Re: Coopertition issues
 

Sometimes it feels less like coopertition and more like "leave the bacon in the bag in the park and we will leave the tricycle in the subway next to the fire extinguisher"

Re: Coopertition issues
 

I agree completely. In many of the matches I watched where no coop points were scored it was because the teams tried and failed. A huge part of the issue is that not all teams can deal with game pieces being in their way when they are already in possession of the yellow totes. Let that be a warning to all human players, please don't clog up the area by the step with noodles before the coop points are scored. It is not worth losing 40 points.

While I do not like the idea of relying on the other alliance for such a large amount of points, I like this years version of coopertition far better than 2012. This year you can do you part of coop and be done with it. In 2012 there were many matches where we would waste the last 30 seconds of the match setting up of the bridge to allow for the other alliance to join us and they would not follow up on their agreement.

Re: Coopertition issues
 

we had this problem many times because the other team's robots couldnt transfer a single tote to the center for us to put our 3 on. sometimes it was because the robot's claw couldn't hold it, sometimes there were noodles in the way, sometimes they accidentally flipped the tote on its side. other teams, for whatever reason, had way less issues than we did (2907, I'm looking at you... how did you even do that well?). We need to know their secrets.

Re: Coopertition issues
 

I think I saw more of the, "Hey, we wont throw noodles until coop is done" but as soon as the match starts they instantly go at it. I think I saw more messed up from noodles blocking the path and not allowing one side to get there.

That being said, I did multiple times at our event tell our alliance member that was doing coop, " Don't attempt coop until they have set their totes on the step." Not because we didn't want the points, but because the opposite alliance team would always talk up their ability to complete it but our scouting said something completely different.

We made the decision to stop doing it (our bot, not alliance) because we could score way more points by doing out own thing...and the one time we attempted it, the team put the totes on the step in the wrong orientation(something we stressed before the match.)

-Ronnie

Re: Coopertition issues
 

I recall seeing some of the teams in Dallas that were collecting the three yellow totes in Autonomous Mode set them at the side of the field, near the Landfill Zone at the beginning of Teleop Mode. It seemed that they did not always pick those totes up again, probably because they did not see the positive progress towards a successful CoOp.

Re: Coopertition issues
 

The thing about coop this year that is different from 2012 is that it is possible to outscore coop points with a good enough robot. Lets say you expect coop from about half your matches. Thats an average of 20 points per match, assuming 12 matches. Its not that difficult for a good robot to put up more then 20 points per match, in the time they would be taking to do coop anyway. Since it was basically a win in 2012, only counted for 50% of your ranking. This year its probably similar for most teams, but it you can outscore it your time is better spent just making your own stacks.

Re: Coopertition issues
 

While we didn't have an agreement issue, we had an issue with one of our co-op attempts. Our bot couldn't get the totes on the step very well and one of our alliance parteners said that if we could stack our three totes for them, they could put it on the step because they said that's all they've been trying to get their bot to do and they could do it well. We setup the stack for them in the first 20 seconds of teleop. They couldn't get the stack on the step...

Re: Coopertition issues
 

I can confidently say that I've never heard, seen, or written that and can also confidently say that I will probably never see, hear, or write that in the future.

Re: Coopertition issues
 

30 seconds? We didn't want to risk losing those QP at all so we always agreed with the other alliance to drop whatever you're doing at 60 seconds and balance with us.

Re: Coopertition issues
 

I suppose it depended on the match and what teams you were working with (some were far faster at getting up on the bridge than others). But I am sure there were matches where we wasted more than 30 seconds waiting for the other alliance to join us and they never made an effort.

Re: Coopertition issues
 

Very much so... It really depends on your (and your alliance's) robot's capabilities. We put too much effort into working with the other side in our first event to make the coopertition points happen and it ended up costing us a lot of time - and points. If you have a strong stacking robot (like yours), it makes a whole lot of sense to have a weaker partner handle the coopertition. Of course, that creates a certain level of unreliability in the creation of that stack. This is where we got burned a little last time: We were relying on the other side to do teh job and, in the meantime, our path got blocked by noodles, totes, etc. and/or the other side couldn't do it, etc.

However, because we have a nice autonomous stack (should be very reliable at our next event), the totes will be sitting right in front of us at the beginning of teleop and the first thing we have to do anyhow is move them out of the way. It will take less than 15 seconds to put them on the step - which is well faster than we can build a stack... Moreover, if a weaker partner were to come and retrieve them, they'd likely interfere with our stacking anyhow, slowing us down. This will make it well worth it for us to do the coopertition for our team...