Dean Kamen is a Liar
 

No really he is!!
There is a multiplier after all, winner gets three times the losers score, personally I hate that rule and I'm praying its a typo, but we all know its not. What are your thoughts, should you be able to keep your own score and blow other alliances out of the water or have to play nice in order for them to get a decent score to multiply by three? Personally, I want to keep my own score and have my machine be the best it can be, there was enough playing nice last year for goodness sake.

ashley

Not so bad
 

I personally don't mind that rule. I understand that it can be annoying at times, but I think it really just adds more strategy to the game. I was a little resistant to it in 2000 when they first used it, but I really grew to like it. In my opinion, this year's game is a little on the simple side, and I think it would be far too simple without that twist. It really changes the whole strategy of the game. I understand that there are quite a few people who agree with you. The same rule was used at the all-day rookie workshop yesterday, and when one of my fellow volunteers at the workshop found out we would be using that rule, his immediate response was, "That really sucks."

It is also important to remember that the qualifying points aren't everything. If you have a really stunning robot that doesn't get many QPs in the qualifying matches, but wins every single one of its games by quite a bit, there is a good chance that it is going to be picked by one of the top alliances and do well in the end. This happened to my team, CHAOS, in the 2000 UTC regional - Because of our ball-stealing design, we didn't place well in QPs, but we got picked by an excellent alliance, and ended up coming in first place.
Just my thoughts.

--Chris Casinghino
Team 131, CHAOS

It adds a great dimension to the game
 

I happen to love the idea, because it really adds a whole new flavor and dimension to the game.

It allows for an entirely new kind of skill, the fast, steal and convert of as little as one ball can make all the difference.

And this is particularly true when a team gets cocky and greedy.....believing they are unbeatable and padding their opponents score so much in order to maximize their ending score....two years ago, I saw that sort of greed repaid with lightning strikes of a goal where one or two balls were "stolen" and redistributed into a goal for a win.

It makes the game more about "point control" rather than shear power or raw point scoring ability.

The game two years ago was great......this will be as well.

-Quentin
:D

Liar is too strong...
 

Come on now...


There is not a multipler for SCORE. There is only a multipler for QUALIFYING POINTS.

Would you say that NCAA Division I Football requires a computer to calculate the score because the BCS crunches the numbers to rank the teams?

I think you owe Dean an apology. Really.

Joe J.

Oh yeah... and I don't mind the ranking method either...
 

I HATED the method when it was first introduced in 2000. I was convinced that Dean & Woodie had set folks up for a world of screwy rankings, but I have to say that in the end, the ranking was no worse than in other year and (imho) probably one of the better methods in actual practice.

It will work itself out.

Joe J.

I have to agree with Chris. His team was our alliance when we won the NE Regional. Hes not giving his team enough credit as I believe it was his team that took us to the finals not the other way around.
We as a team recognized the value of 131 after seeing their first game, I fought the team tooth and nail to have them as our alliance when we were picking our team mates. Some in the team could only see the position of 131 in the rankings but everyone had forgotten that the finals had the QP,s droped.
Thats when 131 really worked its magic and we thank them for it.
Look back through the history of all the games and you will see a patern of the final winners and who were thier alliances, where were they positioned when chosen, you will be most surprised.
Dont look at the placement of the team your trying to alliance, pick the team that works best for what your trying to do. Personality is better than position.
Its my guess that the QP,s wont be used in the finals so keep that in mind.
Rock on 131, maybe we can have magic again this year.
Nick237

As you all already know, no offense on Dean in any way, just a conversation starter. Some love things, some hate things, thus is FIRST.

my 2cent's summerized...
 

I think it's a great concept... it makes were you wanna work with you partners and that you want to build a robot that can cover a little bit of every thing, it makes it where if you lose alot you really lose, if you have the more effective robot you win simple as that, but it's not like winner takes all the loser still gets points. remeber every one is gunna be with a partner once or twice that won't be effective for the strategy... so every one is expected to lose a round or two due to that. so actually every thing will balance out... i like it and i'm sticking to it!

Let's not get snippy here.. 2000 was my first season and it was the first season with that particular multiplier.. I must say that it confused me at the start, but it worked very well in the competition.. I'm not saying this just because we won a regional that year, but because you really have to strategize on the fly when you play that way.. There is no one sure way to get to the top of the standings and it makes for very diverse alliances..

Just my humble opinions..

Tough to keep track without 2nd Coach
 

In 2000 it was not all that easy to decide when to stop scoring points for your opponents and when to keep scoring for yourself to win by a small margin and maximize your score.

In 2000 there was a 2nd coach to keep track of who had what points. This year, the one coach will be too busy tracking what their own robot is doing to see what the other teams score is.

And of course since I was the 2nd coach on our team, I feel sad to be left out this year :(

Raul
(Yes, I finally decided to break my silence on the forums now that the game is under way. And I'll tell you, I have been biting my lip keeping my opinion to myself on some of the stuff I read before)

Re: Tough to keep track without 2nd Coach
 

Raul, we've never known you to bite your lip & keep your opinions to yourself :)

I agree about the 2 coach rule, I'll start a new thread on it.

Mike

I think the QP rule is a great one. My first year was 2000, and this rule was very helpful in leveling the playing field. In our first round at the Mid-Atlantic Regional, our robot didn't work too well (where too well = at all), and the opposing alliance didn't realize the significance of the rule. We scored 0 points in that round, and so the opposing alliance also received 0 qualifying points. Partially because of this rule, we managed to go from last place at the beginning of the qualifiers to 11th seed at the end, and went on the win the regional.
I think the rule adds another level of strategy to the game and makes it far more interesting.

I remember 2 times in 2000 when we tried to add points to the other team and it came back to haunt us. In one we put extra balls in to get close then our human player lobbed one last ball into out bin and knocked out the black ball and we lost, that stinks

Thats what I love about this system.....it can often penalize people for their "GREED"!

:D