Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

I'm not saying that it makes sense for your entire strategy to be to score for the other alliance for the entirety of a regional event during qualifications. I'm saying there's situations where it makes sense to do so.

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

Well I for one, don't see much advantage in only scoring on one alliance for a few reasons.

1) Let's say that only one alliance is scored on. One alliance (the "losing" one) will still gain more seeding points than the other alliance if there are penalties. Penalties are very easy to get this year, especially with travel over the bump. Each alliance will want to have more seeding points, so this cohesion will be impossible if alliances can't decide who will lose. In the pursuit of losing on the field, each team will try to score on themselves as much as possible, but this would cause the coopertition bonus to come into play, and so each team would go back to scoring on their opponents. End result, normal game play.

Summary of that confusion I just typed: Both teams will want to lose, the attempt to lose causes the coopertition bonus to kick in, and the game will resume back to normal.

2) If everyone scores on one goal, then at the end the top 8 teams have a high probability of being just random teams. A good team will focus their efforts on showing off their robot's capabilities during qualifications, so they are a nice pick for a top 8 team. You are not standing out at all by scoring on one person.

3) The team that would be chosen ahead of time to "win" will quickly realize that scoring on their opponents will increase their seeding points by even more. The reason for this is the coopertition bonus. Everyone will see this happen, the "losing" alliance realized that they have been had, and no one will so it again.

As far as all of this decreasing a teams trust for picking for elimination rounds, the teams have proven that they want to win, the only way they can win is by playing for the team. They have also proven that they are in the spirit of the game. If anything, you would be inclined to pick these teams.

I know scoring on one alliance has been seen already and will be seen again, but it's more of a last ditch effort than an actual smart strategy of getting to Atlanta.

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

And don't forget about durability. If the qualifying matches are played like flag football and the eliminations are full contact. A robots first real hit could be its last.

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

Im sorry, I thought that was all you wanted to do. Yes, strategically it would make sense to do this sometimes. I just cant see myself doing this because these situations would be matches you think you would lose. I would not want to give up because assumably the other alliance is a high scorer, so if my alliance were to win we would get more seeding points.

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

Yes, I agree that there are times when you would want to do this in specific situations. (Rant/example below)

Rant::Yesterday on our last match at Kettering one of our alliance partners broke down very early in the match and seeing that we were in a losing situation we successfully scored multiple points for the other alliance. The game ended with a score of 10-0. Despite the fact that it cost us a game (we were then 9-3-0) I believe we made the right decision. I even had a judge come up to me later in the pits and compliment us on our "smart" stratagy. However, I am under no circumstances saying teams should make this their stratagy every game, it is for us, a team who won many of our matches X to 0 giving us a very low co-op score, just another part of the crazy new system.
::end rant

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

This should be done regardless of which way you play the game. the ONLY use i find in this is if the game is a 12-11 match, which we've only seen ONCE so far.

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

The absoult worst thing about a 6v0 stradgy is that it does NOT maximize the seed points. In fact it minimizes them.

Consider a 16-0 score each teams get 16 seed points. Not to bad, right?

Now consider those same 16 goals split evenly for a 8-8 tie, Here each team gets 24 seed points!

Looks to me like a tie is the way to maximize seed points. Why in the world would you want to leave one side scoreless? The alliance which through strong defence skunks the other alliance hurts only themselves.

Play no defence and strive for a tie.

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

I think with TU 16, it is generally agreed that the mutual 6v0 strategy is no longer a preferred option (though it may still occur for reasons I will list below). Let me be clear that I was not a big fan of 6v0, but understood there may be times when it may have been appropriate.

First of all while I fully agree that 6v0 does not maximize seed points, it does not minimize them. In a match, points scored for the losing alliance do not benefit the losing alliance. With 6v0, every goal helps both alliances. Further the argument was that under 6v0, more goals could be scored than under a 3v3 situation.

I also grant that a tie is the best outcome to maximize seeding points betwen two alliances working together. However a tie is much more difficult to engineer than simply scoring all your goals on one side. I believe to properly execute it, you almost need to predetermine the final score, which I feel is one step too far in the argument of collusion. There was also the argument that when engineering a tie there is a much larger incentive to backstab. I didn't like this argument because I feel that is definetly unprofessional and that one's reputation is far more important than seeding points.

Lastly, I think most of its advocates understood that 6v0 does not maximize your score but reduces risk. It's the question of whether you would prefer to have $2, or play a game where a die is rolled that paid $6 if the result was even. The $6 pays better; even the expected value $3 pays better, but there may be situations where all you need is the guaranteed $2.

As an aside, strong defence has its place in qualification matches. Not all teams are aiming to be in the top 8 seeds. For some teams, the qualification matches are there to showcase their abilities which may include impressive defensive capabilities. For others, the win resulting from strong defence may score better than the loss that results without it. Sweeping generalizations on what is the optimal strategy are rarely correct in complicated games.

Re: Playing two different games this year?
 

If you mess up a tie, one team gets screwed over. If you mess up a shutout by missing a ball or something, no biggie. Well, back then. now with the update, predetermined matches won't happen, just occasional bailouts and throws.