Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

Avocado though... Guacamole on a corndog? It's so crazy it just might work.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

Bob, I think the Tators learned their lesson in Spokane about eating beans the night before working together in a 10x10 pit all day:ahh: ! Junk food for us, now!

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

Bacon. Something tells me there'd be bacon involved.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

I'll give you bacon if you pick us.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

But you arent in Galileo. :p

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

We do this at regionals/districts every now and then, if there a clear delineation of who robots #1 and #2 are from the rest of the pack.

The timing for alliance selection is a huge bonus for the #1 team (if they're good enough that they don't scorch the earth) to get with their #1 pick in the evening to make a joint pick list, if they have a good idea of who it is already.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

Now that's how you start a negotiation! ;) I wonder how confusing alliance selections would be if we did pick you guys. I mean, Archimedes and Tesla are sharing fields, I think. So, logistically it could work... Lol.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

How much more confusing would it be if we snuck a team member into the alliance selections so we could accept?

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

I don't know about the word 'negotiating', but teams have always talked to each other as the competitions progresses. Naturally you can't make a pick list together after a single match has gone by, but inter-team communication regarding alliances has been pervasive as long as I've been coaching (a few years). Those conversations have actually been my favorite part of competitions, and the relationships that form as a result. So yes, I do think teams will start discussing potential plans on the second day. Sure, more time would be nice, but going up to talk to another team between matches doesn't take that long.


Yep. Being able to get a jump on scouting decisions for alliance selection is great. If you know who you are going to be with (which is possible even if you're not the #1 alliance), going to sit with that team's scouts and making a very informed decision about the 3rd robot is far better than doing it alone or leaving your alliance captain to do it by his/herself on the field.

Why hide your intentions for first selections as an alliance captain or the top pick until its official? I personally don't subscribe to any reason that teams shouldn't be straightforward and forthcoming about alliance selection. There's no reason to delay realistic discussions, and if you know things will be a certain way, just get started as soon as you can.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

MAR Champs had cheesecake in the volunteer lounge, judge's room, and mentor lounge. :cool:

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

The advantage of being the #1 seed is that you can talk to your 1st pick about your 3rd and 4th picks. If you make it clear who you intend to pick, the #2 seed (and potentially more seeds) then also have that same advantage.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

I was referring to intentions as far as making the first pick, I guess I should have been more clear. There are of course many advantages to keeping your scouting information secret for later selections.

As far as keeping 1st selection secrets so that your opposing alliances can't make any assumptions for their 2nd robot, I guess I just don't like withholding that much information. I totally get the tactic, but to me it just feels a little too restrictive. Really, such a situation wouldn't give a very big advantage to another alliance anyway, as if all the teams did good scouting, the top picks would most likely fall the same way regardless of if a slightly lower alliance was privy to what robots would be selected in the first round before them. Teams should try to plan for all situations that may arise in alliance selections and how to best deal with them.

In that position, I'd rather keep open relationships with fellow teams than try to use every power I have to make sure they don't possibly get a slight advantage on us.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

On a more serious note, we game out all of the possible scenarios the night before the last day. I think we had 6 scenarios in 2013 on Friday night and we had a draft list for each one (several overlapped). We even accounted for being rejected. Most events aren't so complex, but it does take time and commitment. Don't think that you can develop a draft list in 10 minutes (or on the arena floor as we've all seen teams do.) Teams behind the No. 1 seed will be in much the same spot as we've been over the past and to be honest we won't do anything much differently than we've done before no matter where we are after qualifying.

Also for teams further down the list, understand that a high alliance captain cannot make any draft commitments to lower seed teams--you may be gone or you might not fit with the other team that they end up selecting. Just be aware of what a high seeded team may be looking for in particular and try to highlight that in a match. Even ask them before a certain match if you should demonstrate a certain task.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

I don't see limes or cheese puffs on here, this is highly problematic.

Re: Negotiating for Alliance Selections During the Championship
 

I think if you're the one seed and you're gonna pick the #2 seed or the obvious best robot, sure go ahead and tell everyone because they would be expecting it anyway. But if I'm at championship and my team has qualified first, and we've had discussions as a team and are planning on digging a bit deeper into the field, I'm going to keep that a bit closer to my vest. If everyone thinks we're going to pick #2, and we come out and pick #10, it's chaos, and that works in our favor. That's just how I would do it, but I think many teams lean more in this direction than towards showing all their cards.