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Alliance Request
I was wonder if anyone had any advice on how to advertise your team if you are trying to get chosen by an alliance captain. I have found that no matter how you approach them the conversation is always awkward. Thanks in advance guys.
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Re: Alliance Request
Don't advertise in person. Advertise by showing your robot's full capabilities on the field.
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My advice is don't. Let alliance captains do their thing. Imo talking about your alliance with them would just get annoying.
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Perform to the best of your ability. You gotta learn to play the hand you're dealt. If your robot does well, scouting will pick up the rest. There's more to picking a robot than it's win-loss record.
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Alright thanks for the advice guys. We will take your advice.
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Yes I have the same question, at our 2nd competition we got matched up twice with a "no show" and malfunctioning robot. We racked up 50-60 points with one RP on our own on both matches and lost to 90+ points against us. |
Re: Alliance Request
The time to "advertise" your self and talk about your robot capabilities is on Thursday or Friday when teams are coming around doing pit scouting/benchmarking.
Having 1 or 2 people in the pits who know all of the robots capabilities and what to tell other teams on Thursday and Friday designated as "spokespeople" can help. These 1 or 2 people being the only people talking to other teams can insure that all information is conveyed as well as the information being conveyed is consistent. Really the only people who will be talking to other teams about alliances is the potential captian or a strong first pick. Let the potential captian approach you if you are looking at being a 2nd pick, don't approach them. |
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If you perform above average and are consistent, you will almost always get picked, regardless of how many matches you won or lost
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Sorry guys if I am coming off as ignorant it is just our team has just gotten unlucky and ended up in the "no-man's zone" 7-12th too many times and I'm trying to find a way for us to escape this reoccurring predicament.
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Re: Alliance Request
I think about the only time it would make sense is if your robot was broken most of Friday, but you finally got some killer 2nd pick system working 100% Saturday morning. Just thinking back to our 2007 GLR debacle where we had a double lift that was busted all Friday till we w welded together the gearboxes that night. Then it worked flawlessly Saturday morning 3 matches in a row. Double lifting basically guaranteed a win with decent defense or scoring, but we still dropped all the way to 1st seed 2nd pick, because most teams stopped scouting on Friday, or has already nixed us. 1114 nabbed us thanks to really on the ball scouting. We probably could've made things less nervous by approaching a few of the top seeds and briefly explaining the problem and the fix.
I don't think there's a function this year that's nearly that important. Not one that you'd rely on and base a pick on without seeing it work most of Friday. |
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TBH greybots are usually a pretty safe pick no matter what.
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Has anyone successfully found a method for getting out of the no man's zone??
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One piece of advise that hasn't been given yet, is to build relationships with teams long before they are ever in position to pick you. It's probably the least important reason to build relationships with other teams but having friends on the teams doing the picking just means they already know you and what your team is capable of. Go to off-season events, do group demonstrations, have team socials, etc.
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I'm going to touch a bit more on advertising, our team has an excellent example of it.
At the 2014 Lake Superior regional that 2052 competed in, our team was going to get picked by the 2nd ranked team 3018. After they said they would pick us obviously we started to talk about what our alliance's second pick should be in the pits, then Team 3692 approached us and told us they had a bot that could load excellently from the HP and that our bot could pick up the ball right from their holder. We went to their pit to analyze their bot and decided we would pick them for their useful capabilities compared to other potential 2nd picks we were looking at. We ended up picking them and winning the regional.. and we absolutely would not have won it without them. If they hadn't advertised to us, it would of been highly unlikely we would of picked them. But these cases to me are usually pretty rare, but to summarize my message do advertise if needed, but don't go overboard as I previously said. |
Re: Alliance Request
Something worth noting is that our team recently ended first place in qualifications (similar result week 2) and such we had a ton of teams come up to us and say stuff like "our last Match was a small issue we got resolved" and random crap like that to get us to pick them. We literally threw all of that information in the garbage. Don't bother.
Since I'm a CSA my personal preference is teams that are really nice, gracious, and respectful (and fun) towards me but in the end we know what we want and we have collected enough data to know how your robot will satisfy our requirements (until we break our chain on the encoder in the first match and miscalibrate it going into the second, making a nearly unstoppable alliance get beaten by a rather rude and ungracious 8th seed alliance. Ugh) Just be good, be nice, and don't break. Also don't ever get stuck In a defense. That's a huge no-no. |
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So i am getting mixed messages here am I suppose to do a little advertising or none at all?:confused: :confused:
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A small anecdote that shows how you could sell yourself:
We were high in the rankings at Utah and a team came to us to talk about their bot. They told us how they fixed some issues Friday night and if we could please watch their matches. While we didn't end up picking them, we did watch for them and I thought it was a very good way to sell themselves. That being said, if you haven't changed anything, their scouting team probably has already made judgments on you and your lobbying probably won't have much of an impact. Good luck! |
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Your best ambassadors is your drive team. Especially if you are looking to be the 2nd pick. They need to demonstrate they know the rules, don't collect fouls, understand strategy of playing the game, and are team players.
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A little bit of advertising can put you on the radar. Asking if you're on the list will get you knocked down.
What have you demonstrated on the field? Actual, live, match data. Ask your scouts. (If your scouts aren't scouting your own team, you're making a mistake. This isn't the place to go into WHY, but the short version is that it's a great tool for calibrating your scouting system as well as where you are.) Then, what you can do is to talk to teams that you think your skill set can complement. Just say, "hey, this is what we have shown, we think we'd be an asset to you guys because of this" and leave it at that. Will some teams ignore that? Sure. But a smart team will check that against their own data (be wary of that check if your scouts inflate your data!), and if they come looking for you, TALK. (Don't get me started on what happens if you ignore a higher seed that wants to talk to you. Just, don't.) |
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The hope is that the high seeding, picking teams have good scouting. They will be looking at each robot individually, regardless of whether you won or lost, and whether you were stuck with crappy partners or whether you were the crappy partner and were carried by better partners. Good scouting will see through all of that.
Our scouting this year recorded things like: what/how many defenses did you cross? How many low goals did you shoot? How many high goals? Did they go in? How long did it take to line up and shoot? Did you challenge the tower? Scale? Note that this has nothing to do with your actual match score or win/loss, nor the performance of your alliance partners. Then in our scouting meeting we categorized and ranked robots into several lists: - really good offense bots (fast, consistent shooters, preferably high goal, can cycle 4-8 boulders on their own) - really good breaching bots (fast, can get a breach RP by themselves, can go through most defenses without difficulty) - really good defense bots (strong, fast, driver knows how to defend) We were a pretty good breacher so when we made 5th and 6th alliance captain at our two regionals, generally we were looking for good scoring bots to complement us. We were also hoping that we might be picked as the breaching specialist by a higher seeding team, but that didn't work out - there are a lot of good breachers! I can tell you that our drive team had things to say about which teams they really enjoyed working with, and which teams were more frustrating. This definitely influenced our pick lists. So play your hardest, but be honest, flexible, communicate with your alliance partners, and show GP at all times. A good team that's fun to work with may be more desirable than a better team that's rude and stubborn. Here's a tip: scout your own robot. Be prepared to swallow your pride if the numbers you're seeing aren't what you hoped for. You will not win friends if you are trying to sell how great you are at shooting, but when I pull up my scouting data I see that you average 2.3 low goals per match. Advertise only if there's something new that you think the scouts wouldn't have noted. On Saturday morning at GTRC we discovered we could open the portcullis with our mechanism. We had never touched it during quals. We told the teams that seeded higher than us, in case it was a selection factor, but kept the discovery quiet to everyone else in case opposing teams would think they could thwart us with it. |
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Picture it, Peachtree Regional 2011. 2815 is there with none of our college students (one professor popped an exam on all of them), a pretty slim crew, and a robot that was crated without much in the way of hard driving. It shows on the field Friday, when we die or break something in all but one match. I was the coach (by default, basically) and it was pretty embarrassing coming off of two solid robot years. But we keep working through the different issues, and I share the hard-luck story with a few friends on 2415 and 1771 (the latter of which we were partners with on Friday--their minibot won us a match where we broke). We got to Saturday morning and a match with clear #1 seed 2415, where they ask if we can play defense. We hadn't had a chance to really work our arm because we kept dying, but we had a three-year driver that knew his stuff. "Suuuure!" We get one clean match off, get the win...and then break in our last match. I'm billed as the resident optimist of any team, but even I knew we had no business being in the playoff rounds. No amount of hard-sell marketing was going to change that. Yet for reasons I still don't fully understand five years after the fact, 2415 and their first selection 1771 believed me when I said it was a new issue each time, liked working with us behind the glass, and believed our driving and defense was more desirable than the other 24 teams that were available for them to choose even if we had a glass jaw. Six matches later, we're going to St. Louis. Shoot straight, be positive, and sometimes you'll see your faith rewarded. |
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I think that advertising yourself can become important when small or new teams are in the top 8 - teams that can't/don't/won't have scouting info. but generally it's just awkward for all parties involved (since they've either already put you in a pick order, or in a do not pick list). It can be worth asking high ranked teams what they're looking for in a 3rd robot, and then show off that capability in one of your matches. |
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I was the team representative during alliance selection that year...I still remember hearing you yell "WOOOOO!", even over all the noise, when we picked you. And we still tell our new members stories of piling random objects (hammers I believe) into your robot to buff up your weight, to play defense. One of our other mentors still has the cockasaurus rex t-shirt! On topic: Depending on where you are seeded and how you have performed, you should know if you are going to be a 1st pick or a 2nd pick. If you are going to be a 2nd pick, you will most likely be playing defense or some other utility role. (This year it might be breaching, or maybe you can specialize in doing a solo drawbridge/sally port). Use that to your advantage. Gently remind teams that you can cross that defense by yourself, and can grab a ball, cross the defense, then drop the ball off for your alliance partner to score in the high goal. Or mention how you can add a goal-blocking mechanism to your robot if needed. |
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Last year at the Pacific Northwest Championships, our team was ranked in the 40's, and so our team just did a frame per second analysis of our can grabber, which turned out to be the second fastest one there. We went around and showed it off to all of the top teams, and then we were picked up by the three seed as a second pick and we won the event. My advice is to come up with a selling point that could work, be it a strategy, a component, or even a long shot idea and try and talk to the picking teams the day of. The worst that could happen is you don't change anything.
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Alliance request = customized alliance strength "which is good"
I am a firm believer in "advertising" to pre-selected alliance partners. I am not a fan of saying to any team "don't pick us because we want " I think that is corny and have had that happen to us. We go the other direction and talk to those we want to pair with and limit conversation with those we don't feel we are a good fit for (for both our benefit) Face it, there are those you work well with or those that compliment your team in some fashion and there is no shame in seeking a preferential alliance make-up in eliminations. Eliminations hard to win , you need all the help you can get. We scout every match so our detailed scouting info is valuable to other teams we use that to start the conversation with teams we don't already know , those that do know us know we do our scouting already, many have had us a partners before too, so they know how we operate and what we bring to an alliance. I believe in every elimination there are those alliances who are matched and those that aren't and usually the matched alliances prevail. The way we do it is if we are captain then of course we choose, if not then based on knowing our bot and knowing all the top 8-12 potential captains , we then visit those that may be a good fit with us and those that don't match/or duplicate us we probably don't visit. We talk potential winning strategy and what would win the regional we are at. We then ensure them we can find another team to compliment our new-found alliance strength. Every bot we have selected third ourselves has been solid due to scouting. This works for us, we usually end up with a strong to very strong alliance..but remember this only works if your team is solid and you do extensive scouting as a bonus. Otherwise why would a captain pick you? "Sell yourselves based on where you actually rank (be honest about your capabilities) " and that will do it...take care of your part and the rest will follow. Once in a while we "learn" of a team off our radar because they reached out to us... perhaps they had a bad day 1 BUT resolved it and it shows in the rankings climb...I appreciate teams that talk to use to explain "why", if the data supports it and the story then they all the sudden they make our 2nd day pick list and a few watches the second day. It is all about "doing your best" and you rely on two other teams so why not try to get the best partners for all three teams ? It makes total sense. |
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Advertising yourself can be a bit awkward at first, but it gets much easier with experience. Here is generally how I approach this process: First, know what you are trying to get out of advertising yourself. Are you trying to be a first pick? A second pick? A third pick (at champs)? Is the team with whom you are speaking a 1-3 seed and likely captain? A lower seeded likely captain? A lower seeded likely first pick? The way to sell yourself is different for each of these combinations. When you go to speak with them, start by asking to speak with someone on their scouting team (lead scout is best, but not always readily available). Smaller teams sometimes don't have scouts, in which case you should try to talk with their drive team. If you just talk with some random person in their pit, you are wasting your time. Be polite and respect their time. I have found that teams are generally pretty receptive to talking, but if they are busy or do not wish to speak with you, move on and do not pester them. When you find someone to talk with, make sure to keep their time in mind. If you are talking with a scout in the stands, don't talk during a match, let them work. Once you find someone to talk with, start by complimenting their team. They have clearly done well or you wouldn't be talking with them. Mention at least one specific things you like about their robot/strategy (I wish we would've thought of..., it was really cool last match when you..., your ... is super slick) but don't spend too much time on this, keep it short and sweet. Next, and this is really important, you need to tell them things that they might not know just from watching matches. Bring them to the practice field to show them your scaler, and climb 4 times in a row for them. Bring them to your pit and show them the defensive blocker you are building. Tell them that you will be debuting your scoring auto in the upcoming match, so they should keep an eye out for that. When you have finished with this, ask them if they have any questions for you, and answer them truthfully. I won't speak for others, but I value honesty a lot. If you tell me that your team scores 5 boulders basically every match, and our data says you only scored 3 in your best match, you are likely to go down a notch on our pick list. After that, ask them what they would like to see out of your team in the upcoming matches, and demonstrate that ability if you have the opportunity. However, make sure you clearly communicate with your partners what you will be doing every match. One more thing, it is okay to mention that you seeded low, but don't whine to them about your poor schedule and the crappy partners you have been getting, they don't want to hear it, even if it is true. Own up to your own performance. Recognize the failures and limitations of your robot and explain them. Finally, here are some common situations and key features to sell yourself on in those situations. 1. Selling yourself to a 7 or 8 alliance captain. Tell them truthfully how you did in your best match, and explain exactly what went wrong, and how you have mitigated your issues in your poor matches. Remind them they will be up against the number 1 or 2 seeds, and that they really need someone who has the potential to do really well (you), even if you have been inconsistent previously. 2. Selling yourself to a higher seeded team as a second pick. Emphasize your consistency, higher seeded teams want reliable partners. Show them your defensive blocker that you are building, and stress that your drivers know how to play good defense without getting penalized. Also, stress your ability to score in auto and the endgame. 3. Selling a special/unique ability about your team. Find high-seeded teams that do not also have this ability, and explain how important this ability will be in playoffs. Common examples this year often include crossing A defenses, crossing C defenses solo, climbing, and crossing many defenses in auto. |
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Sometimes the best advertising you can do is making sure the other drive teams or decision-making POC know that your team is easy to work with, executes the pre-planned match strategy, and is friendly.
There are many teams that get picked late often when they may or may not have good robots because the drive teams know that they will play nicely together. We typically don't pick based on friends, but we will give an edge to teams that will listen and work with the strategies we propose. |
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(That, and having friends is nice for its own sake :P) |
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Over the years, I have been on both ends many times, as alliance captain/1st round pick and also as one hoping to be a second round pick. Many on this forum have already given good advice. It may be confusing about whether to advertise because sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Here is my take on it if you want to be picked by an alliance captain.
1) Do your best and don't worry about the win/loss. Good teams usually have good scouters who will pick up everything you do and your contribution each match. 2) Stick to the agreed upon strategy with your alliance partners. This is true especially if there are specific requests by the high ranked teams. Show them you can be trusted to perform tasks that they want you to do to help them get more ranking points. They will remember you. 3) Be a team player. Alliance captains like to pick teams that are easy and fun to work with. 4) Clean up your wiring. I learned this from others when we were a young team. A robot with messy wiring has a perceived higher potential of malfunction and would be difficult to trace the problem in the heat of battle in eliminations. There is much less chance you will get picked when there are other alternatives. Nobody wants to take a chance. 5) Be honest when you deal with other teams what your robot can do. Somebody who over promise and do not deliver will not get my trust or be on my pick list. 6) Play smart, make sure drive team knows the rules and minimize fouls. 7) Have somebody knowledgeable about your robot to be in the pit at all times when your robot is there. This is especially true for Saturday morning. A lot of negotiations happen Saturday morning between high ranked teams. Once it is settled on potential alliances of 1st round picks, I usually start shopping for potential second round pick based on scouting data. Often times multiple robots can fit the role that we need. It is very frustrating when you go to their pit when their robot is there and the people there cannot tell you about their robot or whether they can play a certain role. There is very little time before alliance selection and you may not get a second visit. 8) It is also important for your scouts to do their job even if you are not ranked high enough to be an alliance captain. Your scouts should be able to tell you Friday night how your robot can be best used to help an alliance win matches in eliminations. Then target those teams with robots you can best complement. Then near the end of Friday night or early Saturday morning, talk to those teams and ask them to watch your matches and tell them what to look for that your robot will demonstrate on the field. Share your scouting data that put your robot's best "wheel" forward. It may not be an attribute that those teams are collecting. 9) If you happen to have the first match Saturday morning, do not screw it up because everybody will be watching it right after the opening ceremony. I learned it the hard way. 10) Some teams have a do not pick list. You do not want to end up on too many of them. I hope this helps. |
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I remember a team at Buckeye a few years ago trying to sweet talk our team into picking them on the practice field back in 2008. But they would stop to aim the ball which killed their efficiency so we weren't interested. They had tried the same with 1126.
I suspect they did the same with 2340 who had manged to seed 3rd in their division at championships because they were their second pick (they took 1450 as their first pick because they wanted to choose a team they were related to). |
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Last year at North Star it was quite obvious to everyone that we were going to team up with 3130. We were looking for a 2nd pick that could grab at least 1 can in auto, set it down and then stay out of the way. There were a couple of teams that could do this. 2491 was on our list but at the very bottom. Saturday morning their driver approached me and handed me a printed card with all the reasons why they would be the best pick for a 2826 3130 alliance. I told them what I wanted to see from them in their next 2 matches. They did exactly what I wanted to see. When it came time to pick our 2nd robot there were 2 teams left in our list with our criteria. 2491 got picked over the other team because of the time and effort they put in to making a really awesome, professional, and specific marketing device. That marketing device got them their 1st regional win.
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So I started this morning reading this thread then turned on the Waterloo livestream. I noticed Karthick has anot Air Jordan shurt under his regular Blue Jays shirt. Is it only me or does this appear to be a very convenient nod to 2056 referencing their 23 straight win streak? Is that a form of alliance requesting?
I realize that 1114 is already leading this morning.... Thoughts anyone? |
We have been effective preparing an index card with key info about our robot and passing it to top teams. Keep it simple, keep it 100% true, and usually top teams will take the card even if they wouldn't have listened to you much in person. Then, when in the heat of selection, the card might be an easy reference and reminder for them.
Basic info: such as "100% auto on low bar and rough terrain, 50 % on low bar" or "cross all defenses except drawbridge and chevals". |
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Last year and this year are the first time we have "advertised" to other teams. One thing to take into account is who you are lobbying to. Generally when we lobby to other teams they are ranked in the top few teams or a team we would really like to pair with that is ranked higher than us. Whenever we lobby we use our own scouting data. You need to have data to back up your claims. The only way we tell other teams about ourselves is through data. Teams are very receptive to it and really like it. And most of the time they will listen because you can prove why you are talking to them. We have has good success with it this year by being the 1st pick by the number one seed in two events.
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Of our five years at Bayou, the only time we were picked for an alliance was our second worst seed (#42 of 57). Our selection (by the #2 seed) was largely due to "reverse scouting" by our drive captain. When it became obvious on Friday afternoon that we were not going to seed high, she approached high seed teams to see what they would be looking for in a second pick. She found a need that we could fill, and Saturday morning, we showcased that capability (ability to flip totes and get to an RC on the step) rather than going for the points. IIRC, the extra RC we delivered and the totes we scored were the margin of victory in every match throughout eliminations.
There are many roads to success; recognizing them and acting is the key. Whatever you do, do not annoy selecting teams - the last thing you want to do is get on a "do not pick list" because of personnel friction. |
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Earlier this season at NYC we seeded terribly (44/66). This was not due to our robot. We just got really unlucky going through a ton of matches with either 1 alliance partner working or none.
We ended up getting chosen by the 8th alliance as their first pick. What is crazy is we never even played with them. We then went on to pick the 46th seed. We ended up beating the #1 seed in the first match and setting the second highest score for the regional. We did lose the next two matches but there were a lot of missed calls and technically we did win. When I got up to accept the invitation the first thing I said to them was "Wow, I was not sure we were going to get picked. since we were such low seed" and they said "Are you kidding? You carried your alliance every match". If your robot performs well, stays connected to the field, and you present your team well you have a good chance to be picked regardless of seed. The alliance also said some of the reasons they chose us was because of seeing me on chiefdelphi and, our reveal video... So, the moral of the story is to be active on CD and make a reveal video. |
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Everyone's summarized it pretty well.
Know who you're talking to. Pit students usually don't care how good your team is because they don't have any idea what the pick list looks like and they won't be watching your matches. The priority for them is making sure the robot performs. They'll usually be polite about it, but you're wasting your time and theirs. Ask who the scouting lead is and where you can find them. If you're in the middle of the serpentine you're already doing something right. You won't move up by selling yourself to teams at the event. The top teams know who you are and what you can do. You're not one of the first few picks because you're not the best robot. Make a good pick list and figure out how to beat the top seeded teams since your 3rd robot is way better than theirs. CarNack made his prediction for a reason. Be honest when they look at your robot. They have the data and know if you're lying to them. They won't pick you for what you say you can do. Prove it. They don't always know or care where you're ranked. Play smart, play the role your alliance needs, be willing to adapt to the situation that occurs. You'll get noticed. |
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Almost everything in this thread is extremely valuable information, and I would highly recommend reading through it and taking in the main points.
I'll just put in a few of my opinions: 1: Try and talk to teams a few hours before Alliance Selection, or even the Friday afternoon if you can. Many powerhouse teams hold Strategy/Pick list meetings on the Friday night, and reminding them about your team is a great way to spark discussion about your team during that meeting. 2: Approach high-seeding teams. Questions that you'll mainly want to ask them run along the lines of "What are you looking for in a second pick alliance partner?". Another great way to communicate teams is to ask them if they want to see anything performance-wise out of your robot in matches. If they are looking for anything in particular, try and exhibit it on the practice field, inviting them to watch, or plan to fulfill that role for your next quals match to demonstrate. People can talk about their capabilities all they want, but claims mean nothing unless they hold up on field in real matches. We've talked to teams before at competition, and taking 2014 as an example, some of the higher seeds that we talked asked us to demonstrate our ability to play position 3(first assist and shot defender), and for the next few matches, we played matches focusing on displaying our ability in that role. While it didn't change our end result, I believe that it put to rest the question of whether or not we were able to play that role, and might have moved us up a few spots on that pick list. 3: Form relationships. We have the resources to assign an "expert scout" to every team at a regional, but if you don't quite have that much manpower, you'll want to try and find a contact for each of the powerhouse teams that you can comfortably talk to. Not a business relationship, but legitimately find someone to become friends with. In those crucial Friday night meetings, teams who are friendly to work with and cooperative will end up much higher on teams that are not on pick lists. 4: Try and be honest. It's hard to tell potential captains that you're having issues, but they'll hold you in higher regard if you just tell them what's wrong. They may even offer to help fix it if they can! In 2015 at CMP, we had to remove a motor in our intake rollers to dedicate ourselves to our 4-bin grab, but it meant that we would be of little use to our alliance partners. By telling our alliance partners this, we were able to modify our strategy so that we could minimize the effect of our problem, and all involved parties ended up more satisfied. |
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My input on this is to say at least something to any top seeded alliance you think you can work well with. Do this even if you know they have noticed you before, because the last thing I wanted to hear playing as a backup team was that the scouting team of the alliance we ended up with forgot to tell their rep to pick us in the first place :confused:.
It also can't help to suggest teams or types of teams you think will complement both you and the team you are lobbying to. |
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I am sorry to inform you that I am not allowed to disclaim my team number due to my sometimes ignorant attitude when responding to some threads. Notice I am the only person in the world with red bars. |
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This is my personal opinion, so take it with a grain of salt. I think there are two different types of 'advertising'. Going to a team's pit ten minutes before alliance selection and asking them to pick you doesn't work. Most people will just be annoyed by it. Even explaining all your good qualities can still turn off a lot of teams. However, if you go to a team while qualifying matches are still being played, explain the feature that you think would be a good fit for their alliance, and show that strategy in a match (or several), that will go over much better. I was talking to my friend from another team about a pick I didn't understand and their explanation was that this team had gone out of their way to show a versatility in strategy that aligned with what they were looking for. You can't just say that you can do something, you have to show it and make sure they see it. That is the most successful way of 'advertising' yourself.
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Then rest of the day we just play ball and our scouts watch all potential captains for strengths and weaknesses for later in the day elimination matches and work on elimination game plans. 6 week build is all about building a capable bot that is the best at something (be rare) . In each regional... Day 1 is all about ranking high (we aim for top 20% to be in that prime pick area rank 12 or lower I'm happy) and winning your matches to give teams a night to pour over the data and watch videos of all pick worthy teams. We also make a minimum top 20-28 pick list and verify it on day 2. Day 2 is all about ranking your self honestly "as an impartial scout" and making sure higher teams also know about you that you desire to play with. First thing that morning. Remember if you are Captain 5,6,7 or 8 you KNOW you have your work cut out for you to win that regional...so a non-captain team that comes to you with a plausible winning plan and deep pick list can be just the ticket and make your day. We made alliance captain 8 and our 3rd bot VERY VERY HAPPY when we as a potentially very strong alliance 8 took down alliance 1 handily in 2 games..that bodes well for our future.... its all about building those longer term partnerships for future seasons and remissness about previous seasons . Good will goes a long way our list of love to go to eliminations teams grows every year. Main thing is to have fun..it is fun...and never be the weak link. Hold yourself accountable. My scouts look for two things.... "consistency and reliability" because in eliminations any weakness get exposed |
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A good team with good match scouting will notice. Teams planning on being top seeds are having to look deep to discover the teams that will play in a compatible way with them, this is frequently a robot not in the "top 24". Make sure your team is as honest as possible with pit scouts on Thursday, good teams confirm with match scouting the information given to the pit scouts. If there are a lot of inconsistency, this gives a poor impression. Instead of advertising to them what your team does, ask them what they are looking for in an alliance partner. This tends to be a good conversation starter. Start the conversation early on Friday. Ask your self honestly, if your team will fit, if not, look for another team that could be. Saturday morning is crunch time for the scouting teams, and they made their pick lists on Friday night, and spend Saturday confirming their thoughts, and filling in blanks. It is difficult to get your self added by then. |
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I remind myself of gracious professionalism and it worked much better this season. That is not to say I still din't get some red bars :) I'm just very competitive in my make up and sometimes go overboard. |
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I greened you a while back and tried to green you again but got the (Spread some reputation around) message. I have been there actually had Red dots show on my profile without team number and full name for a few weeks until I got greened again. Just be respectful and helpful and I am sure eventually we can find out what team you are from. :) |
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My $.05
Say what you can do and do what you say. Allot of teams say they are the best but a good scout team will sort out the best. In 2014, at the Pittsburgh regional, we got paired with allot of teams that didn't work very well. We did everything we told the pit scouters we could do and got picked. We made it to the finals and came in second. The point is, if you have something another team can use, you will get picked. |
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Just demonstrate what you can do during your qualification matches, and you'll get picked. We did that at NYC regional and ended up winning undefeated as the 8th seed. |
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First, your alliance partners are "horrible." If you feel that is the case, find out what your alliance partners can do and fill in the gaps with your robot. For example, 3661 is a chassis bot. At Wake County, we chose them as a defensive robot because of their speed. We won the event with them. At Campbell they stopped us and 2655 from capturing the tower in qualifications. In eliminations, we chose them again as a second pick and in one of their matches they only allowed two low goals the whole match (once they got back). Teams have potential, even if you believe their one of the worst teams at an event; you have to recognize that in every team to be successful. Second, your opponents are very good. Yes, of course, you will definitely play against multiple top-eight teams in one match in qualifications. Again, recognize how your teammates play and develop a strategy that counters the opposing alliance. Even if your alliance does lose the match, if you perform the best that you can, you will be noticed by other teams. Onto talking to other teams about forming alliances. Usually, if we're on the top 8 (particularly the top 4), we'll approach the team that we want to pick and tell them that honestly, "we're planning on picking you guys. We think we would together good. What do you guys think?"Usually since we pick partners that work well with us for strategy, they'll usually want a robot like our on their alliance. (As a breaching robot that likes passing to teammates with occasional low goals, we generally want a reliable high goal shooter that we can easily funnel boulders into. Generally, high goal shooters want to shoot as often as possible, so by us demonstrating throughout qualifications our passing and shooting, usually high goal shooters want a robot similar to ours.) It is quite often we're not the top 8. At Campbell we were 6th, but had discussed strategy with 2nd. We introduced ourselves to them and discussed how we could help benefit them. Due to our qualifications, they had noticed us performing well with boulders. Right before alliance selections, we did end up deciding to not form an alliance because we couldn't get the tower done fast enough. Point: If you specialize in a role and perform your best in that role, other teams will notice. |
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If your team is seen to be vocally complaining (or bragging) about carrying the match when paired with useless partners, you may get knocked down the pick list for being arrogant or potentially hard to work with. |
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Here is the elimination list by qualification rank in week 0.5 color coded
Notice #49 got selected. Why? (probably because they had a unique quality or showed something) This is typical what it shows is... Top 16 went to eliminations 5 more in next 15 3 in bottom third 17 and lower at risk for not going So to have a much higher chance try for top 16, I personally shoot for 12 (to sleep at end of day 1) as that gets you solidly in as peripheral captain, no brainier second and at worst a high third on alliance 1, 2 or 3... any higher is gravy Ideally we want top 4. There you can get some of the best at that event then it seems to drop off in most events except for the powerhouse ones. |
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Various thoughts on everything being discussed here:
-I've been in a situation where a team that we didn't want to be picked by came to us and talked about alliances. We were honest, telling them that we believed that there were teams we would benefit from being with more. Honesty is both the most gracious and the most professional thing you can give someone, just know how to deliver it nicely. -I've noticed teams that are particularly rude or disrespectful. Many of those teams have gone on our "don't pick" list event after event simply because they've gained a reputation for being toxic. These teams don't know how to act professionally, so they don't belong on our alliance. -We've had tough schedules, it happens. Every team eventually has that match with that team that came in with a kitbot in pieces and asked "what do we do." Speaking from experience, the best thing to do is to get them up and running, and just make sure they know the fundamentals of the game. If you give them simple tasks and a bit of support, you will win matches you didn't think you could possibly win. -Teams that come to the pit to haggle their way onto picklists are annoying. Don't be that team, you aren't doing yourself any favors. Your strength as an alliance partner is decided by how you perform on the field, how well your drive team works with ours, and how professionally your team as a whole conducts itself. -In match, don't do things you wouldn't normally do just because you think it'll capture the eye of elite teams' scouters. With the limited depth of analysis that most teams do, that match will just show up as a blip in the data and you'll be written off as inconsistent. Play in a way that is advantageous to your alliance. The only exception I can think of is defense... sometimes. Good scouts can spot a team that consistently plays with good strategy, and those are the kinds of teams that will be picked. |
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Instead of building a team dependent robot building a robot that can carry the team solves the "horrible matchup" situation.
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*Obviously follow your alliance's agreed upon strategy... |
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Know that if you are ranked low and the game requires defense, you should show defense Saturday morning without getting fouls. If you have cheesecaked blockers to add, add them Saturday morning. The high ranked teams will come talk to you if they need you to do something. Definitely agree with others who have said not to talk to the high ranked teams Saturday before alliance picks. They have more important things to do than satisfy your curiosity. If you are trying to talk to them while they are finalizing their list, you are keeping them from doing what they need to do and making it extremely challenging to be graciously professional. If they are worth anything scoutingwise, they will have been watching pretty closely. I know it's maddening. We have been on both ends of the rankings over the years. |
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1.) Initial contact, greeting, and asking to speak with the alliance selector 2.) Flattery, their team is good and there are reasons you want to be with them. Talk about everything they can do well. You should be using scouting data for your claims. 3.) Complement, how do you complement their team, what do you offer to bring the most potential to their alliance. Why should they pick you? What scouting data do you have to show them of your performance? (optional) Do you have video of a recent match in which you did something special like climb? (optional) 4.) Analysis, show off your alliance picking analysis and playoff game analysis to see how things will pan out and what critical ability you will offer. At our 10K regional we knew they weren't many robots who could get in enough balls for their alliance to capture in playoffs so even though we were a low goal shooter we stressed the importance of that capture and how a low goal shooter putting in 4-5 low goals consistently is worth more than high goal shooters who can only score 2 consistently. We didn't always score 4-5 low goals but we focused on matches where we didn't have to be concerned about breaching and showed alliance captains our potential which averages of scouting data might not show. We advertised as a 1st pick. 5.) Overall playoffs strategy, at 10K we saw that the 1st seed alliance had a pretty clear shot to the win (but Highland's alliance was awesome in giving them a run for their money!), however there would be at least 2 wild cards dropped by that alliance. When we went around advertising ourselves we made it clear that our goal was to make it to the finals, pick up those wild cards, and qualify for the Championships. We would try to win if possible, but making it to the finals was our primary, realistic objective. We would achieve this by assuring our alliance the capture and scoring lots of points, using the second pick of our alliance captain to deny the other team the capture because most high goal shooters aren't able to score many boulders under defense (great job 5996!) We (4th seed) were selected by the Firebears (3rd seed) along with 5996 and we made it to the finals, and our whole alliance is going to Saint Louis! There is a lot to be said for strategy in the alliance selection and advertising your team because quals performance doesn't always reflect the extent of your team's abilities! There's a lot of strategy involved in how you advertise to certain teams as Caleb has pointed out but there's more than I would like to cover in this post. I just wanted to give a framework for the basic advertising plan. That being said, don't just advertise to every team. That is annoying. Advertise to teams who you want to be on an alliance with and that you have something to offer to that you believe they would like. We didn't advertise to 2052 even though they are one of our favorite teams and are so amazing (congratulations on Chairman's!) because their best options were clearly 525, 5434, or 2502. |
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Your best "advertisement" is to have a drive team that is courteous, listens and communicates well, doesn't have an abusive drive coach and is well organized. We move teams up our draft list when our drive coach says "we loved working with them." 5012 was a case in point last year for 118 and us. And alternatively most teams have a "do not pick" list built on poor experiences with particular teams.
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I don't see why people aren't just getting good at being lucky, all you gotta do is make a few sacrifices to the random number generation gods, never walk under ladders, and avoid black cats. |
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This is what I made for our team for our 2nd district event. We had a scout go around and hand these out, and handed them to anyone who came by scouting us. Technically, this isn't helping you get picked, but it's better than nothing.
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That's just about one of the best ways to advertise yourself there is. A small sheet/card with what you can do or have done, all verifiable. |
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1) move Cheval de Frise and Ramparts to the bottom of Teleop so it is easy to see which items are left off of Auto. I know this will break up the categories, if you are a stickler on that you can put blank spaces in the Auto list that correspond to where they are on the Teleop list. 2) either remove or rebrand on 8th seed captain. The interpicking among the top 12 doesn't tell me anything about your capabilities. Ideally you would put "Used strategy to captain an alliance through ___finals" but since putting quarter in that blank doesn't say much about your strategy abilities, it might be better to say "preformed consistently through all previous playoff matches" since that will convey you are able to handle the turn around time of quarter finals and not break on the field. 3) (I know I said two, but I saw this after posting) Change Blacksburg Stats to Blacksburg ranking stats. I first thought you crossed 605 defenses. I would also rearrange so that they are in the order of the ranking sort. I know your 2nd event is over but I wanted to post this for other people that might see it and can keep it in mind for the future. |
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I agree with many of the other people here that there is not a ton of value in trying to sell yourself to other teams outside of field performance.
There are two times where I would recommend talking to the top seeded teams, but I would recommend doing it first thing Saturday morning. 1.) You had an issue with your robot that caused you to look worse than you are, and you have since resolved that issue so your performance should be significantly better going forward. Example, 1086 had issues with their catapult at the Central VA event. The first day they were performing significantly below their capability. On Saturday morning their drive coach approached us (we were seeded 1st) and told us what the problem was, how they fixed it, and asked us to watch them and give them a chance to demonstrate that they were working to potential. They showed in their Saturday matches that they were working, we picked them, and they averaged 5+ high goals per match on their way to an event win. 2.) You have a niche capability that you have not demonstrated during qualifying that you believe their alliance will need for eliminations. For example, last year at the VA regional, we were capable of stacking totes and capping other peoples stacks, as well as accessing the recycle containers in the middle. Due to our seeding, and alliance partners on Saturday, we continued to almost exclusively build and cap stacks by our selves. Never demonstrating our ability to get the recycle bins from the landfill, and cap other 4+ stacks. The top alliances needed someone with this ability, and although we had it, we never demonstrated it so they didn't know. 1610 on the other hand made it a point to demonstrate this on Saturday morning, and were selected by the alliance that went on to win. The key in both of these situations is the ability to demonstrate the abilities. Talk is cheap, which is why I have never put much value in pit scouting. When we seed high, we trust our scouts, they will identify if you are performing well, and your partners have not. However if you think there is a reason why your performance to a point was worse than your performance will be going forward, then it is fair and valuable to explain that to teams, and demonstrate it. |
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So my suggestion is that if you're just trying to get onto an alliance (which is an accomplishment in itself), you might approach those younger teams about sharing your scouting data if you think that you might be a first pick for them (or a 2nd pick of the 8th or 7th alliance). To be honest you're not going to influence the draft lists for the first 2 to 5 captains by talking to them. They'll rely on their own info sources. |
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"you're not going to influence the draft lists for the first 2 to 5 captains by talking to them" Actually that is not entirely true... we were Captain #2 and had a team approach us morning of day 2 (of course we had our first pick locked in) but they were pinning for our second pick. They reminded me of how we played well together put up over 100 and the fact they raised from mid-30's to high teens with an explanation. They were not on my top 20 list at all but that conversation , a good explanation and a trip to meet the team put them back on it. Plus the belief I felt in the kid who approached us. When it came time to pick they were already selected but they would have been our pick had they not been selected (I told them they likely would be as high teen ) meanwhile both of us on our alliance already agreed to pick them based on their second day performance and after discussing with our partner. So I would not say blanket captains 1-5 are so locked in they won't listen. We did and we have a fine scouting department with a deep enough list, never hurts to get more details we may have missed. Sometimes even good scouts can miss relevant info....and picking past 20 I can see where a team may be able to talk their way in to be the selection in the 20-24 range. I know our pick list in CVR had about eight solid picks, the rest were not as solid and the ones towards the end "needed work" so the ones at the end of my our list were close to those not on it. That is where I believe tail end selections can work their way in onto pick lists sometimes especially if they have solid reasons. |
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This year at FLR, after three rocky starts (new camera causing glitching right out of auto, and new gearing on the drivetrain due to chewed-up gear boxes the previous week), we played seven of the best games we've ever played in the history of our team in terms of individual robot performance...
And were 2-8, ranked 44th out of 48 teams. Without any kind of off-field advertising I had no doubt that we were going to be picked, and when the time came we were the 8th overall pick. If you're not in the top eight (or maybe ten), rank doesn't matter. Do your best on the field and trust the scouts to notice. (And when it comes down to it, I'd rather fly under the radar of teams with bad scouts, and get picked by teams with good scouts, because good scouting usually correlates to high performance.) |
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