NO SCOUTS!! Whaddukiddin?
 

Our team views scouting as a very important procedure and it surprises me how many teams don't scout.

We use scouting for the following-

1. almost all our new members spend their first season as scouts. It teaches them how robots work and gives them a chance to critically look at other machines and teams. Several experienced members head the scouting crews and help the newbies learn what to look for.

2. scouting is the only way to get real information on the abilities of a robot and team. Watching them compete in rounds is best. Many teams "enhance" their abilities when you talk to them. Usually it is more overconfidence than deliberate deception.
But head to head in the arena shows the limitations. Actions speak much louder than words

3. developing a scouting program allows many more students to be directly involved with the competition. If you think about it, most of the actual play with the machine falls in the hands of a small drive team. Having a scouting program supports that team and includes many more people in the actual game.

4. I find that photos of robots say a lot more than data. I check out the photo databases daily during the build season to see who has the best ideas and robust designs. We almost always post pictures of our machine and we put the Curse of the Kahuna on those who keep their pix hidden. ; )

5. Strategy development is often based on knowledge of who you are playing against. Every robot has it's weakness and only study of your opponent can reveal that. We often develop a number of playing strategies to deal with a variety of opponents.

6. While we don't assign people to visit regionals to scout, many of us do watch the live webcasts to see who plays the game how. It is also good entertainment

7. BTW- pics for alliance partners don't always depend on scouting info. Sometimes it is just nice to play with friends or folks that really have the spirit of FIRST

To give an idea of how we develop scouts= At a recent off season competition we gave the scouting job to a crew of all newbies and set them loose on the pits. Their job was to make the choices for our alliance partners for the picking of the finals. Nobody was going to do much to help them.
It turned out we seeded 1st and got first pick. It was the choice of the newbies we went with. They felt like they were a part of the action and we got some valuable training in. It didn't matter the outcome of the day. It did matter that our new members got involved for the season and were ready for the coming months.

(BTW- we were eliminated due to our own mechanical problems- proving that you can't win all the time. We did our best and thats what counts.)

WC:cool:

WC is on the money again
 

I always keep my eye on scouting threads and I too am amazed at how some teams feel it is unimportant. The process 103 uses is very similar to what Wayne described with 25. About 20 of our current 33 student members are experienced in the scouting process. Five our our students (drive team, human player, and two head scouts) make up the strategy group that collect data from individual scouts and work directly on strategy with alliance partners. This Saturday at Ramp Riot, our new scouts will be trained. So far this year, we've held two scouting meetings for the sole purpose of ensuring success and commitment from our new people.

Our team, in my knowledge, has never been big on scouting. Most likely becuase weve been too busy beating our bot back into shape.
I was wondering what you guys look for and some of the questions you ask when your teams go around.

Our team is definately big on scouting. Last year, Ursula, one of our mentors, made up these elaborate scouting sheets. One of the most important things that I've found is scouting is to make sure to remember to only take what other teams say about their robot and its capabilitys as about half true. Our team watched our competitors during the time that our team wasn't competing. Each team (we had people work in groups of two just in case multiple were on the field at once) was given a section of team numbers (700-800 for instance) and if a team in this range came onto the playing field. If a team looked ecceptionally good after multiple scouts, the team would be approached and then stats would be requested from them.

Over the past few years, our team has attempted to go scouting electronically w/ Excel and some other methods, but in the end it just ended up becoming a hassle. This year, I think we're going to go back to basics a little and just go w/ the old paper and pen method, and also taking a picture of every robot at the competition to make a posterboard for easy reference. We'll see how it works out, but last year I headed up scouting and everything worked fine by having 2 or 3 people and myself going around w/ pen and paper asking teams questions. :)

Can you tell me more about these elaborate sheets or are they top secret.

Let me see if i can get a copy of one, and i'll post it

Scouting is important, but not just to see the robots. More important then seeing what other team's robots can do is just seeing what strategies are being employed, and which are effective. A good robot alone won't make you win, you've got to employ it effectively. It's good practice for the drive team as well, watching matches helps you get the hang of evaluating the score instantly. I was a driver for two years, and I've seen some pretty bonehead mistakes that have cost teams matches they could have easily won if they employed basic strategy. Know your opponent's abilities, but more importantly go into every match with an effective strategy. This last season, I went and watched the stream from the regionals while the soap guys were digitizing. I feel it made me a much more effective driver, and gave us a strategy edge. If going to a regional is not cost effective, get a group togethor and watch the webcasts and critique the matches. Finally when you know you are going up an opponent people claim is "unbeatable" go back and watch the videos to see what people haven't tried. (Blatant Plug mode) Check out http://www.soap108.com/ during competition to see videos of every match archived online.