Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

Wondering if there might be a 'CanBurgler' agreement at the higher levels of play. Both sides agree to grab two cans (not fighting over them), and may the fastest stacker/topper win.

An alternative to avoid the 1/2 second decider issue, would be to make step resources off limits until an alliance has placed a set number (6?) of (capped?) grey totes on scoring platforms. Or maybe you can't get a step can until you've used your three cans to cap stacks-- now its a race..

Maybe some good ideas for IRI and other off season events ?

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

At the highest levels, whichever team has the slower can stealer needs to be the lower seed for finals so they can place their robots second.

As for IRI/off-season changes, I was thinking just having extra recycling containers behind the driver station that can be put into play over the driver station wall.
This would increase the maximum scoring potential of both Alliances.

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

ok, here's the thing - and it might be something that many numerous teams do not have problems with. Money and external interest. And I am going to stop beating this dead horse after this.

I want to keep doing FIRST. There are many many students that want to keep doing FIRST. and we will keep doing it no matter what the game is. We *do* appreciate all of the work GDC does, all of the work that FIRST volunteers and employees do that make all of this possible.

A lot of teams have a different level of struggle (on the higher end) as far as juggling sponsors and interests - perhaps there's a stable base and you are worried about a different aspect of fundraising and sponsor drives.

Here in California, the State Court recently in the last 2 years or so, made a ruling on a suit. The end result is that after-school extra-curricular activities can not require fundraising as a basis for participation/membership. We can ask people to help, but we can't require it. We can *not* charge a membership fee, equipment fee, or anything like it. As long as we are tied to a public school, our team has a very strict set of handcuffs regarding how to implement our schemes to generate cash inflow. The ideas behind it are great - making it a level playing field and provide a certain set of fairness for participation. However, it makes it extremely difficult to staff fundraiser events.

We enjoy building the robot and seeing the students overcome challenges. The problem is if I have a difficult time generating interest and sponsorships, we won't get a chance to make the robot. The "meh" faces I'm getting from this year - from sponsors and parents - are all that I want to bring attention to. I like promoting FIRST and the game, this year I just find myself trying to apologize instead of cheering alongside my excited visitors at the game.

I know it's a hard job putting together these games and the events. However, I do still want to bring to light some of the challenges that other teams face on the fundraising end - and the overall goal of bringing FIRST and STEM to the general public. I know that every team out there struggles with their budget every year - FRC is expensive. For some teams, maybe losing sponsorship mean having to look for another great shop that can powder-coat their robot. For us, it might mean "no money, no robot"

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

Using this as a metric:

You know that to people that don't know FIRST the very first thing they think I am talking about is RobotWars TM.

So for the first section of a conversation they think we are going to build robots and smash them up like Romans in the Colosseum.
I suppose we could argue that the Colosseum was very effective at occupying the Roman Empire's interest.
We are being even more humane because we are only smashing up robots.

- Point being - sometimes we want to get the right attention.

RobotWars was all about entertainment.
It did not work like a true balanced competition behind the scenes.

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

It's true. Almost every time I open a conversation with "So I've been volunteering with a high school robotics team" the other person says "Oh, like Robot Wars?"

The reaction when I explain "it stacks boxes" is always a little fun to watch... but when you get into the eliminations and finals, things start to look very interesting. Races between can-grabbers, the "will it fall?" when a team puts down a precarious looking 6-tote stack with RC, the moment when a robot is in the act of putting down an RC just as the timer hits 0 (will it count??) and who can forget the moment in the Finals 2 at GTR Central when a pool noodle landed inside 1114's robot and toppled the stack it was trying to build, leaving a tote jammed in the mechanism for a few precious seconds.

It kinda sounds lame to read it, but it was so intense to watch!

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

A team parent is a photographer for the small town newspaper and got a press pass and took lots of pictures at Northern Lights.

The picture caption in this week's newspaper photo from the event was literally "Robot Wars."

The media knows what sells, I guess.

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

ok, no metrics are necessary - I am just trying to bring more people in to get interest in this - though at a certain level it *is* a little bit of selfishness, because the team (and FIRST in general) needs a little more recognition - and our team (like most teams out there I'm sure) needs money. I can't get money without the attention - good or bad (but definitely hoping it's all good).

I don't need metrics or Robot Wars or whatever - I myself actually didn't even know about Robot Wars until several years after I'd started FIRST - maybe I'm closeted or something. And funny enough. I only get that "Robot Wars" reaction maybe 25% of the time. It comes up once in awhile, but definitely much much much less than half of the time.

and Robot Wars is coming back now, so that's going to be another problem come next season.

All I am saying is, "I" and the team don't have any problems with the game - other than the fact that it is - from our perspective and the anecdotal "metric" of looking at my visitors faces and their frantic search for words "that don't insult me" (such as lame) when I show them "look our robot stacks boxes" as compared to "look, our robot shoots/kicks balls/frisbees or races around a track tossing balls or anything else"... - getting more blank stares from my visitors and parents.

I want to show them a game where it's very obviously team-oriented, that it's something akin to some type of sport - so that there is no problem in their minds to make that small leap from what they are already familiar with to what I want them to know - which is what we do is very relatable... As you know, sometimes you only have a few short seconds to make a pitch, the more I have to explain, the quicker they lose interest.

I am interested in converting more minds quicker and not turning them off. If that's a metric, that's the one I'm interested in. I really could careless about Robot Wars - it's pretty much the first thing I immediately discount fairly early in the program each season. FIRST brings the added value of GP and Professionalism that I don't see in VEX or Robot Wars (no insult to any of the other fine programs, I'm sure there are great people playing it. It's just not necessarily a front-and-center stated value)

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

I think the real issue here is that it takes a certain level of knowledge of the game (any game) before you can start to appreciate and enjoy watching.

Robots playing soccer? Everybody gets that, because everybody knows what soccer is (or, even if you don't, you are at least familiar with the concept of kicking a ball around). So anyone who has seen soccer knows what they are looking at when they see robots chasing the ball, passing between teammates, intercepting, shooting.

And due to the nature of man, everyone understands the concept of bashing into other robots to prevent them from achieving their goals, of offense and defense. Violence, basically. Everybody gets that. It's obvious, and compelling.

Robots stacking boxes? It takes a little more understanding to figure out what the heck is going on, but once you see it, then you see it (if that makes sense). Ah, look, that one is holding the RC hoping for the other one to finish a tote stack. See? They are working together. Oh, there's only 10 seconds left, will 1247 be able to finish its double-stack from the tote feeder and get it onto a scoring platform in time? There is real drama there but only if you understand the rules. And since there is no direct interaction between the two competing alliances (save for the canburgling in the very beginning), there is that much less "obvious" stuff to look at and understand.

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

Here's something worth trying when you introduce someone to FRC. Instead of starting with explaining the current year game mechanics, explain the key differentiator which you noted above-- the GP and Coopertition. So instead of "This is a great program, our team built a robot to stack totes", say "This is a great program. Teams built their bots in six weeks and right now in the pits there are veteran teams loaning parts, tools and work for other teams to repair and improve their bots, so that all the bots are as good as they can be. That's like a football team loaning a lineman to the opponents!"

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

This is gonna be a long one, so bear with me. I wanted to hold off until I had actually played the game. (did so last week)

To a large extent, the 2015 game has solved many of the problems that games have had/people have complained about in the past:

Aggressive Defense resulting in robot damage:

-This was only really a topic of discussion in 2014, where there were no safe zones and had carpet with 6 CIM drive trains.

-Since you can't go over and touch the other robots, this isn't a problem anymore

*I still think this could be largely avoided and wasn't that big of a deal
**I didn't watch every instance of damaging contact, and there may have been a situation where it was a big deal

Overworked Referees:

-2014 had a ref intensive game where they had to be looking in five different directions at the same time, leading to missed calls/controversial calls

-There are now scorers for the live score display, and simpler/less controversial rules. Refs have less work to do now.

Game outcome changing penalties:

-Many, many outcomes of games were changed because of the 50 pnt Tech foul in 2014. No other year really had this issue (maybe 2010 to a lesser extent with ball return penalties)

-Penalties are relatively small for 2015, and definitely not changing outcomes.

*50 pnt foul was needed in order to make it enough of a deterrent to not "steal the opponents ball" making it impossible for them to score.

Ambiguous/Unclear Rules:

-2014 had rules that were called largely by "intent". My intent isn't the same as your intent, which isn't the same as his intent... etc etc.

-2015 has clear rules

Bumpers:

-From 2009-2014 FRC required full bumpers on the robot, mounted in a specific zone, with red/blue requirements starting in 2010.

-Bumpers were a lot of work to make, mount, and be easily removable to change colors. Many teams (mainly rookies) would show up to events with no/illegal bumpers, and thus adding a bunch of stress on them etc.

-2015 has no bumper requirement, so one less thing to worry about. Teams are out on the field earlier.

Seeding:

-Schedule luck played a huge roll in how well you seeded. Only play against bad teams, and only play with good teams and you can seed higher than robots that may be better than you.

-2015 mitigates match schedule to a massive degree. If you have a couple of matches with good teams, sure you will rise up in the rankings, but not to the same degree as past years. This means teams with no list that weren't prepared to pick can read off the scoreboard and have a better chance at picking a decent team. Also, it is incredibly unlikely that the best robot at the event doesn't seed first.

Eliminations Bracket:

-Especially prevalent since the wildcard system began, teams would decline to be on the "other side of the bracket" of the powerful alliance in an attempt to get a wildcard slot to champs. AKA (avoiding #4,5,8 alliances)

-2015 obviously has no "bracket" really, and it is entirely possible for you to get to the finals without having to worry if you will have to play the first seed.

Give the GDC credit, virtually every single complaint that people have had about games in the last 5 years, they have worked to solve.

That being said. Obviously the game isn't perfect.

Autonomous is too hard

There are waaay to many 0 autonomous scores. It requires (for the average team) everyone on the alliance to have a functional autonomous. Honestly, I don't know why the GDC didn't make it per robot/tote/can/stack. It's a bad idea to change now, since teams with 3 tote/can autons have recognized the value of autonomous, and have a nice advantage because of it.

Perhaps the GDC was trying to implement a part of the game where all three robots have to work together in order to score points, which I think is a good thing. The problem is autonomous isn't the place you should do it. Teams can't help alliance members that quickly with code based issues, especially in quals at a regional. Not to mention even if I had time, if I use Java, and they use C++, then I might have a hard time helping them move/get an auton working.

Games are less exciting

I'm not going to argue that the matches are boring, but I think we can all agree that they most definitely aren't as exciting as past years. Especially 2014. I think the major contributor to this is the ranking system (which we already established fixes some other problems)

Wins don't matter. Every sporting event is really based around the win, then the secondary is the points. In 2015 wins don't matter, so you don't care if you win or lose (or team 9999 wins or loses) you care about their averages. Before/during the match when all the hype should be, you don't know what the team needs to do to raise their average. Are they doing well/poorly? Who knows! Sure you know their rank, but what do they need to score to move up/down. You have to look at the rankings on your phone/laptop to figure out where each team is at. Simply put, the audience isn't engaged until the end of the match when the scores are released, but by then all the hype is gone, and the score doesn't matter too much because it's not a win/loss situation.

That all being said, lets not forget the many matches where the alliance spends the entire match shooting the ball and missing the highgoal. The team that spends the entire match getting to a 10 point hang only to fall of at the end of the match. Or the matches where nobody can pick up the tubes off the floor and they forget to attempt to deploy their minibot. It's not as bad as people make it out to be. This game still can and will be exciting.

There are a couple other small things like strategically this game is a bit more bland than 2014, but no more bland than any other year. There is also the controversial 3rd robot with a ramp & doesn't move strategy.

The GDC listened to what you had to say but I think to some extent we have a bit of one of Aesop's fables: The Man, the Boy, and the Donkey. You can't please everyone, so don't try to. Someone will always have something to complain about.

Is this game bad? No.
Were other games better? No.
Do I prefer other games over this one? Yes.
Does someone prefer this game over other games? Yes.


Now then. Lets stop complaining all over CD about how bad the game is, and instead think of how you can play the game better.

tl;dr The game doesn't suck, it's just different. /thread

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

I think this year's game appeals to those intested in strategic games (board games or otherwise).

I think the other, more sports oriented games, appeal to audiences that prefer semi-contact sports.

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

I agree that the GDC addressed many of the complaints about last year's game (which were listed on CD BTW so I assume that's where they got them--more on that later). However they didn't need this game design to address most of them.

However I disagree with the 2 categories I've quoted from your list. Completely disengaging the teams is not a useful solution. Robot interaction has been one of the most important aspects of the success of FRC to date. I'm not sure that the bumper issues is so important that to create such a draconian solution--it sounds more like it could be solved in the inspection process (e.g., special help on bumper installation at inspection). The robot damage has been problem. We played with a broken frame clamped together in the final at IE last year. While on one hand that made it more difficult; on the other hand, the team had to work furiously to solve a real world engineering problem of a type that many will face in the field in their careers with real consequences, even lives, as stake. Regardless the robot damage issue can be solved with combinations of safe zones and obstructions that inhibit high speed collisions. (Think traffic calming devices on roads.)

Finally, as I mentioned above I presume that the GDC saw the complaints about the 2014 game on CD and addressed those. That means that we can get somewhere on design of next year's (and future) games by listing issues here. I made laudatory comments about last year's game concept; I'm going the other way this year. I assume that the GDC will avoid slippery surfaces and HP tosses into opposing robots after the 2009 game based on the complaints on CD. I think we have a long list from this year's game.

And I think we've demonstrated that we are thinking about how to play the game better--see CVR. But look at our collective comments--we're thinking beyond just this year.

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

This^

Also, your team has one of the best Robot Crates ever.



Smile

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

Our team has a "middling" robot - the ones everyone seems to feel get 'left behind' this year. I disagree. This year, for the first time, it seems that we are actually placing where we deserve to be - the middle of the pack. I hope we will do better at our next competition, having had more driver practice, etc., but even if we don't, I really like the new seeding, because a "middling" team gets credit (in terms of points, which increase QA score) for what it DOES do, rather than being shut out from getting any credit just because it's up against a better team. It's really frustrating for a team like ours to work so hard to build a robot that CAN, and DOES, shoot a few balls/frisbees, has a 10-pt hang, can balance on the bridge sometimes, etc., but still gets loss after loss because it ends up paired with similar (or less capable) teams and against more skilled teams. It feels like there is NO reward for all that work. Sure, there is the occasional win, and sometimes we would get that win because of our 'bot, but in our competitions over the past few years, it seems like the downside to a 'win-loss' ranking outweighed the upside. In this year's game, we are racking up points right next to anyone we play with - whether they are the proud owners of a 'toaster' or a total powerhouse.

Also, we get to actually PLAY the game, and have our robot DO what we built it to do (in the Quals, at least - I do understand that we might be asked to 'sit still' or at least 'stay out of the way' if we ever got picked by a powerhouse for the playoffs). We aren't just asked to "play defense" all the time - we get to build stacks no matter who we are playing with. And we aren't getting totally shut down by the other side's defense.

And I totally don't get the "we're losing sponsors because it's not a fun sport to watch" or "hard to describe". Our sponsors help us because of what we're doing for the students, how we're helping them, inspiring them - maybe out of a bit of local pride (we're the only team on our island, and most of our sponsors are local) - I don't think most of them even know what the game is from year to year, and as long as the kids are enjoying the activity, and learning and getting inspired in STEM areas, well, that is what we tell the sponsors and what they care about. I mean, we're not talking sponsors who are really hoping to gain market share because their logo is on a robot, right? This isn't NASCAR or professional sports. No one thinks their company is going to get media exposure because they sponsor a FIRST team, do they? Maybe I'm just living in a different world. We get our sponsors through OUR enthusiasm for the game/activity, not because THEY are excited about the competition itself - is this not the norm?

I do agree that autonomous this year is too much "all or nothing" - it would have been better if there had been a point for just getting YOUR robot into the zone, 2 points for getting a tote or container in, etc., with a BONUS for getting all three (robots/totes/containers). This year's auto scoring leaves a lot to be desired, but I think the GDC will learn from it.

Not sure yet how I feel about coopertition this year. I think the disconnect between having coop points contribute so much toward a high ranking in Quals, and then be completely absent from playoffs, is a bit of a problem. Unless you can get into the top tier (i.e., the "pickers") b/c of coopertition, then there is not much point in doing it, because it is unlikely that a score inflated by coop points will lead to being "picked". I would be happier if the coop task were something that could be used in the playoffs (like the bridge balancing in whatever year that was), and/or if the points achieved were more proportional to the value of the task in playoffs. What if a coopertition bonus were given only if each alliance was able to remove at least one can from the step to their side? To get it at all, red would have to get a can off the step AND blue would too. That could maybe add 10-20 points to both alliances' scores. Just a wild musing...

Re: This year's "game" is a job, not a game
 

Sounds a lot like what I posted before kickoff:

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...&postcount=411