Successful teams in FRC history
 

There are some iconic teams out there in FRC. 71 with 4 world champions! 254 with 37 blue banners and the first Curie world champion! 33, 359, 118, 1118, the list goes on and on. What do successful teams do to robot-wise to win division champs and Einstein from year to year? My team has never won a division in the 17 years we have gone on (although we've been close a number of times). Anyone have insight towards national success? Please give thoughts to particular reasons of success instead of just naming successful teams.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

Attention to detail

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

I can't tell if you are making a joke about "1118" or...

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

I'm going to guess that they mean 1114

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

The obvious answer is building a winning robot. Let's look at what that really means.

First and foremost, your analysis of the game (just after kickoff and before the design phase) must be spot-on. You have to deeply understand the game and all its nuances, and how it will play out - not just week one or week six, but divisions and Einstein too. Without this, the rest is not going to be effective.

Then you need to understand the capabilities your robot needs to have to score a lot and be hard to defend (i.e., play the game well). This means WHAT things you must do, not HOW you will do them.

Only when those two very important parts are done, can you start on actual design and prototyping. Design a robot that will do what it needs to, then fabricate it the very best you possibly can. Many teams feel that "cut & try" is good enough. Maybe it is, but that's not the path to Einstein.

Last but possibly more important than all the rest is your drive team. They should have a few hundred hours experience with the robot (or its duplicate <hint>), so that driving from Here to There, lining up to Score, driving around defenders, and EVERY other thing you CAN imagine they will need to do during a match, they can do with their eyes closed. Then, when something you didn't imagine comes up, they can concentrate on managing that, since the rest is so well-practiced it doesn't need much mental effort to be perfect.

All this is easy to say, but not easy to do. Miss any of it, you're watching Einstein instead of playing it.

1676 also struggles with these. We've been finalists at CMP before (beaten by 1114 & 469) and in the Elims many times, but we have yet to crack onto Einstein.

Maybe next year :rolleyes:

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

This guy, right here knows what he is talking about! This is one of the biggest reasons 1678 was so successful this year and last year. But after you have an Einstein level robot your whole Team must be able to follow through with practice, scouting, pre-scouting, and Alliance strategy. Two big things I have picked up over the years about being a winning team are; Your drive train may not win you a competition, but it can absolutely LOSE you a competition; Great Scouting and not a great robot is what gets you to Einstein, its the teams that have the scouting to pick up a robot that the other alliances passed over and should NOT have. In alliance selections as a 1st seed you get the 1st and 23rd pick, at our first event this year our second pick(robot 23) was 6th overall on our pick list. At Champs our second pick was 14th overall and 4th on our second pick list! Scouting matters not only for elims, but for your qualification matches as well. If you know the opposing alliance you can do a better job of shutting them down and improving your own strategy as well at the same time allowing you to win more matches and seed higher.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

No, no joke. Attention to detail is important. Doing a lot of little things better can help push you over the hump. Overlooking a lot of little things will make you fall backwards.

See:
610 and their Design Book. It's a good read.
254's build blogs
1114's Strategic Deisgn
One of my personal favorites, JVN's 2010 Build Journal

I have no idea who/what '1118' is anyway

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

Spending more time developing a winning strategy. You can have a robot that looks awesome, but if it doesn't play a winning strategy, then it won't win.

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Neither do we ;)

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I think that's a good guess.

1114 has worked hard to get good at developing FRC game strategies. Studying their methods is time well spent.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

This especially.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

It takes hours of work and dedication to go far in a season, and years of experience helps too. Remember, winning is not everything.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

You need to design a robot that can play and win at the CHP level.

There are robots that can win a District / Regional, and there are robots that can win a Division / CHP. They are not necessarily the same robots.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

The title seems to be misleading, please don't get me wrong. A more appropriate would have been something like "Championship winning teams strategy?" or something like like that. Some of the teams that I know measure success by number of students that are inspired into STEM education.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

But, the initial post sets the tone. It states things like blue banners, divisional wins, etc. I see what you mean, but if you read the first post in the thread I think it speaks for itself.

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This is very true. Some teams have the muscle and the might (resources and talent) to build the perfect robot to play the game. Some teams don't have that kind of robot capital and have to choose. One thing that I hope will change with a possibly expanding CMP is the addition of robots that can't win at the regional level but know exactly how to plug themselves into an Einstein alliance.

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Now you are going to hurt 4489's feelings...Nerds Inc. -->Cybertribe

Back on point, don't overlook the importance of driver skill and practice time. Watching an offseason event you can see a 99.9 percentile robot drop if a new drive team is behind the glass.

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I just want to put in perspective how difficult winning a division is to remind everyone why so few teams have done it.

Just 106 teams in FRC history have won a division.

That is .02% out of ~5200 teams in FRC history.

There have been 176 slots available for teams to appear on Einstein since divisions were created in 2001, so if each spot was won by a different team it would still be .0338% of all teams that had made it.

Just 34 teams in FRC history account for 59% (104) of the division wins, these are the multiple division winners.

Even more staggering is the 7 members of the "5-Timers Club" account for over 22% (39) of all appearances.

You shouldn't be upset that your team has never broken through.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

fixed percentages

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

fixed fixed percentages

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

"Successful" teams that come to mind in Northern California include 701, 1868 and 604. They've won regionals but haven't won a Champs division. However they've developed overall programs that we are trying to emulate. They could win the World Chairman's. They may approach building their robots differently than we do, but they produce very successful student team members, which is the true definition of success in FRC.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

Your questions seems to focus most on how teams do it from a robot standpoint, but there is so much more that goes into making Einstein than the robot.

There are many, many factors...but they start with the Team. Robots make it to Einstein once, but Teams make it there multiple times.

Some of the factors are:

Leadership: The team must have quality leadership to help guide them through the early stages of the build. Leadership with both fore-sight to see what Einstein will look like, and also hind-sight to know what has worked in the past. Since students are on a 1-4 year cycle, the best teams draw their leadership from their mentors. Not saying students aren't leaders, but the best teams draw from that partnership and usually have a mentor as the final decision maker.

Expectations: The top teams expect to get to Einstein! They focus all of their effort to attempt to achieve their goal.

Quality Game Analysis: This is a must! Need to understand the game and decisions that will be made at the start of the season and all the way though to Einstein. This is a continuous improvement process. Analyze, Adapt, Analyze, Adapt....

Engineering and Design: Very few (if any) robots make it to Einstein that aren't high quality machines. Since you are playing though an entire regular season and the division, your machine needs to be designed for robustness.

Driver Skill/Practice: To compete to get to the biggest stage in FRC, your drivers better be well versed in how to operate their machine. Either through practice or match play, by the time you get to the division eliminations, they should be as good as they can get.

Hardwork / Preparation / Determination: Be prepared to put in the work, either through efficient time usage or brute force hours.... the top teams are focused and determined to not get knocked off their pedestal. From Jan - April there is usually something going on to design, iterate, test, practice, fix, improve, etc...

Execution / Continuous Improvement: Einstein level teams have a hunger to drive for perfect execution. They continously work on every detail of positioning, machine operation, strategy, communication, etc... to hopefully continue to improve every step of the way.

Scouting: Good scouting is essential to making it to Einstein. Without it you won't make it through a Division qualification without issues that may or may not damage your chances at making it to Einstein. Additionally, a successful alliance selection at Champs is probably the #1 way to get onto Einstein. Recognizing that team that exactly fits the strategy that compliments your machine or picking up that team @ the 18th pick that should have gone in the top 8. These are the ways that improbable, but dominant allliance are formed (ex; 1477, 1241, 610).

Luck!: Sometimes it just takes a little luck to make it to Einstein. Having a good qualification schedule, not having robot issues in eliminations, someone else having issues, being on the right side of the bracket, etc... there are just so many variables that have to fall into place to get your one machine onto the correct alliance, against the right opponents, etc... that even with all the above a little luck always helps.

Even with all these factors well in your control, the best robots don't always make it to Einstein. As Peter pointed out above, such a small percentage of teams make it to Einstein, that we should all be considered really lucky just to make it there once!

But even with that said, talking with the Teams that make it there consistently, you know they will be working as hard as they can to be in position to make it there year after year.

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Another piece of being successful on Einstein: interteam relationships. Get to know people from successful teams and build up relationships with them. I believe EJ mentioned on Gamesense that a large part of their division picking strategy (specifically picking 2848). While an excellent robot certainly played into their decision, being able to work with other drive teams and having those relationships can help teams on the edge up their game and get into eliminations and Einstein.

For a lot of teams, building these relationships is something natural in their own area, but at Champs, long-distance relationships is key.

This isn't to say that you can be one of those incredibly successful teams with a mediocre robot, but soft skills are what separates teams with great robots from great teams with great robots.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

Adam's post pretty much sums it up.

The only modifier I would add is that the decision to be a winner is made in September. What your students do in the Fall (positive or negative) will have long lasting impact for the entire team. I have always impressed upon our team that the game starts as soon as we return to school. Your level of preparation will shape your build season actions and decisions. Early and thorough preparation ultimately determines your long term success.

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I would argue that the decision to be a winner starts right now.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

Getting to Einstein takes a lot of luck with respect with being in the
1. right division
2. right schedule
3. right alliance
4. route through elims to get to division finals

in addition to fielding a competitive robust robot.

I'd argue that you have to be either the one of the top 2-3 robots in your division, or ranked somewhere between the 10-15th best robot.

Like small regionals, many good teams never make it on the #1 or #2 seeded alliance, yet are good enough to replace the second pick on the #1 or #2 alliance, always getting stuck somewhere in between.

Not always the case, but happens quite often.

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Robot-wise, successful teams have to push for victory. Off-season training of new members, development of engineering practices/methods, a proper grasp of the game's strategy from kickoff weekend, remaining diligent during build season to produce a quality, top-tier robot, and preforming well at competitions are all things I would bet winning teams would agree is crucial. Strong mentors and sponsors help propel many winning teams forward as well, in addition to $$$.

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EJ Sabathia's ("254 Mentor Extraordinaire") appearance on FRC Game Sense Friday Finale shows why 254's appearance & ultimate success on Einstein was not an accident. If I could be so bold as to summarize some of the the discussion: They were open minded about the game and correctly identified what it would take to win. They prototyped a variety of mechanisms, not just ones that had worked in previous games. They didn't limit their efforts to simply building a robot - they focused on building alliances.They practiced on a full field with two complete alliances, not in an assist-free, defense-free vacuum. They worked with their partners in advance of their matches, rather than just talking to them. They were able to step into whatever role the alliance needed. They did the hard work on and off the field.

It is easy understand this after the fact, but figuring it out and making it happen before you see others doing it isn't so easy. The "Successful Teams in FRC History" (not just 254) are the ones that approach the game with a clear mind, have the ability to "get it right" before "right" has been defined by others, and never quit doing the hard work.

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

Thank you all for the great comments! I really hope others who are reading these posts are as inspired as I am to work hard and try to make it to Einstein. :)

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

A couple of people have mentioned the need to accurately analyze the game before prototyping/building. I'm not sure I agree with that being an necessity for all teams. Earlier on GameSense Tom from 254 said they thought the game would be more run and gun opposed to the focus on assists (turns out the traits needed for the 3 ball auto allowed it play the assist game very well!). I believe there was a post from 33 after their first district stating they were surprised by the game play, expecting to use their well-practice solo-cycles more often.

I think the take away should be that the high resource teams can over come a mis-step in strategy but the average or below average teams wanting to compete with those high resource teams need to nail the strategy as their margin for error is much smaller and they cannot waste precious time on functions not directly tied to winning (such as catching in 2014, climb/dump in 2013, suspension in 2010...).

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True, but functionally both 33 and 254 were able to pick up the ball and score it quickly and efficiently. Their robot did not change, though their strategy might have.

I think one of the biggest things to consistently perform well is team organization. Every effort you make needs to be organized so as to minimize the chaos during Kickoff, build season, and through competition. Being open to all kinds of ideas also helps, but know your limits, both as per the robot but also the amount of manpower you can dedicate to a task.

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True. Can I change my examples to 469 in 2008, 67 and 33 in 2009, and 2337 in 2010? :D

Re: Successful teams in FRC history
 

We were a little bit undecided at first as to what the best way to play the game would be. Our initial attempt at modelling the game (a) severely underestimated how much time it took for balls to be re-entered into play and (b) underestimated the ability of the average robot to acquire an assist, making single robot cycles (with a truss toss) look more appealing. But after about a week into build season it was starting to become clear that assisting was the way to go.

We were able to postpone the conversations about teleop strategy until late in build season because we realized that regardless of your role on the alliance, or whether you are doing 10, 20, 30, 40, or 50 point cycles, it really doesn't make a lot of difference in the robot you want to build. You need to be able to acquire balls (from the ground, from a partner, from a human player) and exit them from your robot (to the ground/low goal, to a partner, to a human player) and truss/score high. You need to be able to play defense, and function in the presence of defense, meaning you can't fumble the ball every time you get hit. The only point of contention was whether catching would really be worth it - even then, designing for loading from the top was advantageous for other reasons.

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I would also say getting your team out there and getting the other teams to recognize you. becoming friends with other teams is a key part to sucess.