players on our alliance managed to rack up 170 points in fouls. Looking back, maybe we should have talked to the human players better before the match to determine what they knew about the rules, Placed that player in a position that they could have done less damage and educated the player on the rules the could draw fouls on to make sure they understood the potential results.

As far as a ball landing in an opponents robot, the rules are very clear about that and even give a warning that you should design your bot so it can not end up with a ball it did not intend to get.

In closing, FIRST has been trying to make working together part of the game for a while now. I think they nailed it. If you end up with a partner that is nothing more than a box on wheels, it is up to you to figure out how to utilize them in a way that is a benefit to the alliance. Many teams have figured out how to do this very effectively. This game is not about being able to win by yourself.
Cant wait to see what the game evolves into in the next three weeks

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I fondly remember the emcee at Arkansas mistakenly referring to the game as "Aerial Assault" in the closing ceremonies

I don't particularly have an opinion on the game as I'm also a junior and lack perspective; I hear countless recollections of how horrible 2010 was in-house and yet I hardly ever see it mentioned on CD as much as 2002 or 2003. This "ranking" of FRC games seems far less consistent than any seed results from qualification rounds this year.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

You live and die by the sword in this game. Yeah 5 and 6 seeds have a chance in elims, but at the same time you can be put in unwinnable situations in quals. We had, on more than one occasion, teams hold the ball and keep missing shots and they wouldnt let us have it back. You end up fighting your own alliance partners in quals and thats why this game ranks low on the totem pole for me.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Question for the masses of CD. Is it GP to call a dead ball in this scenario?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

This was us. Quaters 2, Match 3 at Wisconsin. We are in the pits already, rushing to replace popped rivets on our shooter so we can go play semis thinking we won, and then pops up the score... Us and our alliance partner across from us in the pits just drop everything and stare at the screen from the pits with our mouths wide open. We are in shock.. We ended up losing by 9 points after 100 foul points given to the opposing alliance (final score 197 to 188). We had almost doubled the opposing teams score, and yet, get sent packing. I look forward to seeing some video of this as for sure, the possession penalty is very debatable as it looked like a single bump of the ball to me from the stands. I don't know the details of the 2nd penalty, I never saw it watching the match. Also add in no call for isolation on the opposing alliance for parking to prevent pickup of a ball in the corner of the 1 point goal and wall for what seemed like an eternity, this was a very tough loss.

Rewind to Centrail IL regional. Again, 3rd match in the quarter finals. We are up and basically have the match won due to some tough defense. Opposing alliance throws a truss shot towards the end of the match that falls in a robot on our alliance. They quickly spit it out, but still, 50 point penalty. We end up losing by 5 points (133 to 128). Thus, we were up by 45 before the penalty that was in no way intentional. Some of you may have seen what our lift cylinders looked like after this match, we were damaged beyond repair inside our frame after this match, no calls as such.

Thus, our season is over losing twice in quarterfinals by technicals that really had very little impact on the match in which we had a quite large lead while knowing additional penalties were missed.

Do I hate the game? No, we've had a blast playing it this year. The strategy involved in the game is complex and very interesting. Is the game perfect? Far from it. Can these imperfections be fixed at this point, probably not. Just enjoy it while you can, because before you know it, you'll be packing up your robot preparing for next year longing to put your previous years robot on the field 1 more time like always.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Same thing happened at our (the Virginia) regional. Semi final 2 match 3, one alliance had won 121 to 82. An amazing match, solid on both sides, when suddenly the score was released 121 to 132. A tech foul decided it. Now I was standing in queuing waiting to start the finals match, so I didn't have a good look the entire time, but from what I saw there was no obvious tech foul damaging enough to change the outcome of the game.

I think the most damaging issue with this game is not the fouls, but the stress it puts on VOLUNTEER judges, and all the crap they get because of their calls. I have a feeling FIRST is going to take a serious bite after this year, because I don't see how any judge would return after being put to the grindstone no matter what they decided, like they did this year.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Only in this game, could we be picking up the ball and have someone from the other side come flying at us, run into our arms, and since they got damage, we get the penalty. Thats like me out driving a car, I rear-ended someone, and the cops give THEM a ticket because my car got damaged.

From now on all appanages will need to be made from pool noodles only.

Thanks to 93 for picking us, and 1736. Hopefully will meet up again sometime.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Is this what the 2nd penalty was??

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I feel that as the driver of the opposing alliance's captain, I should input some into this conversation.

I must say that we, too, were shocked when we discovered that there were 100 points in penalties that match; we were on the way to pack up and move out. Honestly, we didn't even see the debatable possession of the ball because we were watching in horror as our robot didn't move. I do want to provide some of the details of the second penalty that match; the penalty that you didn't see.

As soon as autonomous was done, we went to prevent team 93 from obtaining the ball from the in-bounding station, as we had decided that the majority of their strategy hinged on their retrieving the ball ASAP. As we were pushing up against them(I don't remember how hard we hit them; it wasn't "ramming speed" but it may have been forceful enough to result in some of the ensuing penalty) their claw/arm became entangled inside our frame perimeter a good 4-5," and one of their wheels on the arm became hooked around our frame. As they pulled away after about 5 seconds of struggling, part of their claw snagged the power cord to our radio, unplugging it and disabling our top scoring robot for the match, resulting in the low score which the opposing alliance easily outscored.

Additionally, I would like to speak of the ball isolation you mentioned and how it looked from our perspective. I personally wasn't part of that maneuver, but I agree now replaying the match in my head that it very well could have been a foul; however the rule about isolation is very subjective. The rule you are referring to is G12-D (I would assume) which says "overt isolation or holding one or more BALLS against a FIELD element or ROBOT in an attempt to shield them" is prohibited. Our alliance members were not holding the ball against the wall, so I believe the only applicable part of that is "overt isolation." The rules say that G12 is to prevent the opposing alliance from inhibiting interaction with the ball, which is why this particular incident is in question, as the alliance was unable to touch their ball for quite a long time.

////SECTION REMOVED
I removed a section here because it was a mis-remember and I was describing a completely different match

Whether this is overt isolation or not, I don't know; the rules don't say what overt isolation is; however, my guess as to why it wasn't called is that either
A) The referees didn't see it
or
B) The fact that the ball was accessible from some sides did not qualify as "overt isolation" in the eyes of any referee that saw it.


Again, I just wanted to add our perspective to this conversation and point out that at least half of the 100 penalty points was valid as there was a very obvious robot inside frame perimeter which disabled a robot completely. As for the ball possession foul I have no idea; I was trying to figure out why our scoring robot was dead and didn't see the incident. And in regards to the ball isolation, I think we have a case of referee subjectivity as, from my perspective, it could have been perceived as a foul, but it also could make sense to not have been one.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

The only problem I have with this game is having to rely on your alliance partners in quals so much. There were multiple instances at UNH where we shot the ball over the truss to our partners, who then proceeded to fail at scoring the ball for the whole match but not let us come in to just get the job done. We had one of the worst schedules I've ever seen and went 4-7-1 because of it, but were still good enough to be picked by the 4 seed in the first round.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

The largest problem of all is the subjectiveness of the calls and the sheer total number and types of penalties ref's are forced to call by the original game design. (The fixes have been the best things yet, some good, some not really helping, but all have improved the game so far as far as making it more suit the actual as designed mission IMHO....and I absolutely usually hate rules tinkering as a whole).

But, that is a whole different set of issues.....Can you actually compare teams that competed across the board (game play wise, across the entire season, based on any reasonable scoring metric), from Week #1 through Week #4 and further beyond to the last match on Einstein? No, not this year....You cannot and should not (you would have to look at each task each robot can perform & complete, and you will not see that on ANY RESULTS SHEET this year as a whole. Just too many changes so far.

Case in point, posession of an opponents ball last week was a 50 point penalty against and scored as for the offended alliance and added to their score....Yesterday, it was 20 points added toward an offended alliances score (that wouldn't have changed who won or lost in the match I am personally comparing and thinking about, but would / could, many others). And I actually witnessed a called pinning penalty yesterday w/ a completed 2 different sets of full call flag action, that was never even later added to the score, I've assumed, because the offended alliance was a hundred points ahead in an elimination match...They didn't even have the usual (and there were many), end of match ref conference that particular match, because it was evident which alliance had won the match. (So those points were never even added to the ending score).

So IMHO, after all the rules tinkering that this game design has received so far, it is getting much closer to what I personally "think" the GDC had in mind, you will still need to compare all the games played each week to one another, and not any week against any other week, and definitely not across the spectrum of the season as a whole. (If you measure it that way - across the whole season,...You will be very far off on the actual cut). And your ending pcs. just won't fit. That is why most of the adults dislike the game....And why (I believe), most of the students responses, as seen here, they actually love this game.....Now!

By lifetimes of experience, most adults simply dislike change or rules tinkering causing constant change. Most of the students have yet to gain that adult disavantage, and that helps them to adapt quicker and much more easily.

But, we adults can anticipate through having those previous life experiences, what disappointment can and WILL happen when they add those huge subjective penalty points after the matches are completed, and apparent wins can turn to actual losses, and all the effort seemingly just goes up in smoke like a shorted motor. And the "magic" is released in an instant due to subjectiveness of a single action that nobody seemingly has control of. The Ref's are human and stuck in the middle of a human / robot game officiating...It is NOT their fault. PERIOD.

What we will see (I hope and already have seen the effect of the changes take effect), at the Championships, and eventually on that Einstein Field that every FRC Team aspires to play on, will be a very different game than the one we all read that thick rulebook in the first week of January and since, and was set our minds eye then, to really be. It will be a great game to watch if played as designed. And I personally saw some of that yesterday.

It can be an amazing game, but it takes tinkering to get the intended result, and that is why many of us actually disliked (and some may still highly), it to begin with.

I will not make this book any longer. I have added my 2 cents and it is now up to $3.50 by now or $125.00 at least. I congratulate the GDC on getting much closer in Week #4 to their intended vision, but fear there is still a long way to go.

The secret to getting the teams to be more offensive and less defensive is located in a financial reward (IE: As was offered at the AZ Regionals by the Event Sponsor of $500.00 off next years event fee, for all teams involved in both alliances of any 2 alliances, that exceeded 200 points each side). That act culminated in a final match (and true coopertition all around), that rivaled what we saw in another Regional ending match yesterday (Waterloo comes to mind), too. (Last year the offer by the sponsor was all 6 robots hanging legally in any match, which was completed many times). The task was not completed this year in AZ, but they came quite close in the final match.

Watching teams back completely off of the defensive angle on the most part (working together to attempt to rise to another different challenge not in that all important book), and play a really fast paced, and fairly clean offensive only game of Aerial Assist, showed just how great this game can be, how fast paced and artful it can be, and exactly how great each of the participating robots and team members on both sides, can really be, if not hindered by each other. And those matches were cleanly done too, thereby keeping those subjective calls pretty much in the bag. (But, that was a very special case).

I'd bet the Ref's. felt more at ease too in not having to end the event by announcing ANY penalties also.

If you students enjoy this game...Just go play it. (Do not pay attention to how us old foggies feel about it...As we aren't the ones playing)...Enjoy yourselves...You have earned that. But, also understand and accept the associated disappointments too....And, that there will be many of those. So, expect them and prepare for them....And, when they seem subjective to you, understand why some of us expected that and complained about this particular game. Go w/ the flow.

Congrat's to all who played this Week #4....And to all the WINNERS! And Good Luck to Week #5 players.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

There was a monetary incentive for teams to not play defense?...

That seems really sketchy.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

This. Defense is a perfectly valid part of the game, and pay for performance should never be a part of FIRST.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I appreciate your perspective and agree with everything being subjective.

I remember seeing you guys getting entangled with 93 and a penalty being called on 93 just after they pulled away seeing the ref waive the flag. I recall you being dead also, but I guess for some reason I thought both of these occurred at the same time in the 2nd match (the redo one). I will have to watch some replays when they are available before I speak any further.

For isolation, yes you are correct on the rule I was referencing, and I agree it's very subjective along with many of the other rules.

Either way, no hard feelings. This is a perfect example of the game this year, trying to figure out what exactly was called on who for doing what.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

That's not right at all. First of all, money for performing well is a bad thing, but defense is a perfectly fine thing to do. That's like bribing a team to play the game a way that some random person thinks is right. This brings back bad memories of agreements in 2003. :ahh:

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I put our video of Wisconsin Regional Quarter Final 2 match 3 on You Tube: http://youtu.be/sbJUjhtlHLs. Unfortunately the student doing the recording turned off the video before they announced the reason for the fouls. But my recollection was 50 for inside frame perimeter causing damage plus possession. Blue also benefited from a 20 pt foul and I can't recall that either (one instance of ramming maybe??)

3018 was pretty clearly trying to minimize contact with 93 while still playing effective defense to keep them away from the action. No ramming involved that I can see. 93 actuates their arm while inside our perimeter extending the entanglement, but I sincerely doubt that was the intent. It's just unfortunate that we could not disconnect without the radio being disconnected, or that would have probably only been 20 point foul, and we could have finished playing the match.

I must admit I'm still baffled about the 50 point possession foul. Our video doesn't show all the action going on in the lower left corner of the screen. But I'm unconvinced that is where the possession foul occurred.

The only only thing that appears to be close to possession that I can see would be the trapping part of G12 (although the ball was never against a robot or a game piece). However, there are 3 times throughout the match where 706 is trying to get to the red ball but one or more blue robots are in between them and the ball preventing any red robots from getting the ball. Given the 'G12 Intent' clause, perhaps this is what led to the possession foul for the other 50 points.

I don't think it could have possibly been called for the inconsequential contact of 93 nearly catching the one truss catch.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Wow!.......Now that would make this particular game on Einstein in just a few weeks time, a "completely different game", than was released in January. (If we need a 12 point program to fix it, we need to also go to rehab. here in AZ for a few weeks (like many politicians who fall from grace seem to do lately), and the season will never become a great memory for the Senior and other Students)....But, they certainly could learn a whole lot about life in the process. Lol.

Smirk. SRY. (Personally, I hope they "fixed the game issues" about as much as they are going to.....But, I fear that is not the case, since some still believe changes -some wholesale changes, are still necessary. It sure looked cleaner to me yesterday streaming many regionals from the comfort of my home.

Also TY FIRST, for getting the AZ Reg. "stats link" fixed late Friday night...My blood pressure was much less elevated yesterday due to solely that fact. To see those stats & scores posted too made a world of difference.
_________________________________
Thanks also to Falcon Robotics (and others), for the high quality full field Q-vids Friday (that helped me tremendously, though without the actual scores included it was really tough to keep track...Though, I also know doing it by phone had to be very hard to add those too). I hope you also did the elims., and will be posting those on YouTube in the same place too...I know you were plenty busy...Congrat's. on that big Win. I personally know your competitors, fully enjoyed it right down to the bitter & great tasting end.
__________________________________
Those elims., & the finals were absolutely fantastic to watch. (The smile on my son's face at 1:30 AM this morning (when they arrived home), will be a very long lasting memory, for both of us)...And his banner say's Regional Finalist this time instead of Regional Winner. In 4 years of actual building, driving, programming, and every other facet of the FIRST experience he has been immersed in throughout his 4 years of High School, he has tasted both of those feelings, and utter absolute defeat also. He knows the difference by now). He's proud of their acheivements...and there is still the rest of the season to go, and to look forward to. I can tell he is in the "I Love This Game! camp." He said so this morning. I'm slowly being won over.

So, ergo, the game does work GDC! That much I can tell you. You can see it in their sparkling eyes. Even when they eventually lose in the end...They (and we), are all WINNERS! At least they played the game, as some never actually get a chance to do.

Knowing you played your best, against the very best (especially against long rules odds, w/ some odd things occurring too at the same time, and you just battled on w/ pure GP)......That makes that sparkle in the eyes truly & easily show.

I was proud of watching the level of play yesterday across all of the Regions and Districts...I was more proud of that level of play personally involved w/ a team and as a parent of a direct participant, when I later found out this morning, that in the middle of all that great action yesterday, a driver station laptop (the 6th seed Alliance Captain's....Yes, OURS), was dropped & the screen was accidentally broken w/ the drivers station still up during qualifying, but through a totally unviewable white & rainbow colored screen. (I was told only by text that there was "an issue," not ever explained to, what that "very serious issue" was, even when I texted "what system?", I was "properly just ignored"....The "issue" was "being handled", and that, was all I needed to know).

Then for them, to come back from that major issue (all I knew watching the stream is they arrived at the next and last 2 of their scheduled Q-Matches and played very well...looked like a minor issue easily resolved to me, business as usual, doing what they can do w/ the robot they designed and built, can accomplish, and trying things they did not even design for specifically, and battle on like nothing ever happened, and do that well, was just amazing. Good Job.

My personal thanks goes out to ALL that helped concerning the curing of that particular serious issue, as you ALL embody GP. (Strictly my fault...except that I did not drop it...But, then again, you can't drop it, if you don't take the long chance of actually carrying and using it, high pressure, to say the least is, a robot drivers job). My personal fault because, I always sneak the backup laptop puter down w/ us, even if others do not actually think we will ever need it...But I didn't go, so it wasn't ready to just slap on that drivers station in a single minute, all ready & charged and therefore, ready to go...issue resolved).

Lastly, (watch the vids of both the AZ and the Waterloo Regionals, all of them, but especially the Final Matches)....And you just may see IMHO, the game the GDC attempted to design all of a sudden appear out of nowhere. At least that's what I think I saw.

That wasn't Battle Bots like we have seen earlier...Those eliminations were pure art and flow, showcasing what only FIRST Robotics can be. Winning isn't everything, playing is. It isn't ALL about the robot, or ALL about the specific game designed in less than a year.

STEM turned into artful accomplishment. Only FIRST provides that experience to our children. TY FIRST, and TY to all those daring officiants always, but, especially this year.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

The other foul, from what I know (I had to go back to the pit to find out why we couldn't launch the last ball) - that foul had something to do with the start of the match, not gameplay.

The fouls I said before, happen during seeding matches. - Which gave us the Yellow Card.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I dislike this game for two simple reasons.

A single game piece which causes animosity between what should be alliance members. Teams are justified in wanting to play the game with the robots they spent $4000 on and many many evenings working on. Half the teams out there are having to not play offense for fear of losing the game. Now they cant even play defense for fear of incurring penalties.

The other reason is the number of subjective penalties in this game and how punishing they are. On the score and the overworked refs. Good luck getting the volunteers to want to ref again when the refs go through the emotional ringer after every match.

FIRST,I know it is about inspiration and not the robots but you cant do away with the game and robots completely and expect to keep growing. Its like we got an entire new GDC that has never played a game before especially after the complete success of the last few years. What happened?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Caution, biased opinion of first-time finalist team.

At our first event, I was annoyed at the fouls, which (amongst other issues) effectively caused our loss in QFs. After our second event, I have to say I really like playing this game, and it can be fun to watch (at least for an insider) when the robots are getting into a groove.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

It was announced yesterday in full view and voice to all in AZ (and over the stream to the world watching), that our specific team was the original responsible party many years ago, for the very first (publicly known), incidence of collaberation between teams (and that it was also very controversial at the time), but that it is VERY accepted today as "a way of naturally just doing business", to be successful across the FIRST community.

And it is!...Teams collaborate often throughout the community, they sometimes build together, or work out of the same lab or shop, they contact one another often, they practice together, they even sometimes plan to compete together in eliminations (oh really! Ahhhh. Eyes wide). Sometimes, even the actual game is designed to force or reward coopertition amongst red/blue opposing alliances. And some teams even have official FIRST Regulation Field Setups purchased for them by their sponsors as I found out recently. Life isn't fair. And it wasn't ever meant to be.

There were no secret financial rewards, the reward was only an, open & publicly announced & published, further personal event sponsor incentive for all the teams to attempt to do their best on the field during the event (To score at least 200 points for each alliance, and it was never actually accomplished), and said VOLUNTARY SPONSOR INCENTIVE was proper, again voluntary, and was offerred to ALL who participated.

It wasn't sketchy. And it acheived the desired results....Though nobody during the event even qualified for the intended reward. So, please put away the tinfoil hat. </;-) (I was only giving a suggestion that will not occur, and is not expected to occur, of how to possibly further to discourage battle bots, and elevate this particular game to it's desired end goal of Humans using Robots designed to accomplish specific tasks, instead of Humans using Robots to keep others from achieving their goals and accomplishing said tasks...the art of defensive strategies).

The FIRST experience is built and run daily on sponsors asking us each to do our best for them (and showcase them in full partnership also), and financial support is traded on to complete that mission using both parts and dollars and tons of other support.

As a side note...Our specific team never collaborates anymore w/ other teams, except on the field of play itself of course, call it hard lessons over the years and now ingrained in our specific 2 digit long time in existance team (and that probably hurts us now more than ever, during this present age of extreme team collaboration that, we may have historically just BTW helped to create during years past...Remember that was very controversial when first introduced)....But, you will not find any debut vids released of our teams robots until it hits the field at the first event (usually Week #4).

Actually, I tried (to personally change our own team culture this year if others were willing, I would have presented it to the team for acceptance or rejection), here during this particular build season. I received no responses whatsoever, except, after another prod post, I received a few of...."Talk to us after the build season." It never happened so, we collaborated onfield again instead of before we reached the field. And it will again in 2 weeks (though the offer is still always open). I realized early on after reading the game rules the very first time, that the teamwork was needed early on for this game to be highly successful is all.

This game needs team collaboration to be highly successful on field....And it shows when it is done well. Those that do collaborate will be highly complimentary to each other, and should be highly successful as the game seems to be designed, as a pure team game, rewarding teams that are more willing to work together. Not so much for teams that will not. (Though the stats will still be kind to them also if outstanding robot design and task completion is there). I have witnessed teams choosing a really high # seeded team...No other game would you usually find that.

Deals are born and made between teams daily, the games are based on playing in an alliance forcing collaboration.....That is not sketchy. That is just downright smart!

Not to be anti-GP...But, to quote you......"First of all, money for performing well is a bad thing...."

Someday, some employer is either going to get a real steal by hiring you as you will perform at top levels without the associated "bad financial reward"...Or, he will be very sorry, because you personally will not perform because of the idea that...."First of all, money for performing well is a bad thing...." (Not trying to pick on you personally please understand...Just look at the statement, and think about it honestly a minute first......OK?)

The capitalist based business world succeeds above all others, mainly because "Money for performing something well, is a GOOD THING!"

Trading labor, time, knowledge, product, and or services for that so bad & evil money, it is the engine that drives our economies worldwide. If you think it doesn't drive the FIRST Community also...Try surviving a single season without those (things you may consider "evil"), and absolutely necessary SUPER Great Sponsor $$$$'s, and many teams do every year. It isn't easy. It's downright nearly impossible at a high level. (The volunteerism provided across the entire community is the VERY important fuel and access, along w/ all those VERY important Sponsor $$$$ engines, providing us the actual technology!):)

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

The offer to pay part of next year's entry fee was made by a FIRST Director, and the offer was using his own money. No teams were able to fulfill the requirements this year.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Now that I understand what happened, and realized that it is not FIRST's money being spent, I am very okay with what happened. My 2003 comment referred to a few incidents where teams agreed before a match to not knock over each others stacks, but ended up violating the agreement. This was really controversial because it was totally un-GP, but not illegal. When teams sincerely wanted to make the no stack hitting agreement, it was tough to decide to trust them or not.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

This above.....

It wasn't that I didn't like the game (though I anticipated it would become very damaging Battle Bots like, and it did for a period of time, forcing some changes)...It was that I knew I wouldn't like the resulting "fixing that was going to be applied" either to the field elements, or all the rest that would be necessary.

I agreed w/ the above poster weeks ago...Though the GDC took the only route available once many stated how much they didn't like the game, and attempted to, in their way make the game better....It has improved it, and I am now a convert. It is better. Though, if you rely on your scouting or the Stats from week 1, 2, 3, or 4 at the Championships (or compare those stats on a season wide basis)...You just may be sorry you did. As too many changes have taken place in just less than 3 months, and the last 4 weeks. Will there be more to come? Who knows.....But, my personal complaints about the game are over.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

It seems this this section is being taken wrong, and I can see where that can come from.
I would just like to point out that this is NOT referencing any unpreventable fouls. This section is referring to G40, and intentional infractions of G12, but mostly G40.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I agree!

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Thanks for this! Very well said. And actually, at Palmetto in week one, the only time I saw fouls determine the outcome of matches (which happens every year) is when teams blatantly disregard the manual (mostly accidental, of course). If you stay within the boundaries the GDC has set for you, fouls will not happen as much. I think our alliances had only had fouls called against us a couple times throughout the duration of the event. And rarely did it call the match in our case (not for every match, but for the ones in which we played). At WEEK ONE. I don't know what was different at Palmetto, but I haven't seen a lot of things people are ranting and raving about.

What 3175student17 has summarized, in particular 2 and 3 HAPPENS EVERY YEAR. And every year, I see the same complaints.

First of all, when IS a game exactly like we (and the GDC) imagined it would be by the time April comes around? I've only been involved with FRC for 7 years, but I can't recall a time (other than MAYBE 2008/2012) that had every element of the game stay the same from the visions of kickoff to Einstein. But as far as gameplay itself goes, it's pretty similar to what I imagined. It just turns out to be better and more exciting than I thought it would be.

That being said, my team has only competed in one event so far (Palmetto) and will be traveling to Knoxville this week. So, I only have one event's point of view, and admittedly have not seen other events other than maybe a match here or there via webcast.

I really like this game. I was extremely skeptical at first (which isn't unusual for me), but even going into the week one event, I thought the game would be a total flop. We have some of the worst luck when it comes to reliable alliance partners in qualifications. I thought it was going to be a mess for everyone.

What I saw, however, was completely the opposite. There were a couple matches that saw little to no collaboration, and it showed in the scores. But because this game forces teams to collaborate to be successful (even more so than 2012), most teams put forth the extra effort to do so. There were countless extremely close matches often determined by a single last-minute score. It was down to the wire ALL THE TIME, and proved to be a very stressful game, which is a good thing in my opinion. It's more engaging and fun.

To quote our wonderful coach, we can't control what happens on the field. What I see in this game is a lot more of a real-world experience. For example, we saw some awesome defense, but some even better clever replies to the defensive strategies.

Again, I admittedly do not have as much experience with this game as I would like, and this is my first time posting in this thread. I'm sharing a semi-outsiders' point of view. I like the extra challenge of having to collaborate with alliance partners. I think that whatever the circumstances may be, the best and healthiest thing we can do as a community is work with it. If FIRST makes decisions to alter the gameplay, then our students need to come up with clever solutions. It makes life more interesting and challenging, and is definitely preparing our students for the real world. We can never control what happens on the field... That's one of the most exciting parts about FIRST. You never know what you're going to find.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Remind me to guide my kids to build a non-robust robot next season, because all you need is a poorly designed robot and the tech foul gods are on your side.

GDC needs to be fired. Straight up, just going to say it. Go home. I'm tired of you.

We lost too many matches we should have won, including elim matches, because of this bull. With everything else you've put other teams through, you need to make a change. Have you never attended an FRC event yourself? Seriously, what do you expect to happen with one game piece and 3 robots? two robots are doing NOTHING at any given point. And then you have the nerve to put out a rule that basically says "don't touch other robots"? Why in the world was "what if a ball becomes stuck in a robot" an afterthought? Are you kidding me? Are you even aware that most robots at district levels and regionals in some locations can rarely even play the game? We're cheated out of more then 20 MAR points and at risk of not attending because we're sitting on the bubble now.

My kids, my mentors, and myself poured our heart and soul into this robot to make it what it is, including our student captain who is #2 in his class. He is not #1 because of the time he willingly put into this program. We spent countless hours in design to make sure not a single part would fail at events because of anticipated rough defense. And we've only experianced one failure which was a quick and easy fix after two events. We walked away today with the Quality Award, at the cost of being punished on the field for it. You tell me what to do when I have to tell my kids there is nothing we can do other then be at the mercy of inconsistent reffing, poor calls, and the worst rulebook in FRC history all because they worked too hard. How am I supposed to handle this?

GDC if you want to inspire teams to enter engineering fields, you're doing it wrong. Very wrong.

Hey JVN and Vex folk, nows the time to start up a FRC-Sized VEX event. I'm sure more then enough teams will be happy to jump ship at this point.

OP, this game is good in concept. Its execution is amazingly terrible. Its uninspiring and bringing out the worst in people. This is why everyone hates this game.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Yes.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I like this game. That said, I'll know how much I like it come week 7 when the state championships roll around.

I think one of my favorite aspects this year is the unpredictability of the elimination rounds. Really, any alliance seed could win the whole thing, as opposed to previous years where Alliance #1 seemed to win an overwhelming majority. This past week, all three MI districts were won by non-#1 seeds. I can't ever remember that happening before in a single week.

Kinda reminds me of the unpredictability of march madness, which everybody loves.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

It is really disappointing to see a game that is probably at its core the most exciting game to watch in FRC be marred by poorly thought out rules with massive gray areas. It's like they turned in the outiline and first page of the essay but didn't deliver on the rest. It just bums me out.

And I'm not on a team who built a kickin' robot that might get left out of a higher level of competition over the poor administration of the game.

To further elaborate, this game has amplified a lot of things that are both good and bad about FIRST and the FRC community as a whole. FRC can't brush weaker machines and teams under the rug this year. FRC teams who look like pillars of the community are going through emotional breakdowns. Volunteers are either gettign thrown into the fire or doing part of the throwing.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I see flags waived for 1 red technical, 2 blue technicals, and 1 red foul. I only see penalty points scored for the 2 blue technicals and the 1 red foul? Odd.

Looks to me red initiated the tie up twice playing defense on blue. It also looks like red initiated the final pull apart the 2nd time driving away from blue at which point the robot then became disabled. Technical on blue only for this? Or was it to be a technical on both and the red wasn't scored?

The 2nd blue technical appears to occur at the 1 minute mark when the head ref points to the red robot on the right as they moved in/out of a defensive position triggering the 2nd blue flag wave. Correct call?

Quarter Final 2 Match 2 is another story of a match ending with penalties potentially swinging the outcome. A similar tie up occurred between the same robots with penalties accessed upon them separating. Maybe someone has video of this also?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Whichever team flips the better coin gets less fouls. And that's due to a horrible rule book with rules that punish teams for things they could not, under any circumstances, have avoided.

Not sure why that's a good thing...

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Many of your points have merit, but statements like this make it hard to be sympathetic to them. A rational critique is usually more effective than a tantrum.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

When you realize that you've wasted $5k registration and probably ended your season today (in Brandon's case) because of horrible rules, that warrants a tantrum, in my opinion.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I have a feeling everything will be sorted out and all the rules will be in order by Week 6 through Championships. Of course that's too late for many teams to even rationalize the game, but, I have faith that this mess will be tidied up to make for one of the most exciting games in FRC history.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Take this from someone who has learned the lesson the hard way- no one listens to someone throwing a 'tantrum'. The most effective way to get your message across in the most brutal of circumstances is just to remain as calm as possible and keep sticking to the facts.

This may seem like obvious advice, but believe me, it goes such a long way.


That being said, of course there is truth in Brandon's post. Its just being fed through an emotionally charged lens and while some people may be able to see through that, there are certainly others who will not be able to do so.

Believe me, I've been there. I've made the same type of post on CD after a competition way back in the day. Take a night, sleep on it, try to get back to the facts and use those as your ammunition to try and force change.

-Brando

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

$7k+, countless hours, and the robot with the most potential from us to date.

Very much so, thank you for putting that into words for me.

Off to sleep on it.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Many of the complaints to this year's game regarding rules are very reminiscent of sports to me. For instance, whether a pass interference will be offensive or defensive can sometimes be entirely up to the referee calling the play, and we all know how an umpire can skew the results of a baseball game by a simple safe/out call. Or in basketball whether or not something is a foul or whether or not it is a flagrant foul; subjective to the collective referee crew.

Do we always agree with the calls? No. But upon, further consideration, I honestly don't believe there is much that could be done to improve the current rules we have without the degrading the integrity of the game (maybe lessening a few individual penalty values from 50 to 20ish, but only a few if any).

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I see your point, but in basketball, 20% of the matches teams play are NOT decided by fouls. By the amount of drama that's been rising at at least one regional every week, there is clearly a problem that needs to be addressed.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I don't know about that. I can think of quite a few matches where if Team X had/hadn't shot free throws, it would have changed the entire gameplay of the final seconds. Maybe not 20% I suppose, but definitely 10%.

Take today's Wichita State game for example. If that final foul had been a flagrant, it could have changed the whole dynamic of the situation (note: the correct call was made in that instance). And that's just today.

Everyone's getting all worked up about something that isn't new by any stretch of the imagination.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

It is, however, very different in FRC compared with Ultimate Ascent, Rebound Rumble, and LogoMotion.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

My favorite part of this year's game is watching how many things are amplified. I know you know and I know I know what it's like to be a financially poor FRC team, and Brandon is in that situation right now. You know what? He threw a tantrum. However, this game is also making people ask bigger questions. How much are we supposed to go to "defend our kids"? I took over the drive coach position under fire from others on my team until they saw how rough this game can be on the teams. I don't want to puff my chest out too much, but I am there to protect a bunch of smart and talented kids from getting nothing short of screwed over by people who lack understanding of the game they are playing. They know the strategy.

Last year you could get by in a match when a partner committed a foul, one robot went limp on the field, or the volunteer referee clue whiffed on a call or 3. This year, when I go to a week 4 event and have to ask referee crews to check team updates from prior weeks before they misspeak at a driver's meeting, that is objectively NOT GOOD. When I have to stare at a glowing trashcan for 13 seconds, that is also NOT GOOD. When I see a question box 12 teams deep and a rulebook on tap and the foghorn sound effect is getting its biggest workout in half a decade, these are all not good things.

However despite our earlier than planned exit at our last event due to some unsavory no-calls, we still get to play one more time. 254 still gets to play one more time. Brandon's kids ran into overdrive over 7 weeks to put together a very fantastic robot (2nd overall pick at LSDR) only to get booted over a hasty and poorly thought out Team Update that came down the pipe half a week earlier. They don't get to go back and start planning for a surefire trip to MAR or World Champs. They may nto have a shop to go back to if the school district cuts the program if they see it as underperforming from last year.

Yeah, Brandon got emotional. He screwed up. He's not the only person who screwed up this year. People who have really dropped the ball this year are paid to NOT do that kind of thing, ever. You and I get to book our hotels under the arch while Brandon's team is asking why they even bothered trying to build a robust machine when the GDC suddenly changed the stance of "robust machines win" over to "play extra nice".

It's one thing to say that you went out there, left it all on the field, and made your team, your sponsors, your school, and yourselves proud. We didn't win an event, but I'm proud of my team. 254 has won 2 events, and I guess/assume you're proud of them because there's no doubt you guys pushed your own limits and earned your wins. 2495 went out, left it all on the field, and then some, but had the deft hand of incomplete thought wipe them out of the competition, probably for good, in 2014. I can understand that.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Coming from someone who has had horrible luck in the past with referee calls, iffy rules, dead alliance partners, judging discrepancies/bias, other types of adversity etc. I can see why some people have seen the need to call out those responsible. But I just want to throw out a word of caution as we proceed.

Two years in a row, we were eliminated from regionals because of an alliance partner that invoked a red card (or two yellows) completely accidentally and unknowingly. My junior and senior years of high school. Talk about devastating. 2009 we saw many many robots that drove around, had no way of scoring, but still made it to the top seeds of an event. Point is, every year we see problems, and every year we have complaints. Every year, we think we have the winningest design, and poured countless hours, dollars, and manpower building a winning machine. Our team even have a team of students/alumni whose main job is figuring out how the game will be played so we can design accordingly. And every year, we are faced with problems on the field that prevent us from winning. It happens, and it has actually prepared our students for the real world more than anything else.

Every year, we see problems with the games and everything associated with it. Yes, the GDC has made some mistakes with this particular game. They tried to go in a new direction this year with input from the students and mentors with feedback from the previous year. This kind of change is healthy and refreshing. It was a learning year for all of us involved. But again, to quote Dean Kamen, life ain't fair.

But saying things like that will only make things worse. The GDC has one of the toughest jobs in the world. Honestly, they do. And, in trying to put ourselves in that position can maybe help us understand a little better. Honestly, I can guarantee that if we all sit back, take a couple deep breaths, get one or two nights of sleep, we will have much fewer regrets.

Speaking out against FIRST and the mistakes it has made in the forms of tantrums, rants, raves, etc. only reflects very poorly on FIRST and only succeeds in tearing the organization apart, rather than constructively seeking change. If we, as a community want to see change, it is our duty and responsibility to seek such change from our leaders. Nothing is more frustrating as a leader than to see those you lead talk negatively about mistakes you have made behind your back and not constructively with you. I'm sure this is something those persons on the GDC right now are going through. Talk to them personally about why they made the decisions that they did. Find out what went into making the rules this year. I guarantee you will gain a fresh new perspective on things, and rather than seeing the issues through an "emotionally charged lens" and more through a critical and informed one.

The best thing we can do, as a community, is continue through this year graciously and professionally. At our next events, figure out what we can do to win (whether that is what you initially had in mind in January or not). Then we can go from there. If we don't have any next events, continue supporting FIRST's missions and spreading their ideals through outreach, service, etc. as well as cheering on our fellow teams. No amount of complaining, ranting, raving, etc. is going to make the situation any better. I guarantee the GDC has learned their lessons this year. And if we want to be entirely sure, I'm sure they will welcome personal feedback. I can't wait to see what they have in store for next year, and I certainly can't wait to watch the competition in St. Louis (whether from home or in person).

/rant. Sorry if the length or breadth of what I have said is inappropriate. I tend to get more wordy the later I stay up. I'm not trying to say that I'm better than anyone; I have gone through these situations many, many, many times before, and I am only simply offering what has worked best over the years both in FIRST and in the many other organizations/communities in which I preside. I look forward to working with and talking with all of you in the coming times. Thanks for listening.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I find this part of the post interesting. How exactly do you recommend people speak to the GDC?

I'm not entirely sure who is even on it anymore. Serching the FIRST website only gives this result from 2010. A google search turns up the video from 2010. I know Dave and Woodie resigned in 2011. They also introduce themselves in the 2012 kickoff video. Did I miss another announcement somewhere, did they post all their email addresses and phone numbers somewhere that I missed?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I don't think Brandon necessarily needs a lecture about what he posted, as much as I respect Jared and others. I'm sure he realizes what he has posted is emotionally charged, which is why he will sleep on it. He is more mature than his post reflects.

This is really the best solution to a hard day. Sleep on it, gather your thoughts, and at the end of the day, remember that this is a high school robotics competition. Yes, your hard work was diminished on the field due to terrible rulings and a flawed rule book, but don't let that diminish how hard you really worked. I know it, you know it, your kids know it. Leave it at that for now. Unfortunately, everything else is slightly out of your control.

For what it's worth, I think there is nothing wrong with speaking directly about what is wrong with FIRST on CD. I would rather see mentors post their honest opinions than sugar-coating the situation because someone might be reading these posts. I'm sure anyone from FIRST reading this understands the frustration coming from teams, and probably has thick enough skin to deal with it.

This is the most accurate description of this season I've read so far.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I understand, and partially rescind my comment. However, I will reference this http://www.usfirst.org/roboticsprogr...idays-11112013 where persons will be given the opportunity to express opinions of the game through feedback via open-ended comment boxes. Letters (digital or snail-mail) can also be sent directly to FIRST headquarters, where they will be forwarded to the correct parties.

There are also usually times at the championship where questions can be answered directly by the director and other parties of FIRST. And if you cannot attend the championship, these things are usually available via live webcasts. These among other resources FIRST provides are sometimes great avenues to get our messages across.

My point is, there are ways to get your opinions known to the right parties at the right time. The GDC will be looking over CD posts, I'm sure. And if all they see is hateful comments or emotionally-fueled complaints and/or "tantrums" for lack of a better word, they will only get angry (at least I would) and may even be less likely to listen to what you have to say. Again, just personal experience both in and outside of CD and FIRST, in other organizations, with other people.


I do not disagree. However, I often find that comments filled with emotion directly after things happen are not honest opinions. Yes, at their core they may be, but they are delivered in such a way that is not honest or true to the intended message. I'm not trying to call Brandon or anyone out personally. But I see this all the time across CD and other places of the internet, not just on this thread or this topic either. I have done the same thing personally many times and have learned that people are more likely to listen to what you have to say if your comments are not fueled with heat-of-the-moment emotion. Usually, the person who says something like that (again, guilty myself) realizes later on that what they said was not exactly what they intended.

Clearly thought through, well-organized, and even-tempered arguments, criticisms, or general feedback is not sugar-coating anything. It's dealing with it graciously and professionally.

Again, I truly am not trying to call any one person out, so please don't read into this as if I am. We are all guilty of it. I'm just giving some friendly reminders :).

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I've been hesitant on posting in this thread, because I know my views aren't exactly the most popular, and very few people, if any at all, share them.

I've read through countless Chief Delphi threads and Facebook posts. I've heard both sides of the argument, and been a volunteer at an event every week. I've had key-chains thrown at me, drive teams screaming in my face, and people complain that the balls aren't inflated properly. I've listened to people complain about the rules, the penalties, how they lost because of penalties.

And you know what? I love this game. I find no issues with the rules, the fouls, or the GDC. For once, a team of average robots can destroy an alliance of great robots. And no, it's not because they got a lot of fouls. Just look at the Great Lakes Bay Region District from this past week. It seems this year that everyone and their grandmother have something to gripe about. As a drive team member of 68 back in 2012, I can tell you that losing your regional because someone on your alliance drew a tech foul is NOTHING compared to what happened at Worlds back in 2012. Did you see flocks of students running to Chief Delphi complaining and letting their emotions run wild? No. Your Alliance drew the foul. It was completely within your control. Unless someone else took control of the robot and caused you to get the foul, it was your alliance's fault. If you accidentally broke a robot on the opposing alliance because they built a non-robust robot, then maybe you shouldn't have hit them so hard. If a piece of your robot fell onto the field and caused you to lose the match, maybe you shouldn't have pieces of your robot that can fall off so easily.

Eliminations is a best 2 out of 3. If you lose one match due to fouls, you still have the other two matches to prove you have the better alliance. If you lose the second match because of fouls, then you're doing something wrong.

Worst of all, you're taking the victory away from the alliance that beat you. They also spent countless hours and money on their robot. What makes your time and money anymore valuable then theirs? Their students worked just as hard as yours, and you should be congratulating them instead of complaining that you lost because of a tech foul.

The game manual and the rules have been here since January 5th. If you don't know them well enough to not draw a foul, it's your own fault. No one elses. Freak accidents happen, yeah. So go on out in your next two elimination matches and prove that you deserve the win.

Sincerely,
Tired of the Gripe

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

My biggest issue is that nothing is the same from match to match. Fouls seem to be called at the whim of the referee. I don't think they are doing it out of spite but because the rules are vague. Our bot played very little defense but got called out when ever we tried to get away. We had one foul out of many that I agreed with (we ran over to slow down another bout and hit the pretty hard. Other times we got fouls called on us for no real reason that anyone could see our tell us.

As a rule we don't go to the question box. This year though we are thinking of how to decorate it because we seem to live there. Not that we ever got a real answer.

I am not really sure how our if they can fix it. The referees are trying their best though to enforce vague at best rules and it really hurts the game.

What do we tell or drive team? How can they not draw fouls? They get hit while trying to pick up the ball they might they might they might get a foul.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

And this is a good thing because? We usually build robots that are only a little bit above average, and I'd much rather see the best robots win than the average robots beat those that are fundamentally better. If they could, why would we bother trying to built the best bot we can?

Before this season started, I was dreading the day this would happen, and the rift it would create between the FRC and the VRC Pro people. After this season, I look forward to the day we can choose.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Then who would design games for you to play?
I give the GDC credit they put the game out there and let people take full on headshots at them without flinching when it would be just as easy to say "screw all of you" and walk away and leave us with nothing to do but reminisce about the good old days when we had a FIRST competition.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Before I begin, I want to make clear that I am not continuing this discussion in an effort to prove that the match was scored correctly. I'm only trying to arrive at a common understanding of the most likely reason that the score wound up the way it did. I truly empathize with all team members involved on both alliances-- this was a harsh way for the quarter final to end.

I do have video of the Q2 Match 2 you refer to but have not viewed it yet. I will try to post as time permits.

Honestly, I hadn't watched the video of match 3 in full screen until after I posted it. I had watched it numerous times on my camcorder that was used for the recording, but that is a 3" screen. I was going on my memory of what was announced as the final score was read-- not based on the actual flags waved during the match.

I only see 4 flag waves although the video does not capture the ref in the lower left corner-- a red flag first while pointing at red followed by the start of bumping wrists (but not much conviction), then two blue flag waves each followed by distinct bumping wrists together. All 3 of these signals are within a few seconds. Then later around 1:33 a red foul no wrist bump indicated by the lower right ref pointing at some activity that is out of frame on the video but can be seen by looking at the audience screen in the video. I'm thinking that must have been the announced possession in that red was inhibiting blue from getting at its ball to score.

Also, I hadn't noticed on my small screen, but the first 50 points of the two blue TF's was actually scored around the 2:10 point in the video. You can see the ref who waved the fouls accessing the panel in the upper right corner of the field. Red score jumps from 87 to 137.

I have no answer why the ref first signaled a red TF that was clearly never scored. Perhaps the gesture was a mistake (miscommunication between head judge and ref?). Even when he switched to the blue flag he pointed at the red robot while waving the flag. Since the ref who signaled the red TF clearly was involved in the scoring, my best conclusion was that the red TF signal was a mistake.

As to the question of which robot initiated contact. I guess it boils down to this bit of G28:

A ROBOT with an element outside its FRAME PERIMETER may be penalized under this rule if it appears they are using that element to purposefully contact another ROBOT inside its FRAME PERIMETER. Regardless of intent, a ROBOT with an element outside its FRAME PERIMETER that causes damage to another ROBOT inside of its FRAME PERIMETER will be penalized, unless the actions of the damaged ROBOT are the catalyst for the damage.

There was a minor entanglement as red tries (successfully) to interrupt a pass between 93 and 1736 at 0:36 on the video. Red is fully within its frame perimeter (all appendages in) at this point and pushes 1736 as it is trying to receive the ball from 93 and successfully defends the pass. Just after 93's arm catches on some part of 3018, but it is minor, no damage and not worthy of any foul on either side in my eyes.

I see 3 events that led to the next entanglement/eventual damage. Red pushes blue in a way that allows blue to enter its frame perimeter. Blue articulates its arm vertical while inside red's frame making disentanglement impossible. Red and blue attempt to disentangle leading to the eventual disconnection of the radio.

I do not think that blue was trying to intentionally entangle when it articulated its arm vertical. But if blue does not articulate, the two robots easily separate and continue playing after red pushes blue aside, similar to how the first entanglement was resolved at 0:36.

So was red *the* catalyst for the damage it received? I personally don't think so, but of course I'm biased. I can see how some might see it that way. Unless one can definitively say that red was 'the catalyst' that caused the damage, the 50 points has to go in red's favor. That's the only exception to robot A causing damage to robot B while inside perimeter (at least that's how I read G27)

As for the *second* blue TF-- well, I'm not at all sure. I don't see it.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

This is the best question I have seen raised. Another question I would add to this is: Has anyone on the GDC been a mentor or a member of an actual team? I am wondering if the things that are causing such grief this year is because no one on the GDC has actually been down in the thick of it. How do we find out the history of our GDC members?

I have never seen the overall level of grousing, grief and general disappointment in a game on CD in my memory. You can love or hate this particular game (I personally am disappointed in it for reasons I already elaborated) but you have to admit that there is something different about this game than other years by the general noise and aggression level around here. I sincerely hope the lessons are being noted so that we get a return to better years like Ultimate Ascent, Rebound Rumble, Breakaway for next year's game.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Linda Maulding is a long time mentor on my team but she helped design the last two games. Not this one.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Let us have a moment of silence for those teams that built their robots more robustly then most, and may have sacrificed some design functionality to do so, that now have gotten screwed over by the new rule (and may not be moving on because of the rule)

In other news, GDC, please let us know about rule changes like this a little sooner then you did. Seriously, Thursday? Seriously?

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I can sum up why I don't like this game in one word, Rematch.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I'd agree with this. I saw and heard things during this year that I haven't seen in previous years. There were entire sections of teams booing from the stands and entire alliances, including adult mentors, in the referee question box at Boilermaker. This year's game has driven some not-so-great behavior from some individuals that has made us look bad as a whole.

On the flip side, I've seen many teams handle this year with grace and composure. This has been a rough year for a lot of teams and for a lot of the volunteer staff, especially the referees.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

It seems at every event a lot of matches are being decided on fouls. These are not violent matches particularly or bots behaving badly. This speaks volumes.

Even though we got stung by it a few times the human player foul I'm okay with, because it is under our control. There are too many that really aren't. If you have a pickup then you seem to be in danger of being hit and losing 50 points.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

A few thoughts on this contentious subject:

A. Everyone should read this book: http://www.amazon.com/Crucial-Conver.../dp/0071771328

Tantrums/rants not only don't solve anything at best, they are almost always counterproductive. The catharsis is not worth it.

There are ways to disagree passionately and vehemently while being both gracious and professional about it. Most people are pretty bad at it. I'm not as good at it as I'd like to be. We could all use the improvement. This book is an excellent start.

B. "Everyone" doesn't hate this game. As with everything else in life, complainers drown out the satisfied. Unless we have polling data, we don't know what the percentages are, and pretending that we do is simply confirmation bias.

C. Anyone who has ever been in any kind of administrative position (be they a judge or a head ref or a teacher or a coach or a school board member or a member of the GDC) knows the fundamental fact about making people angry:

There are only two ways to make people angry: do something, and do nothing.

The GDC is in a hard spot every year, because no matter what they do--literally--a vocal minority will complain about it. (For example, if they update the rules mid-season or late-season or on some Thursday, people complain that things have been changed and that's not fair to those who built/planned for the rules as originally presented, while if they don't update the rules, people complain that they're unresponsive and don't care.) It's a lose-lose for them no matter what, and I for one am thankful that they're willing to do it at all.

I strongly suggest cultivating some empathy for the decision-makers, even if you disagree with their decisions.

D. Yes, this game has flaws. EVERY game has flaws. If you've ever studied game design, you'd know how hard it is to create an open rules set (as opposed to a closed rules set) game. Professional game companies spend literally thousands of man-hours playtesting and revising game rules before they hit the market, and at least hundreds of man-hours playtesting any rules changes before they're made, and yet they still have unforeseen issues once the game is released to the creative and motivated public. This is not possible with FRC, which means that more flaws will make it to the field.

E. Both "sides" of both the penalties and robustness arguments have merit--but I'm not certain it's possible to satisfy either one, much less both, of either argument. ("The rules are what they are. Build your robot so that it won't be a problem and it won't be a problem" will satisfy one side, and enrage the other.)

Compromise is the art of making sure that everyone walks away equally unhappy.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I think we've arrived at that common understanding of the match. We both had great alliances, and I recognize that the end result is hard on both sides.

Good luck at champs, hope we meet up again at some point in the future.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

There are many things stated by many people in this thread. There are many valid points and some crazy ones (from my point of view). However, I feel I need to respond to this one specifically. Neither VEX Robotics nor the REC Foundation (the actual company who operates and supports the VEX Robotics Competition and VEX IQ Challenge) have any intention of starting an FRC sized competition. The VEXpro product line was specifically designed to support the competitors in the FIRST Robotics Competition. Please do not read anything into the above statement. We are quite happy supporting the VEX IQ Challenge, VEX Robotics Competition, and FIRST Robotics Competition and have no intention of changing that.

Comments like this will mute out the valid points that you do have. I know you are frustrated, but if you make your points in a professional and respectful way you will have a better chance of being taken seriously.

Paul

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

I have a few quick points to make this morning.

1) There may be general agreement about 2013 being one of the best games ever (as referenced in this thread several times), but I recall last year seeing threads with posts that pointed out how bad the game was in comparison to previous years. For more cases like this, see also 2012, 2011, 2010, etc.

2) There have been several recent posts that suggest that teams that didn't win (for whatever reason, though everyone seems to be pointing to the rules) "wasted their money". Really? Is that what you do this for? Are your sponsors going to fire you if you don't win the regional? I always thought that winning was the thin icing on a very big cake that is the development of fantastic young people through inspiration.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

Why is it impossible to test an FRC game? There were six Robot in 3 Days teams this year. Why not invite them to HQ to playtest the game ahead of time? Have them play out the game video instead of those silly animations. Place a restriction on those who work on the "official" Ri3Ds that they can't have contact with FRC teams besides what is released at Kickoff for the first week of competition so as to keep it fair.

Re: Why does everyone hate this game so much?
 

You're quite right, but I want to chime in with a different take, for what it's worth:

While most people are going to be bad at discussing stressful topics like match outcomes and rule interpretations respectfully, I strongly believe that we should still have these discussions. A public forum like CD allows the FRC community to hash out disagreements publicly, share ideas for improvements and ultimately strengthen our collective investment in the program through participation. It is just as important for readers to allow space for various opinions here (and not to conflate personal opinions with team reputation), as it is for contributors to post as professionally as they can muster. This is internet 101, and my bet is the GDC would agree.