2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

What did you particularly enjoy about FIRST this year?

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I enjoyed not having to watch gamepieces during a match to prevent field faults (compare this year with last year if field reset got confused). Also, I liked the change from the standard shooting game type. Finally, I liked not having to build and wire something above the alliance stations.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

If you loosen the rules, and give teams more leeway to build, they often build incredible, creative robots that expand and connect to other pieces and are absolute marvels of engineering.

The 8 Alliance Einstein was incredible, and it allowed so many more teams to be on Einstein and, in my opinion, made them even more exciting and intense.

Lastly, ranking by average score made for more accurate rankings than ever before, which is generally good for the game.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

In a game with no defense, you saw some unexpected teams and team numbers that made you say "who?" rise to the top. You also have teams spending more design resources on making more flexible and creative components instead of beefing up their drivetrain and bumpers.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The referees generally don't need services for PTSD as a result of their volunteer work this year, unlike 2014.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Loved the ranking system, also liked the elimination structure, made elims go quickly.

Though I would have to say the best improvement this year was the change to the polycarb guards on the gates to the field. They didn't come off and fall into the field once this year(that I saw). That was always a pain in the past.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The students on the team enjoyed this game and seem to have had a fun season.

So that kind of overrules any negatives I had about this.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I quite liked seeing Kiwi drive and Mecanum on Einstein. ;)

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I posted this a while ago, and its pretty much what learned this year.

Also: getting hit with pool noodles is a lot less painful that the AA ball. Or a tote... Or a field reset crew member by accident. The ranking system was also my favorite.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The championship venue was able to accommodate all 600 teams well. With how busy some of the hallways had been with 400 I was worried there would be places with total gridlock.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I think no bumpers helped a lot of the inexperienced teams, and it seemed like there was much less of a need to constantly repair/maintain the robot throughout a competition.

It also mostly avoided bringing out a lot of the unpleasantness of last year, including questionable referees calls and large amounts of disagreements over what constitutes the "spirit of the game".

Ranking in qualifications did a better job of reflecting robot performance, although as usual it was not perfect.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The game required actual engineering. Kit bots rightfully struggled to do anything.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I actually liked the game, and the lack of defense. It allowed my team to take risks in the design and manufacture of our machine, that we would not have in any previous game. This years rules created a type of game play where there was a heavy focus on the mechanisms, and we were able to get back to a real engineering challenge rather than just crashing boxes on wheels into each other. This game more closely modeled industrial automation applications than most games of years past, and for that reason, I like it.

Also, not having to make bumpers was a hugely popular and favorable change.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The extra teams and fields were handled well from what I saw and experienced.

Division playoff pits in the center of the arena were a great idea

Inspections went extremely well considering the number of teams. I know Hopper which I inspected on ran very smoothly.

No bumpers! Best thing to ever happen to the build, the game, and inspection.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

This. 1000 times this.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The new wildcard rules.

However, if they had anything to do with the championsplit, which I'm guessing they did, I'm not a fan.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The 4th bot at champs was a nice option and fun to strategize!

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I didn't play this game, but it seems like if you had a good robot, you could consistently seed high. This is amazing, considering last year it felt like I was banging my head against a wall of bad partners. There was also no defense related carnage.

Also, bad calls from officials were not really a thing this year (well, at least compared to last year).

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I don't know... Noodles to the face can be frightening :P

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Lack of size restriction on the field. Hope this stays.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Our team had a lot of firsts this year.

• We were able to successfully implement a slide drive with only 1 wheel in the back.
• We developed a strong drivebase with 0.050 Aluminum (2024-T3)
• We drove with belts for the first time
• We used live axle for the first time
• Used built an elevator for the first time (Thanks Adam Heard and the guys from 971 for posting CAD and providing some inspiration for our elevator. R3 bearings were great [until the broke after a couple competitions])
• First scissor mechanism on the robot (still not sure I was a fan of it)
• Designed and built our first (and second) gearboxes.
• Successfully implemented some 3D printed parts (Camera mount, pneumatic tank mount, constant force sprint spindle)
• Were able to not have a single inch of chain on the robot for the first time. (only belt, pneumatic and lead screw)
• Were able to build an extremely low profile drivebase (everything within 2.75 inches from the carpet).

On the other hand, there are some things we need to do better.

• Build faster and better prototypes
• Not overload machines as much as we are (rely more on COTS parts)
• Finish design faster
• Get back to using PDM (No PDM this year was a disaster)
• Finish mechanical build quicker so software team can get more time to do things like control loop tuning and autonomous
• Build certain parts to a tighter tolerance. We had to rebuild some axles because they were too short.
• Too much reliance on snap rings to stop axial movement. We designed the drive so the bearings so their flanges were on the outside and retained by a snap ring. Unfortunately, snap rings came off and we had to resort to drilling/tapping and putting a bolt with a washer on to keep the bearing retained. Ideally we would have swapped the way the bearings were inserted into the drive, but we were too far along in our build and didn't have enough room in the wheel channel to allow for the extra 1/8 from the flanges of 2 bearings.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I Love! LOVE! LOOOOVE! having 8 divisions and eight alliances on Einstein! It was so much fun and so exciting. I wish FIRST would do this forever!

This year may not have had the best game but these were some of the coolest robots I have ever seen produced!

Volunteer food was awesome at most of the events I attended.

I have nothing but total love for my fellow volunteers. There is no one else I would willful permanently damage my body through will self imposed torture than every single one of you! I miss all of you guys already and I can't wait to see you in the off season!

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I also love the new fields! I especially love the scientists they chose to honor, such as Grace Hopper and Nikola Tesla!

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The new rules allowed a lot of new and unique designs, some totally out-of-the-box.

Teams could focus on precision rather than brute force, leading to more elegant designs and driving.

Using average scores in Qualifying helped make seeding more accurate (though I disagree with its use in Elim, also defense would make this difficult)

Wildcard rules good for many teams attending events with several "powerhouses", allows more good but not quite dominant teams to make WC.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The later start for practice matches at Regionals made Thursday a much more effective day - you could actually make the changes or fine-tunings you needed to, without worrying about missing practice matches.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

And from an inspection/ref standpoint, we actually had TIME to get people to their matches, get any briefing/training out of the way, and more to the point, there were an awful lot of robots out there with colorful stickers in the first or second match... that stayed for the third or fourth... You get the picture.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

:D

:(

I think the shock to the system in terms of robot design paradigms was a net positive. I like that we're now being kept on our toes the next couple of years in this department. There were elements of the game this year that are worthy of being placed into the melting pot of FRC game design, whether or not a full concept similar to Recycle Rush should ever see the light of day again (Magic 8-Ball says: No, pls)

Growth of the district model is also a good thing. Like with robot design, game design, or team building, it will still come down to execution.

Personally on 422 we removed a lot of negative influences that caused some short term negative effects on performance but will enable us to be a stronger organization in the long term. We didn't play as well as we did last year but everyone finished the season with higher spirits and with stronger determination than last year, and that outweighs the negatives out of my control.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I agree 100%. Engineering is fun and exciting. It does not need to be shoehorned into the contact sport model to be made so.

Yes, making a robust, survivable robot is an engineering challenge too, but it's a relatively low order one, and tends to be the same from one year to the next. This year was a rare opportunity to devote a greater portion of our energy and creativity to challenges unique to this particular game.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I think that this game was necessary for FIRST. Over the past several years teams have been getting more and more "ordinary". Partially due to Ri3D as well as the general increased resources for teams, many teams have been settling for "just good enough". I think that this year forced teams to reconsider many of their options with the lack of size constraints, bumpers, etc.

Hopefully this trend will continue, regardless of the game in the future. I really enjoyed seeing the designs this year.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I personally liked the averaged-ranking system for qualifications. It required teams at the Championship level to be excellent every single time in order to advance. I also think the rankings more accurately reflect robot ability than the win-loss system does. In the win-loss system, a robot that wins two matches 50-25 has the same ranking as the robot who wins two matches 150-25. Throughout this season, I felt that the top 8 seeded robots lining up as captains in eliminations looked far more deserving of being there than in past years when I would scratch my head at some of the teams who were represented there after looking past the first three or four seeds.


Perhaps it is more frustrating for teams who go to a single regional or two who don't have the time or the events to incrementally improve their robot and correct problems so that it is consistently performing at a high level. The District model lends itself well particularly well to fielding excellent robots at Championship. Our team competed in three smaller PNW District events before going to the District Championship. Each event taught us where we needed to improve if we wanted to be in contention to go to Worlds. It did not allow for sloppy play and it required us to perform well match after match after match. I think it reflects more the real engineering world as well. I would much rather fly in an airplane or drive a car that is consistently excellent than one that crashes 1 out of 3 times.

I was personally surprised at some of the inconsistent play at Worlds by some of the top robots who are in the Regional rather than the District model. They had become used to dazzling 2 out of 3 times at their regional competitions, potentially falling apart the other time and still being able to make it to Championship.

Our team (3663) made it to Finals in Curie because we consistently performed at a high level and chose partners who also reliably did so. We passed over teams who could amaze at times but imploded at others. We were at an advantage when those teams followed their same up and down pattern of variability in eliminations. We eventually lost to the better alliance, 148 and 1114. The best alliance in our division still made it to Einstein in this year's system.

If they go back to a win-loss model in 2016, we may change our strategy and go more for a high risk-high rewards type of alliance. It makes sense to adjust alliance-picking strategy to the one that helps us advance the furthest. I, for one, however, appreciated a competition that required us to hone our skills to perform well every single time.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

My first reaction when the game was released without defense was "boring...", as defense is one of the aspects of driving I enjoy the most.

As the season progressed though, the game grew on me. I've come to appreciate the change as it lets teams focus on being creative instead of trying to build their robot more robust and sacrificing weight that can be used for something else.

My biggest bone to pick with the game this year is just how much the rules changed. The teams that thought outside the box (kudos to them) and built tethered ramps really had an advantage over newer/less experienced teams that are not as confident in stretching the rules that far. I realize there are other options such as pass-through robots and such, but I hope you see my point.

This led to the teams seeing other teams with ramps and instead copying them by adding a string and a cardboard ramp to the robot. Something about that doesn't sit right with me. I would have liked to see a little more detail or explanation about the changes in rules early on that either says "Yes you can have a string to another section and still call it part of your robot" or "No, that's not the intention of the change in the rules."

Whether it was intended by FIRST or not, it really doesn't matter to me. I just feel like some teams didn't think they could stretch the rules very much, and were at a possible disadvantage because of it.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

- Seeing the amazing designs that came out of the relaxed rules. I will never forget my awe that night when I first saw 148 reveal of Batman and Robin, or the days that we watched webcasts of GTRC and saw 1114, or seeing the matches that 254 played at SVR. I'm not sure if it came from this being my first year really paying attention to the game, or if the gap truly was larger this year, but I loved seeing what some teams came up with.

- Getting proof that drivetrains really are about implementation, not specific type. (And that WCD can win any game.) We did mecanum this year, and although it was interesting, it's not one I'm particularly interested in repeating...

- Less confusing fouls. They still happened, and there were still some I don't understand (like yellow totes falling over the step), but overall it was an improvement from last year.

- The removal of bumper rules. Numbering wasn't always great, but it was usually easier to read than looking at bumpers last year. Plus then we didn't have to find someone willing to make them.

- New wildcard rules.

- The emphasis on practice. Consistency of stacking, manipulation of the chute door, dealing with noodles (both driving over and throwing), and other things made driver practice really, really important (not saying it usually isn't, but consistency this year was really key). It's a lesson I hope we learned.

---

These are the things I'm either still divided over, or unsure whether they're really "positive" experiences, but I wanted to mention:

- Less dependence on alliance partners to seed high or do well in general. Perhaps way too little.

- QA ranking. On the one hand, I did find it more fair and a better way to identify the top teams than WLT. On the other, it made me feel like we were constantly competing against everyone, and that if others messed up it was a chance for us to seed higher.

- 8 divisions at champs. It was really cool, and we were able to watch two fields at once, but it also made it seems like which division teams ended up in played an even larger role. Anything is better than split champs though.

- Having it to compare to Aerial Assist. I started FRC in 2014, and even though I've read of the other ones, these are the two I know well. It'll be interesting to see what I think next year after having these two extreme games.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I really liked the idea of the "engineering challenge" that Recycle Rush created. Totes and Recycling Containers were difficult to manipulate, (as our team soon found out) and seeing the creative solutions people came up with at the Week 1 event I attended was great.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

For the past two years, my team had some rough times. We lost our main mentor and faculty adviser along with some big sponsorships all in one summer. Since, we have been recovering. This year was my third year but I never took such an active role. I was in a frustrated position for the past two years as a rookie and 1-year veteran; I was stuck in spirit and scouting at competitions whereas I wanted to be working on the robot or just helping in some way with our pits and build crew. This year, my sports experience showed how good of a human player I was, loading totes so fast and throwing litter like Tom Brady. At the heart of it all, I really stepped up my game. I think previously in my first two years, I sort of was not so much there for my team. I went to all our meetings in and out of build season but I never understood the amount of work my main mentors and lead teammates put in. Thus, I put in as much effort and realized how fun it was. Apart from learning to just get involved, I realized that our team should have spent so much more time planning on strategy and tether design and other ways to exploit the game methods. In the past, we have been worrying so much about getting parts on time when in fact we want our design to do best. Thank you to 1114 (Simbotics), 2826 (Wave Robotics), and 148 (RoboWranglers) for being inspirations to me!!!

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

In the final analysis, maybe I'm in the minority, but I really liked this game a lot.

- Loved the engineering challenge, we literally had to brainstorm for 2-3 times as long as we normally do before we started prototyping.
- We had so many functions to build into our robot that many different groups of students designed their own mechanisms that were integrated into the robot.
- The split field meant very few difficult judgment calls for the refs.
- I like no defense because it means we can try out cool new drivetrains! Now we've had a 3-wheel kiwi drive on Einstein!
- I think the game designers balanced the can race vs the auto points and stack values very well. Even on Einstein, it wasn't *just* the fastest can grabbers that won, they had to put up big points too. We had a 250+ in match with only four cans for example.
- 8 teams on Einstein was really cool
- Average match score was excellent for ranking
- Excellent implementation of co-opertition!
- On Einstein we got to watch the matches without long speeches in between!

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Tote stacking was a fresh and challenging engineering challenge.

I actually enjoyed the canburglar arms race - both as an engineer and a season-long spectator. I wasn't such a big fan of the role they played in the game - too much of the game was decided in the opening fraction of a second.

Qualification Average seeding was an interesting departure, with pro's and con's. I hope to see it again from time to time, but not every year.

The lack of direct interaction between the opposing alliances allowed for some cool machine features. I wouldn't mind seeing it again, but definitely not every year.

I really like having 8 divisions at Championship. I liked how the qualification rounds were completed by Friday evening so we knew the final rankings prior to our scouting meeting. I also liked having division playoffs in the morning and Einstein in the afternoon.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I liked the general concept of the game.
I liked the freedom with the robots. Just to feel old, the LAST time unlimited expansion was legal was back when I was a sophomore in high school... Ten seasons ago.

Unexpected bonus from the ranking system: You know that you know that you know exactly where you finished. Either you're X seed, or your alliance finished in Y place. Can't just call yourself a quarterfinalist or semifinalist anymore, you're #Y.

As a ref, I REALLY like that I don't have to call as many penalties, and I actually have a chance of training the HP out of them quickly. Most teams figured out that "no advantage gained" is a pretty good reason not to do something.

The ranking system... eh, it is what it is. Put defense in there again and you won't be able to use it as the primary system, but I do think having it in there is a good idea. Maybe 1st tiebreaker.

Are there items I don't like? Yeah. Not the thread for those, though.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

All the positive threads and the negative threads, Not 1 mention of the most pervasive change this year ---- The new roborio and control system.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The new control system seems to actually work the first time, straight out of the box. That's a huge accomplishment that should be recognized. Compare this to 2009, where less than six robots moving in a match was a regular occurrence and driver stations were being fried repeatedly by static discharge.

Ignoring every part of the actual game design itself (i.e. point values for objects, what you did on the field, etc), the game pieces and robot build rules made for a creative, incredible build season. The sheer creativity and out of the box thinking FRC teams were allowed to do in a no-bumpers game without the constraints of a frame perimeter or expansion limits was amazing. This was one of the most fun games to design and build for in years as a result. The game pieces were a new, interesting challenge.

The ranking system was almost as good as the 2010 ranking system at sorting teams.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Southern California Regionals adopted the handheld inspection tablets using GMS software. Significantly improved the efficiency of inspections.


GMS Overview
http://gms.pejaver.com/

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I also liked the ranking system, and especially enjoyed the opportunities for robot cooperation. If the cooperative ways to score in auto had been more valuable we might have seen some very amazing things. At our district event We were getting 12 points in auto by getting all three robots to move a can (one from the step), it was a pretty cool thing to watch. Cooler, I think than seeing one robot grab all the objects. If there were extra points for having multiple robots involved we might have seen some amazing combinations of robots getting three cans and three totes in auto at champs. Something for the game designers to think about.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

This game provided the best autonomous modes ever. 2826 and 4613 were awe-inspiring. StepWars were exciting.

RR struck a nice balance between teams that could dominate a game with the need for good alliance partners, strategy, and communication.

RR was a great game for the district model. Our robot logged nearly 60 matches - three times that of most other years - and still is going strong into the offseason.

The Innovation Faire was really cool, especially for families.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I feel you there!

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

1. Because of the open sizing rules and lack of robot-to-robot interaction it opened up a massive space for unique and very different robot designs. Tether bots (not the ramps -- the electrical kind), conveyor bots, and robots that were basically stack manufacturing facilities all stretched the limits of design. Which was very nice to see.

2. 8 division Einstein. This was awesome to see, even without being at the event. Being able to see all the robots that would normally have been in the division finals on the big stage was really great, and gave a lot of team some exposure that they may not have normally had.

3. QA ranking system (for qualifying rounds only). I'm going to list this as a positive because I believe it worked very well in this game. (Though I am not convinced it would work well for all games). The rankings at the end of qualifications felt more or less correct for a given event.

4. New control system and components. Our team had what felt like a very smooth transition from the cRIO to the RoboRIO, and had FAR fewer problems with the new system. In addition, the new motor controllers were a welcome upgrade. We used the Victor SPs and (as far as I know) did not have a failure all year.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Would you be willing to give your opinion or the context of your statement as to what (going off your post) you feel the negatives are involving the new roborio and control system?

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

That's literally how it works.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The only negative I could put to the new system is we have at times had problems deploying. I believe this is a problem with our team. Other teams we talked to do not have the problem. I do not like the wire connectors on the pneumatic module. Do not have a suggestion for something better.

Other than these 2 thing I am amazed that a joint effort with several different entities pulled these monumental changes off with out any blow ups.

It just works! Cudo's to all involved in the control system change.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Loved Linux, roboRio, Talon SRX and the engineering challenge required to excel in the game!

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The new control system rocks. I cannot stress this enough. This was the first time in my 8 years of FRC that my team has fielded a robot without a single major controls problem during competition. The new motor controllers are absolutely fantastic; we didn't have a single problem with our Talon SRX's, and the integrated signal wires are a godsend (even using them in PWM mode, being able to easily daisy-chain motor controllers on the same side of the drive train saved us a lot of wiring effort and mess). Just about everything is a huge upgrade from what it was before.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Ditto the new control system. A huge improvement over cRIO, and I'm sure it will only get better (nits were delays in establishing DS<->Robot communications, and some minutiae in the new Java WPIlib).

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I REALLY wish the beta program was different. We had quite a few issues with the new control system this year. There were just some small things that would have really helped out had we had access to the control system with the rest of the beta teams. Unfortunately, it seemed most of the beta team presentations seemed like variations on the same presentation. Not much real debugging seemed to happen, just a "this is how you use the system and here's what it can do". There didn't seem to be much sharing on the little differences that have to be done between the RoboRio and cRio. I'm not a programming guy, so I can't really point any one thing out at the moment.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Really liked that FIRST is attempting to emulate the FIRST in Michigan championship video format.

For reference of FiM videos, the FiM 2014 video is a fantastic FRC video production !

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Can I ask how you'd like to see it improved? We were part of the beta and if there is something specific you'd like to see then I can try to take the idea forward with the folks we still have contact with. They asked for feedback on how to improve the beta program and we're trying to give them some.

I thought that the different beta teams, there were about 100 of them, did a good job of covering the different aspects of the beta testing in the dozen or so presentations that I saw. Let me know, would love to pass the feedback forward.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I think for me the biggest thing I liked about 2015 was that the finals at events was always the best two alliances. In the past, there have been several events I have been to where the semifinal was the real final. Since, alliances played against each other based upon ranking it happened fairly often the two best alliances would play each other before the finals. I liked thanks to the average the two best alliance played in the final.

The new control system was excellent. I'm so glad to be done with those awful WAGO connectors. All the new connectors are snappy and much easier to use. The smaller size of all the electronics in general was a huge step up. The roboRIO having USB connections was very useful in having an easy way to deploy code without dealing with networking.

Having eight alliance for Einstein with two fields was a wonderful idea. It made the transition time much better between matches. In the past there was a lot more dead time and having two fields fixed that. Also Einstein being a full elimination event made it more intense and interesting. I very much hope that stays.

I really enjoyed the less strict rules about robot size and parameter. It led to some really neat ideas that were fun to watch. Not having the hassle of changing bumpers was also nice. It might

I appreciate that FIRST decided to create an API for third parties like the Blue Alliance to get data from. When it worked it seems like updates were pushed faster than with the past system of web scrapping. I would like to see FIRST in future work more with these type of third party projects. I think the API being down so often shows an area where this can be even further improved. If FIRST could reach out to people who make these type of things and have them make some official stuff for FIRST I think it would be better for everyone. FIRST biggest asset is the people who love it enough to poor time into great third party resources.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

That FiM video is incredible! And maybe a statement about last year's game versus this year's. The game is very entertaining to watch and much more "sports like", as opposed to this year's "Red alliance is stacking totes! Not to be outdone, blue alliance is also stacking totes!" ;)

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

There is quite the difference in seeing a presentation on how a control system is nominally used and actually getting your hands on the hardware. You learn more about the small idiosyncrasies than would be demonstrated in an hour long presentation. A very specific example is being able to use an odd number of bits per word in SPI (as documented here: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=133046) If we were able to get a hold of the beta system, we would have been able to figure it out before the season even started instead of getting an answer more than halfway through the season. I find it difficult to believe that this wasn't seen by any of the beta testing teams (and should have been shared).

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Are you of the opinion that information was intentionally withheld to provide a competitive advantage, or is there another complaint?

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I honestly don't know. Given how prevalent gracious professionalism is in FIRST, I would like to think that is the case, but you can never tell. All I know for sure is that we would have been able to figure it out (or would have known it to be an issue) prior to it becoming a problem.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

As a programmer, I loved the new control system. Our team this year had essentially no electrical-related issues at competitions this year, whereas in the past we always had many. I'm sure our electrical team would like me to attribute this to them having improved, but I think the new components helped too.

This game really managed to cut down on the complexity of the rules. With regards to design, this freed up our options and allowed us to explore more creative options. We didn't do anything crazy with tethers, but our robot certainly wouldn't have been possible if we had to follow strict bumper rules and size limits. Gameplay-wise, in past seasons avoiding penalties has been an important part of the drivers' job, but this year the only way our robot could get a penalty would be if we were trying to.

My belief, starting from as soon as I saw the game video, was that FIRST never intended for non-interactive, non-win/loss gameplay to be permanent. I think it was a combination of 1) doing something really different to throw teams for a loop and 2) creating a (relatively) safe testing ground for more streamlined rules. The challenge for them now is to return to more interactive games without returning to the old level of rules complexity and penalty frequency.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The queuing and field set up at champs was awesome. I could tell that someone spent a lot of time thinking about it to make it work smoothly, and they did very well. The entire pit and field layout seemed to be very efficient this year.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

We learned a new kind of game this year. New way to design, new way to play, new way to score, new way to advance, new way to ref.

I think this might have been a factor that allowed some teams to bubble up in stature. Top teams like 1114, 111 and 67 manage to fight through defense and still score in normal games. This year many mid-range teams could shine because they didn't have to try to fight defense and score.

I doubt we'll have another no-defense game next year, but it was a refreshing change this year.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

- I liked the relaxed restrictions on size, regardless of the shenanigans it almost allowed on Einstein.

- I like Cheesecake, and the responsiveness to the loud voices of the community to keep it an active part of FRC. Perhaps restrict it somewhat in the future, but don't eliminate it!

- I really liked the whole concept of assembling in under 1 minute on the field in order to breach outside the starting frame perimeter. It made for a much easier design in some cases and allowed us to focus on the tougher aspects.

- In general everyone at FIRST HQ seemed to be more willing to show their humor, like 'Chute Door'.

- A Champs format with Quals ending on Friday was easily the best thing about the new Champs schedule. Planning logistics, lunch, etc for Saturday was much easier. I'm sure alliance captains appreciated it too.

- Districts are coming, next Winter (to MD/DC/VA).

- Frank's responsiveness and openness on his blog really helped add context to some of the announcements from this season

- 600+ teams at champs - I like it!

- I liked the small practice spaces at Champs, and would like to see more of them with 20 minute time limits rather that 15 minutes. Those little areas made all of the difference for us capability-wise, and it really looked like there was plenty of floor space to add many more. It would be nice to see more small practice spaces at the Regional/District levels, but I know those are limited by the venues.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Agreed: 20 minutes would be just right, but 15 was not quite enough.

To make it even better: get each practice space a big clock and a reset button. When you start on the field, the next team in line makes sure you hit the button to reset the clock. When it hits 20 minutes, the next team in line clears their throats until you get off the field. All the volunteers need to do is keep the queues full.

Practice spaces in each division would be better still.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

The lack of defense allowed more creative thinking. I don't want to see it every year but it allowed thoughts you would not have considered in past games.

I know for us we would not have used mechanum wheels if there had been defense and we would have missed out a lot of knowledge and fun getting to know them. The rather flimsy arms we had for picking up the 2nd and 3rd bin in auto would not have survived a game with defense.

I thought the added traffic from 600 teams was handled well by opening up more entryways into the pits and generally more thought to traffic flow thru the building.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

I learned that the judges might possibly think you're being sarcastic when you cheer for literally everybody when you're really being serious.
In other words we didn't win spirit award and we were bummed about it.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

Team Spirit Award sponsored by Chrysler
Celebrates extraordinary enthusiasm and spirit through exceptional partnership and teamwork furthering the objectives of FIRST.

The team spirit award has nothing to do with cheering at competitions...
Our team makes an effort to read through the descriptions of the awards so that we can tailor our interactions with judges at the event towards winning the awards that we want.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

It's worth noting that judging criteria can be ignored or followed rigidly at any event. Outside of Chairman's (an even that sees some latitude) criteria is not always enforced to the way teams may expect.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

O, my bad, we are still a fairly new team and don't know the requirements for awards outside of winning the competition.

Re: 2015 Lessons Learned: The Positive
 

You can find descriptions for each award in every game's Administrative Manual (link). Note that I've linked the current documents, which apply to the 2015 season and may be totally different/exactly the same/completely gone/whatever for 2016 and beyond.

In last year's document, check out section 6, starting on page 37