Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

I really like what you guys did at your event Libby. I just think that all the arguments here in Delphi have been said on this topic. If you don't like the event rules don't go, if you like them go. Find the off season event that has the same philosophy that you do. Its that simple.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

It's my offseason, we'll do what we want..

I've watched this from afar, but with Libby's post I feel the need to add my post. That event had a goal of getting everyone into the finals. They got that to happen, it's a great thing.

I did a similar thing, I went to the two top alliance Captains and said. "You think you are hot, pick two bottom teams, you make it to Finals, I'll buy dinner." Read about the details Chapter 9 of my autobiography on "How to spend $176.50 at McDonalds".

It's an off season, we are all here to push robotics...

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

This has been getting to me for a while now, but I thought the thread would die down earlier...

Repeating yourself over and over again and trying to force your opinion upon another is not a trait of "gracious professionalism," which is another goal of FIRST. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, and there comes a point where one is no longer rationally discussing it and listening to the points of others' but treating it as a one-way street. I am absolutely certain everyone here has the best interests of FIRST in mind. And there is a difference in how each offseason likes to do things.

To use an extreme example, if the goal is to be more inclusive, then why, during the official season, don't the top teams at a regional pick some rookies or teams that haven't been to eliminations before, in order to give them the learning experience and excitement of being in the knockout stages? The answer is simple; everyone is trying to compete and if the captain believes that team will not give the alliance the best possible shot of winning the event, they won't be picked. Now if an offseason decides their goal is to model an official competition, then it is the CHOICE of the captain to pick whoever they would like, and it is not another teams' place to approve/disapprove of their pick. If the offseason event's goal does not match the specific goals of your own team, that's fine, everyone is acting in good faith towards the best interests of their team - but no one is forcing you to attend the competition.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

It's been done, I've seen it happen, pretty stunned expressions on the captain saying "We Accept", and I've watched some teams then rebuild robots because they are suddenly going to Worlds.

All teams are not greedy about the banners.

And just aside, flying the "GP" slogan doesn't cut it. Jane has multiple posts on that, when I see her post about "GP" I'll worry about it.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

Emphasis mine. I was intruiged by your assumption that eliminations experience leads to learning, so I did some digging. I looked at a number of second bots that 254 has worked with over the past few years and looked at the eliminations histories of these teams. Though I didn't crunch numbers (in part due to a lack of a metric to compare elimination records), it seems that teams who played with us as a second bot did not seem to have an effect on their elimination records at other events: teams that won in the past kept on winning, teams that never went far into elims stayed that way (heck, one team hasn't seen eliminations since playing with us :ahh: ).

But a few disclaimers:

1. Learning could take multiple forms, but the easiest way to try and measure that is eliminations records.
2. I looked at the second bots from regionals/offseasons for my dataset, because I knew that they generally have less eliminations experience than us or our partner. I also picked the teams 254 played with because I had experience with the teams (which may have opened the door to bias).
3. I wasn't really sure how to measure elimination histories of teams, but the basic metric I used was to count how many times they made it to the semifinals or later each year. This metric is less than ideal, because it weighs wins and semis appearances equally. A fairer metric would be to do something like districts.
4. I did this counting by hand, so it is not very precise. If I were to do this again with greater rigor (which I may well do if I have time), I would probably look at Michigan for cleaner metrics/data.

Tl;dr- Playing in elims once with really good teams doesn't seem to have an effect on future performance, though a more rigorous analysis is needed.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

I wasn't trying to imply that teams who don't do that are greedy for banners. I was saying that in my opinion, and experience with other teams that I've worked with in scouting/alliance selection (during the regular season), this has been the case; to pick the best possible team that fits the strategy.

That's true, but when I see teams like 4814 describe how much they learned from getting the opportunity to play with teams like 1114 and 2056, I get the impression that some teams feel very inspired. Obviously, this isn't the norm, as your data shows, but every once in a while, it will have an effect, no?

And yes, it was an extreme example, it wasn't meant to be taken for it's weight in gold.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

Snide comments are uncalled for.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

That's an interesting metric, but I think I"m looking for a different one: of those teams that played with you, how many are still operating compared to the overall average? I suspect the thrill of playing with 254 probably boosted the enthusiasm for those teams for some time and increased the number of team members in the future.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

Here's the argument (sorry for restating it for those who have followed what I've been saying--one poster said "Specifically Mr. McCann, I believe that I and the majority in this thread have read your posts and understand what you are arguing for." Apparently some still don't follow and are asking for further clarification.):

I'll start with my premise, which I think many of you may have missed (and I was remiss in addressing earlier). I haven't yet seen a counter argument to what I've proposed other than saying "I want to do what I want to do." That's not a rationale position that states how what's happening now promotes the objectives of FIRST. I don't accept status quo bias--that what we've stumbled into so far is the best outcome. Make your case, don't just say that we should just stick with the status quo. To be honest, the attrition rate of FRC teams, which I've seen discussed in other threads, indicates that there are problems that we need to address. Lets' start fixing them. Come up with some good ideas. I've put out mine. Instead of shooting them down, propose something else.

So here's my principals:

1) A preferred way to encourage participation in the FIRST program, and thus in STEM education, is to allow all teams the broadest level of participation in elimination alliances.

2) As a corollary, less experienced and less competitive teams learn a tremendous amount from being able to ally with more experienced, competitive teams through a series of elimination matches.

3) Teams drafting their own second bot creates an insular environment which degrades the atmosphere of coopertition. A team doing so appears to be implying, even if that's not the intent, that it is better than any other team, that it is not interested in learning from other teams that might in in other alliances, and isn't interested in sharing its expertise and resources with other teams.

4) With these objectives in mind, I suggest these changes to be used by event organizers (I can understand the concern about event autonomy, but FIRST can issue guidelines):

a) Offseason event should decide the intent of their event as to the level of competitiveness. IRI and Chezy Champs stand as the most competitive. Others like the Rookie Rumble will decide that maximum participation among all teams is the objective.

b) in the less competitive events, to maximize the interaction among teams and the ability for the greatest possible number of teams to play in the eliminations, alliance captains would not be allowed to choose their own second robot unless there are no other 'bots running.

c) Another great option is to require alliance captains to teams other than other alliance captains. I specified rule changes above that would dissuade teams from losing late matches to avoid become an alliance captain.

5) If teams tried to do these on their own they would be unilaterally "disarming" because other teams would choose more competitive drafting strategies, and a deep literature in political science and economics shows that few will choose this approach. If you really, really don't believe this, I can start sending you citations from the literature. I know of no studies that say otherwise.)

6) Hal Varian (1986) [now Google CIO] showed that we will underprovide a preferred level of charitable contributions or cooperative giving if we avoid compelling everyone to participate and leave the provision to individual choice. This means that if we want to encourage meeting the first two objectives, the event organizer needs to compel all teams to follow these rules so that everyone gains greater benefits and reaches a higher level of satisfaction with the outcome.

Yes, this does limit individual freedom of choice. But the sequential draft already restricts a team's ability to choose whichever team they want, and the selection refusal rule adds even more of a restriction. We often limit freedom of choice in many situations to improve overall societal benefits. The speed limit is just one example.

An important difference in offseason--for almost all teams, moving on the World Championships is at stake in the Regionals and Districts. That is never the case in the offseason, so it has a much different competitive flavor. Think of the NFL preseason games vs regular season and the level of competitiveness.

As to contacting event organizers, I am encouraging other teams who see the benefits of this approach to contact their chosen events and persuade those events to use these rules. It is not my place to be the event "police" and monitor what each event is doing. I used the Fall Classic as an EXAMPLE of a situation and I don't feel its my responsibility to follow up with them. (I follow up with events that we compete in where I think that changes would be beneficial.) So please do not ask me to contact anyone about this comment.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

I'm going to respond in two ways: First, the two holes I see in your argument. Next, my perception of what the ACTUAL problem is.

First, your two holes are in your #1 and #3 statements. The first is that the preferred way to encourage participation in FIRST is to maximize the number of teams in elims, and the other is that teams drafting their own second robot is a bad thing (paraphrase). The second one is easier, so I'll start there: I've seen VERY few events where one team, let alone multiple, has the ability to pick their own 2nd robot, and actually does so. I believe this to be an infrequent occurrence, thus, on any risk matrix, it would need a rating of "catastrophic" to need serious action taken.

Back to the first hole. Maximizing the number of teams in eliminations is a good thing, IF "we're all winners" is a good thing. However, I note that this is a COMPETITION, thus, "we're all winners" is not something you really want to encourage. Furthermore, I would posit that the preferred method of encouraging participation is not necessarily maximizing the number of teams in eliminations, but maximizing the number of inter-team interactions through pit visits, alliances, team socials, and other similar activities. Maximizing the number of teams in eliminations is but one aspect of this, and seems to be the ONLY one you're focused on. Please, look at all of the trees in the forest, not just the oaks.


Now, my perception of the ACTUAL problem, relating to attrition. There are generally 3 or 4 causes of a team not returning. I'm going to go ahead and list them; they are: Funding, Lack of Mentorship, Lack of Administrative Support, and Lack of Interest (students/parents). Of the four, again, you seem to only be tackling one, the last one--I agree that interest is higher if you win more--but I would argue that you need to watch out for all four. What if, for example, your high school decided that robotics was no longer worthwhile? Could your team survive the transition to another administrative base? What if your mentors suddenly burned out or got transferred? (One team I've been involved with did have this problem--they've been doing VRC and FLL since that year.) How about funding? Can you increase your fundrasing quickly enough, if your sponsors pull out or you don't get that big grant (see the Texas thread)? Or what if all your current students graduated, and somehow you didn't have any recruiting?

As a side note: You weren't been around for this, but one of the ALL-TIME most successful years for one FRC team was followed the very next year by that team NOT being in EXISTENCE. Think about it: Einstein Finalist, along with a lot of other awards/event wins. Gone. Split into 2 or 3 other teams, at least one of which since folded too, re-emerging as a rookie for a year or so, might still be around. Think about that for a minute. That isn't a problem of not getting inspiration from being in eliminations! In that case, I believe I remember hearing that it was some form of administration issues leading to the split, and a sponsor doing something-or-other that led to lack of funding for the team that folded. This was a top-tier team. Not a mid-pack or low-end team. Top-tier attrition. That could be you guys. That could be anybody.


So attrition isn't a problem that can be solved just by slapping restrictions on what teams can and can't be picked by alliance captains in order to artificially boost the number of different/lower-ranked teams in the eliminations. Another thing ya missed was the first year of alliances, and the various things tried that year to make it work. What ended up happening was largely the system we've used ever since. FIRST has had multiple iterations of the selection rules to even things out a bit--the most notable being the serpentine, but others include monkeying with how teams are ranked. Whether they've worked well is up for debate year by year.

And this isn't something, at the offseason level at any rate, that FIRST is even going to want to address. Their attitude towards offseason events is something like "put it on our calender, if you want to; if you want to use our fields, here's who to contact; here's a form of field control you can try to use" and other than that they don't touch them. They'll acknowledge they exist, and support pre-stop-build scrimmages within range, but they don't go any further. That guideline isn't going to happen, not from HQ at any rate, unless they actually see this as a solution to a problem.


Here is my solution to the attrition: Start tracking the teams that drop out of FRC. Figure out how many are going to FTC and VRC, and possibly other competitions, because that's where a lot of them end up. The robots and budgets are smaller, the mentors have a little less work, there are a LOT more teams, and they're at least as effective. I can think of at least 4 FRC teams, off the top of my head, that aren't in FRC anymore... but are in VRC or FTC. Those aren't attrition. They're multiplication.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

I disagree in whole with the statement of "I want to do what I want to do". My team is young, has experienced some success, and this was the first year that we competed in an off-season event at MRI. I did not invest my time nor my team's very precious resources to compete at this event to win. My goal was to offer up to my up and coming members that same experience that we would expect to find at a highly competitive regional. Yes, we did very well. However, that was aside from how I approached the event as a coach. I established the idea with my team to treat this as a regional event. Do not expect to make the elims. We are here to hone our skills.

If the other teams do not approach this off-season event in the same manner (whether it be an 'A' squad or 'B' Squad) lessens the experience for my own team. My scouts would not get an experience that is like a regional; my PIT would not get an experience that is like a regional; my Marketing team would not get an experience that is like a regional. Etc.

Why is it that learning only happens in the elims? Why is this your only hang-up?

How is that? If you are a coach (I am assuming that you are because you have stated your accolades in athletics and such) - how can you not see the value in placing your team in a situation that allows for them to compete with the best against the best? Even as my alliance has to compete against another that has two bots of the same team, I want this. That means that the other alliance may have a competitive advantage and should be able to compete at a different level. But is that necessarily true? If alliance A is made of 3 robots from 3 top programs and alliance B is made of two robots from teh same team and another from a different team - what makes Alliance B stand out? They (Alliance B) have to compete against an alliance that is made up of 3 teams with their own best drive team, pit, etc. What about Alliance B sharing it's collective knowledge between the alliance - shouldn't the other team learn just as much from the other two robots team? I trust that through the integrity of FRC that alliance B's robotics teams would further the other team even so much more.

On the same note - I have witnessed first hand 2 different times where my alliance has benefited from our opposing alliance helping out one of our partners. So that point is mute.

On a side note, I would discourage my own team from choosing our 'B' robot - but we are 3-5 years from that being a possibility.

This is not just a ludicrous statement, it is insulting. Just because these two events draw in the best of the best they are exempt from your policies? Then how do other events ever grow to challenge IRI or Chezy? So events in other regions or states should just water down the competition to best fit the lowest common denominator?

Why then play qualifications? Why not just play 10 rounds of 'practice' and then random draw the elims - and leave out all the 'B' teams because they are not worthy of competing in the elims because their school is just too good.

And within these statements I realize the difference between you and I. I understand the beauty of the FRC competition season and the need for off-season events. You, as a self-proclaimed policy-maker, want to regulate the off-season events - events that are put on by people that are fans/supporters/coaches/alum/etc of FRC that just want to put their own spin on FIRST Robotics.

I fear the day that the current generation of FRC leadership retires and a new group of policy-wonks/educational experts/politicians take over and recreate Dean Kamen's view of competitive STEM through cooperation. What you are suggesting goes against everything that I believe FRC is about. If you are solely concerned with promoting STEM through equal outcome - then please go ahead and do so. But do not do so at the behest of the rest of us.

So instead of encouraging the teams that do not make it to the finals at an off-season event to create their own venue - you would rather have them push their own agenda on the kind folks that put on these off-season events. Is that how you create change? In other words, don't pave your on path as Dean Kamen did, pressure everyone else to change to your own ideals?

McCann - do you realize that you are truly the minority on this site? This site that is dominated by the hardcore FRC community? Why are you pushing your agenda for off-season events so hard? I just don't get it. Allow the FIRST to conduct the game and organization that has created so many opportunities for so many students to continue in their manner. And in that same breath, allow the off-season organizers to create venues and events that adhere to their own ideals. Why is this such a problem for you?

In the end - it is you that created the problem, stated the problem, offered a solution that was undesirable to the masses - and yet you complain that the rest of us aren't GP.

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

Others have said a lot of what I would have, though not necessarily with the same tone. However, I want to repeat and/or emphasize a few things.

It's your preferred way, obviously. But in causing certain teams to progress past where they otherwise would have, I think you've diluted the experience. I for one do not believe in the platitude of "everyone's a winner".

"I'm not going to tell you all that you all are winners. At this point you are smart enough to know whether you are or you aren't." -- Woodie Flowers

I see you focusing on elimination matches. I don't think that's where most of the learning experience takes place. They are much too stressful a situation for that. It's certainly exciting to participate in them, and I can believe that a team might want to do it again after getting a taste of it, but I don't see any evidence that a less competitive team is going to learn a lot by being allied with a more competitive one in the eliminations.

This strikes me as a very unlikely state of affairs. I have to wonder whether you've actually been to a competition with the kind of "friendly" alliance selections that you disagree with. And I again note that you seem to be focused on the elimination rounds and ignoring the rest of the event.

NO.

FIRST has no business telling FRC teams and event organizers what they can and cannot do outside the official FRC competition structure. You can certainly suggest the changes you desire, but you should be suggesting them to the people who can implement them instead of to the general Chief Delphi forums audience.

That's enough. I disagree with "maximum participation" as a universal goal, and I strongly disagree with your presumption that you can tell a less competitive event how to run their alliance selections. I find it absurd that you would consider making "level of competitiveness" an explicit measure of event planning.

I could respond individually to the rest of your points, but it would not add anything to the discussion.

--
Alan Anderson
TechnoKats Robotics Team
FIRST Team #45

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

First you say FIRST should be issuing guidelines, then you say teams should persuade events to do this.

Off-seasons are unofficial. That's the whole point.

FIRST might provide a field but if I felt like running the 2014 game with 17 balls in play at once and full-field ramming allowed then that's our prerogative at our offseason.

It's up to the teams who buy in to that event to decide if that's what they want to spend their offseason budget on.

Now if I made that rule and teams decided not to come because of it, that's my feedback right there. Maybe the next year I won't make such sweeping and drastic changes.

Same goes for what you're proposing. Some offseasons prioritize competitiveness at whatever cost, some prioritize getting everyone to play in elims, and some balance in the middle somewhere.

What you aren't quite getting is that you can't enforce a standard across offseasons. There's just not a realistic way to do that, nor should there be.

You have certainly stated your opinion, over and over - but the fact is that unless event organizers are getting specific feedback (or teams aren't giving them their money), they're going to make their rules as they choose.

And no, I'm not talking about 'feedback' in a big Chief thread- I'm talking about direct emails or conversations with the people running a specific event.

If you'd like an offseason where teams aren't allowed to pick their second robots, then I suggest you start forming a planning committee and make that your main rule.

If you see an offseason near you that you think has the 'wrong' rules, then just don't go.

--

Side thought: Are we not recognizing that a 'B' team is still kids who might not have had drive/pit/scouting experience unless they were at that event? How is excluding them okay?

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

+1

Re: A comment about alliance selection in off season events
 

^+1000

My point in one statement. I would be safe to assume that teams that bring more than one robot to an offseason event aren't doing it to "annihilate the competition". Pretty shallow don't you think?

If our team had the time/resources to build a practice/side bot, we would do the same! Just for the sole purpose of developing new drivers and giving other kids the chance to be at the controls that didn't have the opportunity at the regular season events.