Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

FIRST has in the past allowed defensive play.

FIRST has allowed pushing, non-malicious ramming, accidental "oops, your CG is too high" flipping, all at the refs discretion. FIRST has repeatedly, emphasized that this is a physical game, and pleaded with teams to build their robots accordingly.

I imagine, this will continue in the future.


I believe this thread is designed to highlight ways to end "overly aggresive" defensive play. Intentional tipping, entanglement, and such. Also to get ideas such that refs will be better able to warn teams that their play is "entering the grey area". I think we've done a good job, and posted several great ideas.




Defense makes the matches exciting.
It should NOT go away. (In my opinion)


I thought FIRST did a heck of a job balancing this year's game. Defense was present, but not overly so. There were plenty of tradeoffs. A successful alliance had to be well balanced. I imagine things would have been pretty boring to watch if all we saw was machines corralling, capping, and hanging.
Wooooo... another 300 score.

Wooop-dee-freakin-dooo.

Defense is an important strategic part of the game. (Or do you still disagree with me on this Ken? Did you watch the webcast?) As a coach, I'm glad we have it at our disposal, when we're outgunned offensively.

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

I think we are on the same plane here, I suggested that bot to bot contact for the purpose of pushing and shoving must be limited to a defined bumper zone at the base of the machines, so you would not be able to point your arm or hook at another machine and take out their spleen with it, or push them over

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

When this thread started the intent was to write new rules.

It seems to have evolved into a discussion on whether the games should be played like football or like ballet. Any game has two sides and playing defense is just as important as playing offense. FIRST intentionally warns teams to build their robots for robustness in the robot build rules and in the tournament rules (under picking partners).

Everyone should look at the standings lists. How many boxes are in the top 15? From there , how many were in the finals? The game rewards good design practices, robust robots and strategies that include offense and defense.

The game is designed to mimic the real world. We are teaching that life is not fair, we need to look at our surroundings and plan for the future. If the rules say expect interaction with other robots it should not mean that they will be only kissing each other.

I think the card system has merit because what may be unintentional in one match would be recognized and punished if it is a recurring behavior.

(edit) There should also be a method to recall yellow cards for teams that play two or more matches without further penalty. 'Reduced sentence for good behavior' (edit)

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

in the refinement of the rules as I posted them on page 1, I said if you push a bot from the side or back and topple it or damage it, then you are DQ'd - if you CAN push it sideways then no foul is incurred.

look at the video MikeDubreuil posted in his text on page two. Team 56 had a tendency to wheelie up when they accelerated, and they drove across the playfield into the SIDE of 45 (who had a 2X ball up in the air) - the contact was above what I defined as the bumber zone, and 45 was toppled (taken out)

with my new refinement of the rules 56 would be DQ because the result of their 'ramming' and contact above the bumper zone caused 45 to topple.

that was a quarterfinal match BTW - 45 got that far and ended up sprawled across the floor. I defy anyone to design a bot that could be holding a 2X ball up in the air, take a hit like that and NOT fall over - you cant drive around with outriggers planted on all 4 corners of your bot. when 45 was hit they were not even close to the goal yet.

Im not trying to eliminate all defense - Im trying to acknowledge that there IS defense and to put guidelines for it - thats what this thread is about - nobody here is saying all bot to bot contact has to stop

if you think you can push someone sideways without tipping them over (esp when they are extended and vunerable) that will be your choice - you push them and they slide and its ok, you push them and 'take them out' of the game, and you are DQ

isnt that fair? As others have pointed out, no matter how low the center of gravity is on your bot, if my bot pushes above it once your CG is past your center of balance, your bot will topple - any bot can be toppled, we cant design bots that defy the laws of physics

but we can design rules that will allow teams on all levels to play without getting destroyed or knocked over without penalites.

Even in RollerBall, they had rules, at least at first - so we really want the elimination matches to be a robotwar freeForAll?

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

If this is the refinement you propose, then I TOTALLY disagree with it. I don't want robots out there, holding hands and humming as they go to score points. The "hit" that 56 put on our robot was darn-good-robot-action. This is the kind of stuff that may make the highlight reel on ESPN, eventually. This is action. It's dynamic. Spectators want to see this.

Was the hit malicious with intent to destruct? Heck no!

Was the hit intended to try to keep us from scoring our 2x ball? Yes!

56 had a good move, they had good position on us. They wisely shoved us out of the way, away from our target.

It was a good, clean, move. We are not complaining at all. To give you more insight, you are the only person I know that has pointed to 56's move to be illegal. I am the team leader on 45, and I talk to many people. Many people said many things about our matches in Archimedes, but not one mentioned that 56 tipped us over illegally. We didn't even think about it.

Andy B.

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

im not saying the match action was illegal - many matches played out this way and no penalites were asessed

look around the forum and you will see that many people this year were disapointed with the level of agressive play this year, and could not understand why no penalites were called, anywhere - for tipping or for damage inflicted?

thats what this thread is about - clearly teams had different expectations this year going into the games as to what would be allowed and what would be called foul

personally if you asked me after the kickoff if driving across the field and ramming a bot and knocking it over like that was allowable, I would have said -no way - they would be DQ'd for being that agressive

esp when a bot is not even near the goal

ok - I was wrong - apparently this type of no-holds-barred action is not only allowed

its encouraged? is this what we want? to be on ESPN?

if thats what the majority of teams want then ok, make it clear - get rid of rules that are not called at any event anywhere, stop leading people to believe there is some sort of good sportmanship happening on the playfield. Lets stop pretending that tipping, ramming, bashing is discouraged - cause apparently the crowd loves it and thats what they want to see

and lets play battlebots - lets play RollerBall

no penaties, no disqualifications, and no subsitutions. the last bot not toppled wins (thats how it turned out this year)

how far were we from that this year in the finals, seriously?

If thats what everyone wants, I'll go along with it - but at least tell us at the kickoff meeting so we dont feel like idiots when we show up at our first regional and watch our 6 weeks of hard work get battered, smashed and toppled repeatedly.

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

Who is saying there is no good sportsmanship going out on the field? People are playing to win, maybe some are playing too extremely and going nuts, but not the majority. My team and many others out there "play to win or don't play at all, but if we lose take it graciously." There are some hard fought battles out on that FIRST carpet, and most of the time teams love that kind of hear-stopping action. Agressive play will always be there, some robot out there will always be the 'annoying, im going to get in your face and ram you until you stop scoring points against me' robot, and there will always be teams that beat them. Robots will always tip, take damage, etc.. Thats why FIRST tells you to build them robust, its in the rules, they are going to take hits over and over and the best robustly designed robot will still be out there.

Winning is encouraged, its human nature to want to win. If a robot is out there trying to cap, get in there way, hit them, stick your arm up there. Play some defense, but keep it legal. Of course it is going to be agressive, thats what defesne is, you can't just sit at your drivers station saying to yourself "Please, please, please, let them not cap that goal." You have to get out there and get in their way. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't, but at least you know you tried and didnt just cower your robot in a corner and hide. The best robots are able to adapt to the game, they can play offense with the best of them and then turn right around and beat the best of them with their defense. Its tough to build a robot like that, and you don't see alot of them.

Let the robots play, rules are like laws, there are gray areas. There will be no-calls and play-ons just like in sports. As long as the robots aren't continually beating each other down. Let the refs make the judgement call, its their job. But don't totally outlaw agressive play, it is part of what makes it fun to play and watch.

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

your team decides what to make and how to use it.

If everyone made a steel box to play defense with thye couldn't play defense! Only defensive robots would make for no offense. But if everyone made offensive robots and played no defense, you'd watch in horror as the team your against scores higher than you repeatedly and you can do nothing to stop it.

Listen folks there needs to be offense and defense, a Yin and Yang and a Hall and Oates if you will (well maybe not hall and oates but you get it)

Be prepared for defense and ways around it simple as that. I think we are creating a problem for something that isn't broken.

For example, one could argue that 494's or 56 defense was unfair. But in saying that their defense was too good could you not also say that 71's offense from 2002 was too good? I mean they were unstoppable back then and there was no rule made against that. Even this year they could do it all and no rules are being made about how much offense can be played?

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

I'm not sure if you can make that statement.

A few individuals have been complaining about overly agressive play, but for the most part people seem very happy with the referee calls, and with the way the game has played out.

Why is it that people pay the most attention to the negative comments?

I LOVED this game. I LOVED the job the referees did. I would hope next season plays out the same way.

[edit]
Let's see what people actually think.
[/edit]

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

IMHO:

If a robot is rendered inoperable or (partially) destroyed by another robot, then the offending robot should be given (at least) a yellow card. Severity of card (yellow or red) would be determined by the witnessing referee(s).

Definition of inoperable: Tipped or destroyed in such a way that the robot can not complete the rest of the match. However, if the robot is tipped and manages to get back up, the card issued to the offensive robot shall be recalled with a green card.
Definition of damage: destruction (either intentionally or not) of any rigid (non-pliable) component (so something like a styrofoam bumper would be excluded) to the point where that component is inoperable.

However, bending of a component, like an aluminum arm or whatever, would not be deemed as a card-worthy action, because it *may* not represent a total inoperability of said component.

How's that? :D

MrToast, having fun with colors :cool:

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

A very small minority were upset with the church of England, now we have the United States of America. It's also possible that some people are not coming out because they fear being the minority.

I think the real puspose of these threads is to determine what qualifys a violation of the standard rules. It also points out how open the current rules are to interpretation.

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

I agree with John here. Everything played out pretty well and the ref did a good job.

There were a few things I disagreed with:

1. The refs had a tough time acknowledging overly rough play without a dq. A dq in my mind was overly harsh in most all cases. A warning that carries over and discouraging the team from playing like that would work better and give the refs more options in penalizing a team in a less harsh way. Unintentional things happen and it would be hard for a ref to DQ for unintentional things but I can see a warning for unintentional damage.

2. Sometime resets bother me because sometimes teams get a second chance that maybe in all fairness they shouldn't. One example I saw was a team in autonomous mode hit the wall and drove one of its wheels outside the playing field. I all normal cases this would merit a disabling of the robot. But for for some reason when they hit the wall and drove the front wheel of it caused the balls to drop even though the ten point ball wasn't knock off. They stopped the match and let all the robots reset and play again. My assessment was that the offending robot should have been able to be put in the starting position but be disabled for that round. I don't know that was just my thought. I saw a couple other type instances where I thought there should be a disabled bot off of the reset. This didn't involve my team at all I just thought it was odd.

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

I agree that in most games and events GP and good sportsmanship reigned and teams did their best to respect the opponents machines and skills

why do you think that, from a perspective of fairness?

if my team is getting wild and bashes into your bot, either knocking it over or disabling it, your team has done nothing wrong

but now you cant play for the rest of the match

while my team continues to play, and benefit from our actions since it is now 2 against 1 on the field

most likely, my team will win. If we are not DQ'd why wouldnt my team keep driving like that?

and if its the last match of the finals, what do I care about yellow cards?!

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

What's interesting is that this is whats wrong with our justice system.

If I murder someone they lose their life. I however, could potentially get out in 20 years. I get to raise a familly and have the American dream. The parents of the murder victim get nothing.

Should we move to a biblical eye for an eye system of rule in FIRST?

If a robot becomes disabled should the offending robot be disabled?

Or maybe like the US jusctice system, should an offending robot be disabled for a period of time? For instance, 15 seconds.

Re: You write <G34> and <G35>
 

We already have rules for this. It just so happens that the refs didn't make the calls because they didn't feel a robot was destroyed or maliciously and intentionally "taken out" of the game.

Andy's right. I never heard anyone talk about 56s action until you brought it up. We are not complaining. If we thought something was unjust we might have contested it or at least asked about it. But 56 did nothing wrong. Sure we got tipped but it's not all 56s fault! We could have had our arm in a different position to help keep us stable. They shouldn't have to wait until we get within a foot of our goal to prevent us from scoring. Heck, we could score from 5ft away if we wanted! I would expect someone to try to keep us as far away as possible!

You can only make defensive rules so conditional. By adding all these "can't hit from the side or back", "can only hit between 2-8" mark", "if Blue Bot falls and breaks it's arm because Red Bot pushed him, Red Bot is disabled"... it just makes the refs job that much harder and way too many conditions to watch...

According to your rule, if I push on any one of 3 of 4 sides of a robot, and it happens to tip.. I'm disabled..Because tippage was the "result". If I rammed them, it might be different, under the discretion of the ref. What about those sly guys that can right themselves? What about their partner who helps them back up? So I should still be disabled? So now I'm out of the game, but yet whoever I "pushed or shoved", they were awesome enough to get back up and continue playing! Now that doesn't seem so fair either! I personally don't think I should be responsible if the opponents robot gets "destroyed" when they fall over as a result of defense. They could have fallen over all by themselves and destroyed themselves just as much. Apparently they weren't robust enough if they were "destroyed". But I shouldn't be disabled just because part of their arm snapped off when they came crashing down on top of it.

The point is, we already have rules for overly aggressive and malicious driving/playing. I'm sure there can be some words to improve the rules, but I don't know what they are. But I can say that I don't think the resolution is adding very specific conditions that pretty much remove defense from a game.

G's.. this has gotten out of hand... I don't need to react anymore..

We should try the yellow/red cards at IRI and see what happens.

This just cracks me up.....