Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

I apologize. I assumed that AB, and CD were homestretches.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

If the refs are limiting where you can shoot from, I hope Aidan hears about it before tomorrow. Remember, hurdling from outside your homestretch is allowed (you just don't get hurdling protection).

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

You might want to quote whatever rules or Q&A you are basing that opinion on.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

<G42> is the hurdling protection. One condition is that the robot is in the homestretch. Therefore, a robot outside the homestretch gets NO hurdling protection.

As for the rest, the definition of hurdle doesn't say "from the homestretch".
But you want the GDC's response in Q&A.
Here it is.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

1625 did a couple shots across the lane divider like 27 Rush did and the Colorado referees said that it didn't count. My brother, Aren, then had a long discussion with the head ref. and I am not too sure he got anywhere. Hopefully all of the rules will be straightened out before all of the qualification matches tomorrow.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

Aiden has been contacted, as well as, other GDC members. I expect this to be straightened out in today's dirver meetings. The definitiions, rues, and Q & A regarding this subject make it pretty obvious that the diagonal hurdle is legal if it satifies the rules of a legal HURDLE (note: not HURDLING).

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

Just for retrospective clarification, there were teams that interpreted EricH's three Q&A's to coincide with their opinion and interpretation of the game rules that a trackball needed to be HURDLING in order to score 8 points.
After clarification from Dr. Browne, all doubts were laid to rest on the legality of hurdling from the quadrant clockwise from a teams homezone (it counts)

As a (hopeful, even if temporary) closure to this topic, I am pleased to see the generally progressive and constructive tone to the challenges that this season has presented. We are seeing a vastly expanded rulebook, we are seeing literally thousands of penalties called each week, points being subtracted in a scale not seen since 2005's 30-pointers, and not likely to be equaled any time soon. We are seeing much more pressure being put on volunteers from both sides, from both FIRST National and from the teams, for perfection in an imperfect world.

But it seems as if people have realized, for some part, that at least on the perfection part, we are progressing in the right direction. Going from a small-scale cultlike following to a worldwide movement obviously requires some (heckova lotta) change, and obviously we're in the middle of it, all of us. As the sign says, "Please excuse our dust while we are remodeling."

And so this year it seems like people on the most part understand. Last year was the burst of anger and surprise and shock and outrage that reverberated through the entire FIRST community, and this year there hasn't been as much emotion as that. Yes, there are still some bricks and mortar that we're stubbing our toes on (and some people that need to learn the responsibility that comes with their roles in FIRST, in regards to this forum), but at least the volunteers are being trained better, and the folks upstairs in their jeans and hawaiian shirts are saying, "There is a problem, we are aware of it," even though it seems like they aren't doing enough to act on it. I have no doubt that next year will be better than this year, just like this year was better than last (because honestly, I don't want to imagine anything worse).

Oh, and P.S. - for the record, from experience it's about 100 times easier being a bleachers referee than being a real referee. Try the latter sometime. (No, seriously, I need refs for MARC, ARC, and Kettering.)

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

As a team that competed in a regional twice before the Hawaii one, I made sure I talked to Fred, the head referee about certain "gray" areas or areas that were interpreted and called "differently" to see how he would instruct his crew to call them in the event certain things happened.
Just a suggestion to do the same prior to championships matches, especially during practice day so that no confusion takes place and the record is set.
Of course many teams have different regional(s) that they attended versus other teams and the timing of when they competed may have rules that have evolved/clarified since they last participated.
Since, as stated, that almost 75% of teams only compete in one regional, they cant assume the refereeing will be exactly the same at CMP.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

I talked to benge in boston, and he instructed me that as long as the ball was completely within the overpass, meaning it wasn't over the center bar with the FIRST logo on it, it would be good.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

Just another thing to add on to the pile...

I saw a Ref at Boston, during a match (not in between matches, which some refs do which I am more okay with but still don't completely agree with), take out his cell phone and text someone on numerous occasions. I started taking note of that same ref, and noticed that he/she was paying attention to the wrong area most of the time, which nearly got him/herself killed on numerous occasions.

This ref did happen to fall under the "Friend of the VC" category. Although, I do know that Boston was short staffed on refs and tried to get anyone to ref.

Put that on to the plethora of bad calls he/she made...it was one of the worst ref jobs I have ever seen.
The rest of the ref crew did happen to be great though. It was one of the best ones I have seen, besides the aforementioned.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

Volunteer Coordinators were informed today to recruit the following for the game this season:
1 Head Ref
3 or 4 Refs
6 Scorekeepers

Refs will need to pass a test, scorekeepers will not.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

I do not know if the could do this but in the playoffs if a team wanted to use a timeout and get video replay to see if its a close match and see if some points are missing.

Re: Improving Officiating at FIRST Events
 

Oh, no! Search for "instant replay" to see why I say that... Namely the one about "this is the year for instant replay".

Doable, yes. Practical, no.