high scored matches
 

Some of these high scored matches seem hard to believe now. Is anyone seeing what I'm seeing?

Yeah but I'm convinced that some of them were fixed.. I mean the last match got 363 points or something because both sides had a human player stack of 8 that stayed untouched throughout the entire match..

I'm thinking the same thing. Matches like those are making a joke out of this years' game. I just watched 4 matches in a row where alll robots got on top nicely and no one went after the other alliances' stack.

Exactly, I was getting so disgusted watching the florida regional. What happend to it being a competition? It makes it really unfair to rookie teams tring to make it to the top. This year is suppose to be 2 vs. 2. Not 4 vs. 0

I hope FIRST hurries their statement about fixing matches.

Ya I was watching the Florida Regoinal and in the first match all the stacks were standing even when another robot was near by that could have easily knocked it over, thats just down right cheating, rigging matches like that just ruins the game for people who actually try to play it.

Not Likely
 

Replic, don't hold your breath. I believe FRC has provided information that will not be utilized. Last year it was the rulings around tethers, this year it's the ruling about collusion. The game will not be changed at this point; even the human player portion where there is significant risk of injury will remain through the championship.

One of these years someone is going to put drive motors on a cement block and run that as their bot. Maybe that will be the wake-up call for FIRST to abide by their own rulings. The game may not be fair as Dean said, but they have established rules of play, and right now the rules are being ignored.

Unfortunately, sponsors attend these regionals and see the collusion, see the "bash bots", and see that well engineered bots are disadvantaged due to the lack of FIRST following their own rules. Why would you pony up $5000 if this continued? The students that build these robots, from many teams that I have watched over the past three years deserve better than to have their seeding lowered by continued collusion. (DISCLAIMER: These are my personal opinions and in no way reflect the opinions of anyone else.)

As much as I hope you are wrong, Bill Moore, I fear that you are right... FIRST won't make the announcment. But my team has already unanimously voted not abide in any way to fixing matches.

And yes, the tether rule was blown out of all proportion last year, as we specifically asked if we could use a tape measure. After first said no, we wasted precious weight on the mini-me tether I'm sure you know well Bill.

I certainly am completely against collusion, as can be seen by my posts in those related threads.

However, I have been watching the Florida regional, and what has been taking place does NOT appear to me to be collusion. These 8 stacks have been built, and have often come down. In the matches where they stay up, it is usually because it is heavily defended from the other team.

Teams realize, strategically, that it is not in their best interest to always destroy what the other teams create. This does not mean collusion is occuring, it is simply strategy, which I believe is fair in the game. If you already know you are going to win, you want to maximize the other team's points. This does not have to be discussed with the other team before the match.

Again, though, I would like to reemphasize I am completely against the practice of collusion.

Edit: Of course, I was not there, and did not see everything that was going on. This is simply an observation, and I want to make sure people are not just jumping to conclusions. At AZ, I witnessed the collusion first hand. I have not seen any first hand observations about this occurring in FL yet.

An unfortunate downside of all this, of course, is the fact that it is extremely difficult to tell the difference between on the fly strategics and collusion. Do not let this fear of fixing matches become a fest of finger pointing and witch hunts.

well i was at this game we where actually on deck and they where totally fixed cause they where trying to get ahead of everyone so much. And everyone knew it. It was kinda sad.i wont name the teams but they where trying to stay first and second and they dropped and then the 4 on top of the ramp was fixed two which i mean was cool but i wish that was real

I think the forum should adopt these rules for the sure-to-come surge of additional fixing matches posts-

a) No teams are to be named! Pointing fingers leads to no good.

b) Do not assume that all highscoring matches are neccessarily fixed. My team has competed in only one match with all 4 robots ending on the top of the ramp, but it was in no way fixed- in fact, I was surprised the last one pushed his way on in the last second.

I dont think seeing 4 robots on top of the ramp is fixed, when I see stacks of 8 on each side of the playing field, not touched, thats seems a little too hard to believe.

My team was at the Great Lakes Regional, and I only saw one match that looked like it had any collusion. It was really obvious - the final score was 102 to 101, and the winning team got 304 qualifying points. That was the only match like that, and I'm glad that most of the teams were noble enough not to stoop to that level.

(I edited this post because I originally pointed out which teams I thought had been involved in the collusion; I took the advice of another poster and decided to edit my message. I apologize to anyone who saw my original post.)

I don't see a stack of 8 on both sides being that hard to believe. If I was driver, I wouldn't knock a stack over if I still had a stack the same size in my zone (and I was winning). I would wait for the last 20 seconds if we were losing to knock it over. Not knocking over others stacks at the beginning will normally assure you a high score if you win.