Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Confirmed by Frank during the Founder's Reception broadcast tonight:

• 600 Teams
• 8 Divisions
• 75 teams per field
• 2 fields for Einstein
• Wait-list reopens at noon on Monday.

Thoughts?

FRC 2015 Championship News
 

Frank Announced tonight:

There will be 600 teams at the Championships

They will be playing on 8 fields

Einstein will have 8 alliances on from each division

There will be 2 fields for Einstein this year.

Thoughts?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I'll be disappointed if one of the fields isn't Tesla field....also...HOW?! Does this mean the Einstein Fields won't be fresh/unused (i.e., used for two of the divisions)?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

So if they can support 2 fields for Einstein, they should be able to support 2 fields for MSC, right?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

and
Einstein will have 8 alliances on from each division

Will the amount of alliances on the field change?

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

Real or Troll Thread?

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

Two fields... Hopefully what they'll do with that is have matches running back-to-back, with setup taking place on the other field during each match. That would be fun to watch for sure! What I'm afraid they'll do is have just as many speeches as before, with matches taking place simultaneously on both fields in between...

I still maintain that 6 divisions and a round-robin would have been really fun to watch, but I suppose this is a much better way to fit 600 teams.

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

It was just announced by Frank.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I don't remember him saying that...that would mean 64 alliances in total (8 alliances from 8 divisions). That doesn't seem right.

You mean Einstein will have 8 alliances, one from each division?

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

Real.

http://www.streamingmeeting.com/webc...IRST_Founders/

Scroll to 2:45:45

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

Did they announce names?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I guess we'll find out tomorrow...

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Wow....... Never thought there would be 8 fields and two Einsteins

Two Einsteins means little dead time between championship matchups. That's good!

I'm excited.

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

Nope.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I'm curious to see how they work 2 fields for viewing purposes. From my experience, it would be very hard to see two fields at once inside the dome, especially if you're not in the middle.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

threads merged

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

The real question should be "what are they naming the 4 new divisions?"

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

This will be very interesting
I'm curious as to how they plan to fit all of the fields.....

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Alternate matches between the two?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

They also said about 1000 match played. With an alliance of 3 teams that is 10 matches per team. With 4 teams it increases to 13.33. It is interesting that the 3 works out to a perfect integer. Maybe that means alliances are staying to 3 per team this year but this is all speculation with estimated numbers.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I mean viewing angles. If the field is a rectangle in the long orientation, wouldn't it be difficult to see the one farthest from you? Especially if the close field not in use gets in the way somehow?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Maybe with the world championship growing so large it is becoming unrealistic for everyone to watch one field all the time. Even when teams are playing on one Einstein field, not everyone gets a good or even decent view.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

4 dimensions.

Um, seriously: The dome floor is huge. 8 fields fit easily. (use paper cutouts if you wish to check).

I would imagine 2 fields along the long direction of the dome would both be visible for a majority of the seats along that side.

Likely the Einstein fields will not be pristine, but used. Doesn't take much to go over everything carefully and bring it almost back to perfect. Unless 25 tears up the carpet again...

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

What carpet? :rolleyes:

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

*Cough Regolith Cough*

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Whaddaya mean? The field will be easy, but draining the Dome afterwards will be rather difficult. That cornstarch in water is really a pain to clean up...

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

We are gonna fill the entire dome up with water? Dang, gotta rebiuld the robot cart into a robot dingy.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

No need. That's what the cornstarch is for. Won't be a Newton field, though--that's a NON-Newtonian fluid!

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I suspect the two Einstein fields could be on opposite sides of a corner, like Archimedes and Curie, with the stage set just behind and between the two. Viewing still isn't great, but it would keep everything a little more together.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

:O The extra team capacity at nationals would allow them to do 4 alliances at the regional level

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

For about 2 years, then the anticipated growth in teams and events means FIRST would need to expand Championship again. The goal is for the Championship to be sustainable.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I don't know, that's a lot of fields. Five last year wasn't exactly tight, but doubling it up to ten fields? They may have to pull the lower level of the bleachers back in to make room, thereby using more of the seating up top.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Dont worry, this was heavily vetted over the summer about being able to expand to 8 fields in the dome and it was proven to fit comfortably.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I doubt they would use ten fields. I'm seeing them just reusing two of the regular division fields for Einstein.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

There are plenty more reasons that that won't happen in the next few years--sub-32 team events, the current field, all the field-specific infrastructure that would have to be redone... I just don't see it happening.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I like the change - more teams get to experience CMP, more matches per team, and less downtime on Einstein. What's not to love?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Volunteers' perspective: time for a bigger boat! :) 1.5x most roles, 2x others.

I hope some of the changes coming will streamline robot inspections.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

As per the administrative manual, the total number of teams on the field at once is staying to 6, so either we're staying 3v3 or its going to 2v2v2 or 6v0. Due to the AndyMark field its likely two alliances, so 3v3 is almost certain *Knocks on wood*

There is a lot of space in that dome, I doubt there would be an un-solvable issue with fitting 10. Remember, the Dome and its attached convention center is all for FRC now, not all four FIRST programs. If needed they could easily push all non-field activities/items into the adjacent convention center, leaving the entire dome for purely fields.

I can't remember where, but some FIRST high employee (maybe a past president) mentioned that they didn't want to reuse another field for Einstein, because in that a big percentage of teams would get to play on the Einstein field while others did not, and also the Einstein fields wouldn't be "pristine" as they are currently.


As for names, I'd assume they'd keep the current four, so it means we need four more extremely influential scientistst. Tesla has got to be one. Other than that, possibly Pasteur (like pasteurizing liquids), Darwin, Bernoulli, Maxwell, or Edison. Maybe Faraday also. For the younger crowd, possibly one for Hawking or Goodall?


Oh yeah, and having Einstein quarter-finals is the coolest thing ever.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Outside of worrying about where exactly they're gonna fit these eight plus fields I'm just absolutely geeking out on how amazing Saturday is gonna be.
What happens on Einstein this year will easily surpass anything FIRST has seen even at IRI!
I can't wait!

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

My understanding of the preliminary schedule is that the speeches happen consecutively from 6-7pm. Because they are spending the whole day (7-5) doing alliance selection/division elimination and championship matches.

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

Weird. Unfortunately, I foresee many people leaving before the speeches. Unless they do the final four of Einstein during them.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

We need you!

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

My new favorite meme. But seriously, I know Champs is always running kinda low on volunteers. What's gonna happen if they don't get enough? D:

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Cool. I hope they name some of the fields after some Chinese, Indian and Middle Easter scientists!

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

From what Frank announced, it will be back-to-back matches on the alternating fields.

Re: FRC 2015 Championship News
 

It will likely run very much like FTC Eliminations

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Getting the extra volunteers is going to be a huge challenge. There really isn't much incentive for the volleys.... I take vacation days to work my rear off, and have to pay for all travel & lodging, all for some (usually mediocre) catered food and ONE t-shirt for me to sweat in for 4 days? I have worked Champs before, and would love to do so again, but they really need to work on their volunteer incentives. I know there is a separate thread about this somewhere, sorry.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

That is not going happen. We will have more first time Championship volunteers than ever before, but our veteran leads and inspirational VCs will make it all work. They always do.
-----

edit@Carl (above) -- I agree about the volunteer shirts. Either provide more, arrange shirt laundry for out-of-towners, or both. I think other volunteer incentives are excellent already; however, the volunteer dining area will need to be larger.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

How are there already teams on the wait list?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Two t-shirts. You just have to go and get the second t-shirt on the second day.

I put in my volunteer application for Worlds months ago. Doesn't matter how my kid's team does, I'll be there. I'd just as soon be on the practice field again, CIA was a great time, but I'm worried I might get "promoted" to one of the competition fields.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I'm still hoping they name one of the new fields Nye :D

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

The two "Einstein" fields should be named Tesla and Edison. Or Newton and Leibniz. Or some other pair of funny scientific rivals. But I guess Newton and Edison are both already in use.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Field 1: Einstein
Field 2: Rosen

Makes sense if the matches are directly after the previous. Because you have to move real fast to the other field to watch the next match.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Nye or deGrasse Tyson would be awesome. Maybe Kamen might be tossed in.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I am still concerned about the hotel situation and related crowd logistics.
With FTC and FLL still in town, plus 200 more FRC teams and the volunteers to support them, where will everyone sleep? And then there are other issues such as the Einstein seating, the wrap party, entry to the pits, shuttle service to Union Station, etc. They already have not fully figured out how to handle 400 teams gracefully. I just hope they have a solid plan.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Perhaps they could put some sort of bridge between the fields.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

This was my first thought as well...

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

My question about all this is... where are these extra 200 teams coming from? More regionals, or are they letting more teams through at each regional? I heard someone say (random, unofficial source) that they were going to advance both finals teams to champs.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Wait list for the next few seasons, then program growth means Championship needs to expand again.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Ah okay, thanks.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Some quick Math - 8 alliances of 4 teams each and 8 divisions means 256 out of the 600 teams there will make the elimination rounds? 42.6%?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Yep! It's nice that the percentage is so high, since according to the preliminary schedule, playoffs are running all day Saturday.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

If you didn't make playoffs that would make your Saturday pretty boring...

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I guess East St. Louis comes into play.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Aint no different than previous years where your day was done after a couple of matches Saturday morning.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I think I'll just nickname field one Kamen and field two Flowers. unofficially, of course.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

According to TBA, the new division names are Carson, Carver, Hopper, and Tesla divisions.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Yes but Einstein has two fields so what to call the first and second fields? Kamen and Flowers sound about right.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

They were used as names for major pit aisles at the Championship years ago. Einstein fields seem like a more appropriate, celebratory use.

Off topic warning, and quite possibly a rant: You're right about "rivals", but im curious how well known that us. Tesla would turn over in his grave to get equal billing with a guy who cheated him. Edison wad a great marketer and patent hog (that's the GP term for it), but Tesla forgot to write down more genuine innovations than Edison ever produced himself.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

The FRC Spyder app says that the 8 fields are
1.Archimedes
2.Carson
3.Carver
4.Curie
5.Galileo
6.Hopper
7.Newton
8.Tesla
I don't know if thus is right, but its in FRC Spyder.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Yup, this was confirmed in the blog a few months ago.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

So will there be 64 alliances on the both Eisenstein fields or just 8 alliances?

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

Each subdivision will go through an eight alliance playoff schedule like the schedule at regional and district events. Then the winners of the subdivision will go onto Einstein where the overall World Champions are determined. So to answer your question there will be eight alliances.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

There are two Einsteins.

Do the the winners from each eventually play each other so that we have one winning alliance? I had heard a rumor that they don't and we would possibly have two winning alliances. Say it is not so.

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

There's one Einstein round split across two fields. All alliances will play on both fields. (I think. The manual doesn't say which matches are played on which field.)

Re: Championship 2015: 8 Divisions, 600 Teams
 

I expect it to be similar to MSC, alternating matches to speed up turnaround time