Re: The cheesecake runaway
 

Looking Backward, I can't think of a game over the past ten years that didn't have these properties.

Extremely critical task that is difficult to accomplish - 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005
Strong incentive to "race" to complete this task first - 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005
Chokehold strategy present with successful task completion - 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2007, 2005
No defense - 2013, 2012, 2011, 2005 (in the form of protected zones)
Cluttered field with lots of areas for congestion - 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005

Re: The cheesecake runaway
 

Not clear on what you determine the "chokehold task" to be besides scoring points in 2013, 2012, 2010, 2009, minibots in 2011, and 2 super-long chains in 2007, but none of these are things that could easily be "cheesecaked" onto a robot like can grabbers this year. I can't comment on 06/05.

Also in a large majority of these games, if 2 of the robots have a majority of the offense under control, there is something for a 3rd robot to do to keep their "offense area" less cluttered:

2014: Run interference/defense while cycle completes. Also be part of a 3 assist cycle.
2013: Run interference/defense while allies cycle, and hang at end. This game is the only one close to the level of "cheesecake" of this year at all because of plywood 10 point hangers and full-court blockers.
2012: Run interference/defense and participate in balancing.
2011: Run interference/defense, steal game pieces, funnel game pieces from midfield to scoring area to make allies more efficient. Possible "cheesecake" minibot/launcher here.
2010: Run interference/defense. Requires being able to expel balls from the far zone, but you don't have to be the fastest, so you pick a team that you know can kick the balls out, and not try to "cheesecake" a premade kicker IMO.
2009: Pin opponents, and keep your trailer out of the way.
2008: Lap lap lap lap lap
2007: Run interference and participate in endgame


2015: Attempt to grab cans that lose you eliminations if you don't have them, don't knock over stacks, attempt to use any of the limited game pieces the first 2 offensive robots aren't using.

Re: The cheesecake runaway
 

I need more explanation of each of these because I'm not seeing how they fit the these definitions. Except for the 2011 endgame and the 2010 chokehold (that was eventually defeated), none of these are obvious. Defense played a big part in whether teams could get to safe zones and even then shots could be blocked. Cluttered and congested are two different things. I don't think anyone would call 2014 cluttered or congested except with other robots--the nature of 3 team alliances.

Re: The cheesecake runaway
 

I would think that the bottom line thought process for cheesecaking is this:

- Something needs to be done that is very, very important for the success of the alliance.
- That thing cannot be done by me because of whatever reasons. I'm too busy doing some other very important thing.
- Therefore, I'll help someone else to do it.

This is a subtly different thought process than the following:

- Something needs to be done that is very, very important for the success of the alliance.
- I could potentially do this, but I don't know how.
- Therefore, I'll ask another team to help me do it.

Re: The cheesecake runaway
 

Many of those years had a fairly wide open field (2006, 2008, 2009, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014)
Unless you're talking about poof balls and track balls littering the field?

Re: The cheesecake runaway
 

I think you're really stretching the limits of what each of these parameters describe to prove this point. To save time writing this post, I italicized all the years that I feel do NOT apply to each parameter.

In 2014, the only "extremely critical" task was possessing a ball to get an assist. And driving, I guess. Neither of these were very difficult, and any "cheesecaking" needed to get them done was usually pretty crude and something the team could accomplish themselves - no need for pre-built mechanisms from home to be bolted on. You certainly wouldn't pick a kitbot to cheesecake over a capable third robot.

2013, what could you argue was extremely critical? Receiving frisbees from the human player, I guess? If you could only play defense, it wasn't so critical where people were putting a complete shooter on your robot for you. You could argue 10 point hanging, but I would argue the passive hang was trivially easy that year to add to a robot that otherwise does nothing.

2011's minibot race is an example of an "extremely critical" task - if your alliance didn't have two minibots, at all but very weak matches (or with the absolute strongest tier of scorers) you were unlikely to win.

None of those games have a "race" component, or any incentive to do something first, except 2011. If it takes a robot 4 seconds to complete a task versus 2 seconds, it's slightly worse, yes, but it's not that big of a deal unless the task itself is a race. The key word here is "race".

In fact, the *opposite* was true in 2005 - you were trying to be the LAST team to score on each goal...

You've got a really strange definition of chokehold strategy. 2013 did NOT have a chokehold at all. 2012 had game piece recycling making a true chokehold almost impossible. 2009 did not have any chokehold strategy. 2007 had an element where if you scored enough tubes in the right places, you could guarantee a 60 point lift would beat any pure tube strategy. But pure tube strategies were extremely rare, and you didn't have to modify alliance partners to lift them. 2005 did not have a chokehold that I am aware of.

2010 had a chokehold-esque strategy in the 469 type robot, but this could not be "cheesecaked" onto any old kitbot. A regular deflector that could get the balls in the same zone could be, but since that's just a sloped flat piece of material held in the air, I'd hardly compare it to 2015 or 2011.

2011 had an achievable "unbeatable score" if you could guarantee first and second in the minibot race, very similar to 2015's unbeatable score if you guarantee seven cans.

That's not what I meant, I meant this as in "defense is not a task a third robot could go and do". There was plenty of defense in every one of these years except 2005.

Are you seriously going to argue that 2014, a completely flat and empty field spare four goals in the corners, is "cluttered"? I'd love to see your definition of an empty field then. 2006, 2009 had similarly open fields.


The point I was trying to make here is, an overwhelmingly important race-type task that must be completed to win at the top level combined with a relative lack of better things for the robot to do and a field too congested for three robots to score independently constantly means that there's simply not a lot else to do with that third robot but cheesecake them. In 2015, there wasn't a lot else for your third robot to do anyway, unless you got some steal of a draft pick like 1671. If there is a task that many robots can do that can still contribute to top alliances, such as fetching / feeding game pieces, playing defense, etc. there isn't a strong incentive to cheesecake unless the task is of gargantuan importance like the minibot race.