Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

I feel like this thread is a good place to express my opinion on the competition aspect of FIRST. Let’s begin with the purpose of FIRST and how it applies to these competitions. Nowhere in the FIRST mission statement or vision statement does the word competition appear, with this said I do realize that the competition aspect is a big part of what got me personally enthralled with FIRST alongside being able to do hands on design work as a high school student. Competitions provide many learning opportunities for students such as time management, problem solving skills and an introduction to statistical analysis and how it applies to strategy implementation. All of these skills and more are extremely valuable to companies and increase the employability of students that have been exposed to these through FIRST. I can’t speak for FIRST but in my opinion I think too much emphasis is being placed on winning competitions. When I see the integrity of a HOF team being questioned for strategic implementation completely within the rules set forth by FIRST, it makes me uneasy about the direction we are headed in. I understand the urge to win and who is involved (students, sponsors, parents, schools), but I also believe that students are being engaged and inspired regardless of the amount of banners they receive.
I wasn’t at the regional, I don’t know exactly what happened but we are getting a pretty good depiction from both sides on the decision process and what those decision led too. It seams both alliances wanted to win and decided to do what they thought would win them the competition and the challenge set forth by a sponsor. With regard to defense itself, there is nowhere in the manual that sais defense must be played. Defense is a strategy that many teams employ and has been deemed by many to be a big part of the game, that doesn’t mean it has to be.
These are expressly my opinions and I do recognize other viewpoints made on this thread as valid concerns, and as such I though it important to also express my opinions on the matter.

I think the better question would be if an alliance is allowed to discuss strategies with an opposing alliance that may alter match play.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Okay I am hearing a lot of opinions and statements that do not really reflect the teams in questions but individuals. Right now most of the teams and their members are feeling attacked and judged and emotions are starting to run statements. Everyone just needs to take a breather and take the events of the finals for what they were. You've heard plenty of different perspectives and accounts of what happened and it is what it is. Never did I or any teams involved think of how controversal this would be when the decision was made. If we offended anyone then I apologize but at this point we are just beating a dead horse. I suggest all involved in this heated discussion take a break from it and ponder on it to themselves for a bit.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Nobody gave up! That's the beauty of it! We both decided to play the game a different way. Mutually giving up defense isn't giving up. If anything, blue played a better match against us. They improved their score even more than we did!

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Play 100% every match?
I felt the #1 seed playing the #8 seed should have played a more conventional 1assist game and save the double assist as a surprise in later matches when it would be a surprise and an advantage in perhaps a more difficult round.

In the finals, blue would have had to win two matches after they fought their best to defeat red. While it is possible they could win the next two, it seems extremely unlikely. In fact, they still had a chance to out score red in the shootout, although also unlikely.

Six teams playing a friendly match who set a goal for themselves that had no effect on any other team's ranking or playoff chances and entertained the crowd was great to experience.

As for the $500, it was the challenge itself that made this, in the final match of the day, a refreshing alternative to a crash and bash slugfest.

Note that the International Chairman's team receives a $10,000 scholarship to give to one of their students. I doubt it is the motivation for submitting an entry. But even if it was...

The spirit of FIRST has little to do with robots or winning. I think the teams who were involved have explained themselves well. Not much more to add.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Ok then lets use ratios:

Blue(Finalists): They scored 1.09x more in F1-2 than the average of their 5 Elim matches before. Thats only 15 points more.

Red(Winners): They scored 1.55x more in F1-2 than the average of their 5 Elim matches before. Thats 108 points more.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

With 60 and Gila playing defense on 842, 2486 would be scoring away as we are defended by 2403. We knew the only way we could have any chance of getting points was by getting the three assists, and it just took too long with the limited ball handling ability we had on our alliance. We could pick up the ball when there was defense on us, but we could not truss or score fast unless 60 was blocking for us, and if they were doing that, they could not be defending 842 or 2468 at the same time. Gila took a while to get set up for the inbound if they left the corner to defend, and could not truss or score.

I think we did respectably well in both finals matches. If we looked like we were not playing hard, I don't know what to say. We gave it our all in both matches.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Every team is entitled to act the way they do within the rules of the game and the spirit of the competition.

Playing no defense is not necessarily the wrong strategy.

The six teams do not owe us anything, but personally I believe they should ask themselves:

did they believe they could win?
did they try their best to win?
would they have played this way if there was no financial incentive?

If they answer yes, fair play to them.

I hope that any financial incentives offered in the future tie directly in to the existing regional incentives (ie winning an award/match).

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

The 500 lb. gorilla in this story is not these teams, or if or why they decided to play a certain way, or whether it was right or wrong. The much bigger issue is whether it can be acceptable at a FIRST event for a sponsor, or anyone else, to offer money rewards to teams for running up a high match score, or a low score, or any other goal that could be manipulated or affect outcomes. Where would this stop if permitted? I do not fault the teams for taking the temptation of the cash reward (nicknamed the "challenge".) I fault the sponsor who made the proposal, and any FIRST official who knew of it and allowed it to go on. It is a dangerous phenomenon that FIRST would be wise to nip in the bud.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Well according to those who were there, the man who proposed the "challenge" is on the FIRST Board of Directors.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Apart from S1-1 where we tried a different strategy, our other elimation wins were by respectable amouts.

Is it really that surprising that an aliance might want to try a purely offensive game to see if they could win on that alone? It was a different way to play but that was fine by us. We played the "stock" defend-when-not-holding-the-ball style in earlier matches and it worked too.

As the teams involved have already (repeatedly) stated, noone was forced into this and everyone played their best to win the match even if it did not involve trying to bash the other robots mercilessly. (Does anyone really think that Blue did not want to win the tournament??)

If it was just about the money then we could have just foul'd them over 200 and claimed the prize. We did not because thats not the spirt in which we were competing. The challenge was on the table the entire tournament and noone did that in any match because its not how we complete.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

Why wouldn't it be?

I did exactly that in 2002 in front of Woodie Flowers (he was literally standing right by me as I called the other alliance drive coaches over to discuss the match). He seemed to think it was funny.

Qualification points were a little weirder back then- if you lost you got your score or, if you won, three times the losers score. So it was beneficial to make sure you won but also to make sure the other alliances scores were high. It lead to all kinds of funny stuff; teams scoring for their opponents and, in a few cases, 'fixing' the match. In our case both alliances came out of the match with higher rankings than if we had played a 'normal' match.

At the time it caused a little controversy but people pretty quickly figured out it was just the smart play in some cases and, not surprisingly, FIRST didn't disagree.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

I hope that any financial incentives offered in the future tie directly in to the existing regional incentives (ie winning an award/match).
I hope so too, it would have made this a lot easier....

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

The dynamic of the game changes drastically depending on who you play. It's a mistake to include their previous elimination scores. If blue scored more in the first 5 elim matches, it goes to show how much better the defense of the 1st alliance was.

Re: 301 points! and could have done more
 

So the only way to play AA is to be playing defense when we dont have the ball?

I'm pretty certain that all the teams were trying their best to score as much as possible and win the match and the blue banner.