[FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

I have been re-reading through the Official FIRST Q&A Forums, specifically "Section 2 - The Game" and noticed that at least 5 different times (#6,#7,#8,#9,#13) it is stated that it is not against the rules to either hold the opposing alliances' pucks or to dump them out of play either in Tele-Op or in Autonomous modes.

Defense is about denying your opponent the opportunity to score.

I am curious to see what people's opinion's are about this type of defensive strategy.

Is it good aggressive defense or does it cross the line into being ungracious?

Does it make a difference of what quality opponent you are facing or when? (For example: I think against a new and struggling team it is obviously way too aggressive/ungracious, but what about against a quality team that consistently scores a full rack during Auto and the other 3 during Tele-Op).

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

It sounds like a smart and winning strategy. Don't let the thought of GP deter you from using it, everyone there is competing to win, don't think anyone would hold it against you. Good luck.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Gracious professionalism is about respecting your opponent's, this doesn't mean you can't play with a good defense. That's sort of like saying that scoring a ton of points in one dump of pucks is disrespectful to your opponents because you're setting the bar way high. Defense has been a long time aspect to challenges and games of all kinds.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

This strategy is great. Gracious professionalism should not stop you from using it. Some people may frown upon it saying that it may be unsportsmanlike. Personally our team has used the strategy of holding the opponents pucks and dumping them out of the field. This is a very useful tactic and i think it is a great strategy and not lack of gracious professionalism. Props to those who use the strategy to their advantage.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Keep in mind that your RP points are related to the amount that the losing alliance scores. So, if you are a strong scoring alliance and will likely score more than the opponent anyway, dumping their pucks outside the playfield actually hurts your standings.

The optimal would be for your team to win with a slim margin and high score.

Sean

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

It seems that many people confuse gracious professionalism/good sportsmanship with not doing things that are part of the game, such as blocking opponent robots and taking opponent pucks out of field play. But just like stealing the ball or blocking a shot in a basketball game isn't bad sportsmanship, blocking a robot or dumping opponent's pucks to help your alliance out isn't opposed to gracious professionalism; it's just another way of doing better than your opponent.

-Jonathan

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Wordat Nitro-Guy.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

i've been wondering though, has any1 here scored their opponents pucks against a not so strong opponent to boast their RP points? :cool:

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Yup, combining that aspect with your defense strategy is the difference between just a high torque (or speed) squarebot and a winning defense bot.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Until this year my team has never scored for our opponet more than a few points, but this year there were rounds where we scored an entire dispenser (i think once we scored 2) when we were facing two "square bots" and needed those extra RP's to get up in the rankings another slot or two.

I don't know why, but this years challenge seems to need a lot more scoring to for your opponents than previous years. Though it isn't always.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

We didn't score much for our opponents last year either (guess why :D ) but it seemed that back then, even against a good scoring team the goals could swing things either way. Getting off the field this year simply does not compare, especially in comparison to the number of points that can be scored. And, especially for rookie teams, it's hard to build a decent scoring robot.

In regards to defense, I think it's a fine strategy but against the majority of teams dumping pucks on the floor would be just as effective. I couldn't really justify the extra time taken to dump pucks outside of the field unless you were up against a robot that could pick up pucks from the floor really well.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

In the matches I've seen with better-quality robots, nothing that happens after autonomous really makes much difference. Defense, offense, or sitting on the ramp, if your opponents dump two trays into the center goal in auto the match is pretty much over.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

but in the worlds, when you have good robot against good robot, i think the chance of scoring 2 pucks in auto is pretty remote seeing how every1's gonna be moving. you might be able to obstruct the other robot's first rack while you go for your second, but 1 rack in auto doesn't decide a game. but yeah if you get 2 racks in... then yeah.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

It works the other way too - if you block an opponent during autonomous and make them accidentally dump their two racks on the floor instead of in the goal, they are going to have a seriously hard time winning. Blocking autonomous programs, mindgames, and strategy will make things much less predictable at Worlds.

(But it still means that things will mostly be decided by autonomous. Which means that my team has a lot of work to do before Atlanta. :ahh: )

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

The other skill not much in evidence at regionals that could be key at Worlds is picking pucks off the floor. If the defensive auto strategies work there will be a lot of pucks down during auto.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Another strategy I found was defensive, yet I, to be honest, think it is a "cheapshot" strategy:

In one of our matches, there was a robot's autonomous mode. We noticed it changed.

Normally, the robot would just proceed and go forward.

However, our robot had an autonomous that scored (Only maybe 4 or 5 robots at the tournament had a scoring autonomous). It seemed as if they knew how our autonomous mode worked, and they changed their code to go forward, then turn, then go forward, and "park" in our path. It threw us off by the way.

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Those programmers should be rewarded for their accomplishment of scouting ahead of their match, and being able to program on the fly accurately. I can think of numerous FRC matches that were won based off of similar autonomous mode strategies.

This promotes competition, if teams are able to stop your autonomous mode on the fly, the best teams will program scoring autonomous modes on the fly as well. Or potentially it will encourage use of sensors to extreme ways that the robot will know their is something in its path and is not able to score. Another possibility is to program multiple autonomous modes, and keep scouters guessing at which one will be used in the next match.

See how wonderful FIRST is?

Re: [FTC]: Defense vs. Gracious Professionalism
 

Gracious Professionalism may be a fuzzy little bonus of FIRST, but you can't withold a good strategy or a strong auto-mode because of it. As long as it OK'd by the rules, intense defense like dumping racks outside the field is not a "violation" of GP. You can't allow "Gracious Professionalism" to limit your strategy or Auto modes.