Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

I voted no because it should not be changed now that the competition season has begun. Also, not allowing goals to be scored on yourself is not the best way to fix it.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

I am split having not played the game yet. I can tell you that there is an element of this ranking system that I like and it is the removal of pressure on each individual match. In pas years at large events such as the championship if you lose 1 or 2 matches you have dropped way down in the rankings. People always seem to talk about "lucky pairings" but I would argue there are just as many "unlucky pairings" and most teams are going to lose a few matches.

I DO NOT endorse starting the regional with no other strategy than scoring for your opponents, but I do feel that the 6v0 is within the spirit of this game and a necessary evil.

If I could change the ranking system I would change it to this.

Winner - Same as now (winner score + 2x the losers score)

Loser - Gets the winners points PLUS their own points

In many matches the ranking points would be as close as they are now. If a team decides to go 6v0 they still get the same score, but it gives incentive for a team to try and score for themselves and for the opponents to help their competitors and score for them. Basically what it breaks down to is any ball scored by the loser in their own goal or opponent's goal goes right to their ranking score. So why would you score for your opponent 100% when winning gives you a notable advantage and it doesn't hurt you if you try to win and fail. Thoughts?

A few examples (disregard penalties)

Blue loses 5-3 Blue gets 8 points Red gets 11

Blue loses 7-1 Blue Gets 8 points Red gets 9

Blue loses 6-5 Blue gets 11 Red gets 16

Blue Loses 8-0 Blue gets 8 Red Gets 8

Re: Don't count goals scored for the ophttp://www.chiefdelphi.coposition - Yes or No?
 

Rich, I thought I was the only one who loved this year. This was my first year involved and it has always been my favorate. Though I thing it was 2000 Not 2001, but thats not important!

The first year I was "Cooperation" points was the following year with Zone Zeal. In this year the loosers got their score and you got 2x their score. In zone zeal, we had dual arms that could score in our endzone and in theirs. If we were winning otherwise, this would nullify the points in regard to win or lose, but as the winner we'd get the 2x score of the opponent and thus have a higher score. This has been the basic premise of how "cooreration" points are figured ever since. I think last year and maybe the year before they started messing with it again. But this year (2010) is totally convoluted.

Why should we be penalized because our opponent cant score. The initial premise of the rule was to not Hog all the balls. That was good when you actually could hog all the balls. But now they only allow you to control one at a time and there are 12 balls and 6 robots... so you do the math.

I think the Win-Lose method is best and use the cooperation as the differentiator for tied teams. Otherwise its too conveluted.

I believe it doesnt matter who scores where so who cares about the way its counted... but it the rankings are done in a more logical manner then that would sort out the desire to score or not.

I have also stated in another post that they should have thought more about the scoreing in general. For instance, if we can score 2 on average in autonomous, why is that only two points. They used to give extra points to give people the incentive to actually spend time working on programming and get the most points possible in autonomous. Also Hanging could be a few extra as well... I think you would see more autonomous and more hangers had they done that. You want innovation, give people a reason to spend the time.

In short I think the ranking system is convoluted and i would love to see that change. I dont think you need to ban scoring on other peoples goals, just determine the results better and rank better and that would sort out what you do on the field.

Whats more confusing than "I get my Penalized Score, You Get my Unpenalized Score" But wait you lost and have more points than me... "but wait thats not all... the winner also gets the losers score for cooperation" Thats great what if they get Zero. I saw a lot of Zeros on the board. So now the losing alliance is higher than me in rankings... is this actually corect or am I missing something?

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

Travis:

The scoring rules this year allow a team who has not even fielded a robot to captain the alliance who wins the competition. Quite simply, if noone on your alliance shows up with a robot, it is very likely that you will receive more points for the match than the other alliance, since you will get their total points scored while they will get those same points MINUS their penalty points, plus twice your score which is likely zero (since you can't score any points yourself without a robot on the field). If you continue like this, you could possibly make it into the top 8 teams, pick an alliance, and then declare that your robot is not able to proceed so someone needs to substitute for you while you still get to be the captain. That way you can have 3 teams on the field when it's only a win-lose problem.

The team next to our pit finally passed inspection at about noon on Saturday, made it to their last match but sat dead because they couldn't establish com's, and finished 8th seed (they were 5-4-1). They moved up to 6th during alliance selection, picked us (of course), then proceeded to sit dead on the field for eliminations (they actually established com's prior to each match starting but lost them immediately).

Your proposed rule change makes this even more of a certainty. Fix the root problem - make winning count something.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

This is much better than the current system (and better than not scoring opponent balls), at least it gives "some" incentive to the loser and hence more incentive for the winner not to 6v0. However the loser still has more incentive to score in the opponents goal than their own so as to not help out the opponents ranking.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

My proposal was based on the assumption that a certain individual would not permit the GDC to toss his entire patented scoring structure out the window this season. A compromise would be more likely if enough people discussed it publicly and it became large enough of an issue - I think it HAS.

You gotta start somewhere - keep up the discussion and suggestions.

Like Greg, I also like the aspect of retaining the basic structure of this ranking/seeding method. You still have the ability to vault yourself up the rankings if you have a really good match, and that having one match with less than ideal partners (or has been our history, multiple matches - so far, we've been the "less than ideal" partner this season! :p) won't harpoon your chances of making the playoffs.

I still advocate not scoring for the opposition at any time, because it does no one any favors in the long term. Leaving balls in their zone or tossing balls into their zone to help them score the balls themselves is a much more preferable course of action, which is still in the spirit of "coopertition". But I suppose there are too many people who believe it's ok to provide virtual "scoring welfare" to the opposition because it betters their own positions and makes them all warm and squishy inside....:rolleyes:

I also still advocate defense in qualifying, but only against those great scoring teams where you would be demonstrating something useful for the elimination rounds - a tight, close fought match where you need to suppress the opposition to pull out the win for the most likely immense coopertition bonus. Again, let the less-capable teams show off and score whenever they can. But let THEM score.

Now that I've read some other posts, I really don't like the loser getting any of the winner's points - this is along the same lines as my previous arguments - they've not EARNED those points - instead those points are like "scoring welfare" for the inept.

New Proposal

Winner = Winner Penalized + 2 * Loser Penalized
Loser = Loser Penalized

Get rid of any hint of receiving any UNPENALIZED points in this game. Penalties are there for a reason and should be factored into all aspects of the seeding and coopertition bonus scores.

If the loser is sooooo inept that they are penalty machines that erase all coopertition bonus incentive for the winner, then I suppose the winner should do a better job behind the curtain of making sure their opponents can score and avoid penalties. Nyah. :p

This also eliminates all loser scoring for the opposition scenarios. The loser only gets what the loser earns. The winner gets what they earn plus a bonus for whatever they (hopefully) let the loser earn on their own, without (hopefully) any artificially "fake" score boosting.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

This situation is really distressing. A scoring system simply SHOULD NOT allow a team who hasn't even fielded a robot to finish as 8th seed.

While I realize this was TECHNICALLY possible in the 2004-2009 years, you would have had to have excellent alliance partners. Look at the detriment a dead trailer was in 2009. This effectively prevented this very thing from being a problem.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

This makes 10X more sense than the current system. This gives everyone an incentive to try to win AND not get penalties. Isn't that the goal?

I believe that this current system isn't teaching students about the real world, where there are winners and losers. We need to stop worrying about hurting people's feelings.

Winning feels great, and losing sucks, but you know what, it's a part of life. Losing builds character, it allows you to grow to get past the hard times. We don't need a system that attempts to make everyone happy because in reality there is no difference in winning and losing now.

Hopefully the GDC sees that the current system is not ideal and attempts to remedy it. However, if this was the intent the whole time, then bravo, you are desensitizing the youth of America.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the ophttp://www.chiefdelphi.coposition - Yes or No?
 

Actually, the 4v0 game was indeed 2001 and the game was called Diabolical Dynamics. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diabolical_Dynamics

While the 2000 game was called "Co-opertition FIRST" it was not the 4v0 game http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-Opertition_FIRST

But, you're right that's not important here.

What is important is the discussion and I do see a lot of viable and interesting potential tweaks here. While was may not see any changes this year, I'm certainly very happy for the discussion.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

Good job of making that happen here Travis - I think it has been productive.

It's important to note that Dean's patent makes no claim to how points are awarded to the losing alliance; only that the winner gets their own points plus 2 times the loser's. Thus your final suggestion meets that intent and certainly makes more sense to me.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

The main root cause for us even having this discussion is the fact that the loser gets the winner's score. We would not even be having this conversation if the loser got the loser's penalized score like in the pre-2004 years.

Giving the lose the winner's score has broken the "coopertition" model. It is stupid, but my teams will play the game according to the rules. We will score for the opponent when necessary and lock down our own goals when appropriate.

If 148 or 217 is with 2 incredibly ineffective robots and we are up against a tough alliance, we will have the rookies lock down our goals and we will score like crazy for the other alliance. I do not feel bad about this and will not apologize. These are the rules we are given and we will play within them.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

If you would just humour my curiousity: if such a scenario were to arise, and your opponents knowing your proposed strategy offered to play for the tie instead, would you accept such an offer, or do you believe it to be too risky?

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

I'd love to start another poll which simply asks "of all the teams on alliances who've had goals scored for them by the opposition over the years, how many actually were truly inspired by the practice?" That is the root question to me for all of this "coopertition" junk. HOW DOES SCORING FOR THE OPPOSITION ELEVATE THOSE WHO NEED MORE GUIDANCE? "Oh wow, we just got pwned and embarrassed publicly; I think I've seen the light - I'm magically going to go design a robot as good as Paul or JVN now". As far as I'm concerned, scoring for the opposition over the years has primarily served as a mechanic for the BEST TEAMS to ensure higher ranking at the expense of lesser teams. Is this "you inhale audibly relative to them - go get better" negative reinforcement inspirational?

I don't blame the better teams for using the rules to their advantage, but what in the heck is FIRST thinking in believing that this practice holds any type of positive outcome for the program?

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

It's kind of interesting that in the one page summary of the game there is no mention at all of the seeding system. I guess all these non-FIRSTers we're inviting to the competition will just have to wonder why one alliance is sitting there while the other alliance does all the scoring for both sides.

Re: Don't count goals scored for the opposition - Yes or No?
 

I have long since given up on that question. There are some things that I have just stopped arguing because there are bigger battles to fight. Now my only expectation is that the rules are clear and consistent. I don't much care what the rules are. My students are still having fun, are inspired, and learning stuff. When they stop is when I stop doing FIRST. Until then, these little rules just don't matter. Don't get me wrong, I think it's dumb to have the scoring the way it is, but it is what it is and it isn't that bad.

Please do not misunderstand, I will not collude with the opposition. We will lock down our goals without any prior warning to the other alliance. Think of it as a hostile, or forced, 6 v. 0.