Importance of Scouting
 

I know at least one team that is at a regional right now that is not competing. They are there just to scout other teams.

Is this advantageous to watch teams that you may or may not be ever competing against? In my experience many teams change their robots up a bit to improve them from one regional to the next. Also, what would knowing what a team does before your regional do to help you?

It's always good to know a little bit about the teams you're competing with or against. The more you have seen a robot compete, the better idea you have of their capabilities. We don't typically send team members to other competitions, but some have gone on their own, and we usually ask them to do some scouting of the teams we'll see later.

well... I'm not totally sure. Personally, I don't think it's important to "Scout" teams that you won't ever be against.

However, I know that I will be watching the regionals via the webcast this weekend to see how they play out and some of the winning strategys.

Actually, I'd say that the team most likely really isn't scouting teams but rather just viewing strategys.

I know for a fact they are there scouting teams. Robots, strategy's, components, alliances.. the whole shabazz.

From your input.. I know ask the question, is scouting matches in the stadium better than scouting via webcast? Especially since my original statement was how many teams change up their bot if they plan on going to another regional.

Another point I think I should make... if your team is having money troubles, would it be smart to go to a regional and stay in a hotel for 3 nights, while just watching and taking down info?

theres no need to send the whole team to scout

we actualy send everybody that is not in pit or the players station to scout. It goes much quicker that way, ad we can get everythign done with about 20-30 min per person

That's about how we run our scouting. Everyone who isn't doing something else goes out and scouts. This year, we have 5 Pocket PCs, so we'll be sending people out in groups of two with one PPC each.

Scounting is very important no matter how competetive we are. Sure, scouting lets us know who we're up against and what we need to do to win. It lets us know who we're aligned with and what our strategy needs to be going into a match. Scouting also provides a glimpse into the creativity and imagination and engineering that went into the machines that we scout. It lets us see the team structures and organization and things that work or don't work with regards to these. It provides us with ideas that we can incorporate into our own teams or our future robots in order to keep making what we do better.
Yes! Scout away!

Scouting is VERY important

I think scouting is important, but i dont know about going to another regional just to scout teams, if there are a lot of duplicates at your regional and another earlier maybe, but for nationals you never know who is going and what the divisions will be, so i dont see that much of a point in that aspect. Especially since most teams go to the closest regional to them, meaning that the one they would be scouting at isnt too close. I guess if some members of my team wanted to go scout, the more information the better, as long as it doesnt cost too much to send them, or better yet, anything if they pay themselves. Webcasts are good for strategies, but if you are at the match you can find out if bots arent working and thats why they lost or just a new strategy they were trying, being able to talk to the ppl on the team is a major part of important scouting

YOU CAN NEVER DO TOO MUCH SCOUTING!!!
Even if your not against them at any of your regionals, they could still be in your division at nationals, or you could meet them in the finals.
Being at the vent is better than the webcast. If a team has problems in a match, you can always go ask them what happened and how they're fixing it and what other problems they have had. You can't get that from a webcast.

Scouting is important. It allows you to develop a soid strategy to hopefully win or at least foil your opponents. Knowing thing like if they have a brake, how good their traction is, etc... are all components of winning the game or at least giving a good shot at it. It is vitial some you don't, at least break something on your robot. You don't really want to try to push someone off the ramp if they have their break locked down on it. Or take advantage of where a team has the least traction. Often wheel type along with the drive system is an indication of it.

Our team doesn't acutally assign people to go to regionals and watch, but there's been cases of people going. I was giong to go to the western michigan (I think that's what it's called...it's in Grand Rapids) regional and watch the teams that were going to be at nationals, but it snowed. You can get an idea of what you'll be against because a different area could have come up with an amazing strategy. As for the money issue, it's better if you don't send the WHOLE team, or if you just go for a day. (Works best with nearby regionals). What's nice about individuals giong on their own is they can pay hotel bills and such...

Last year (2003) was the first year our team was even half-decent, so we spent more time focusing on keeping our robot in top condition and scouting got pushed to the wayside. (plus we only had five people-not enough to effectively scout anything!) This year I wrote a scouting info sheet for other teams to fill out, from the perspective of a driver/mechanic. It seemed to work pretty well, and since we've improved enough to make semi-finals, it helped to know who we were up again when it mattered.
-Liz