Chief Delphi - FIRST Rule Changes

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Re: FIRST Rule Changes

Quote:

Originally Posted by sircedric4 (Post 943366)

I was in a first week regional and here in the south we don't get the incredibly unfair advantage of bag and tag, so whatever we are adding at Atlanta we have to bring in completely self-contained and ready to bolt on. Are you a bag and tag team which can basically rebuild your robot every weekend?

You should probably review the rules regarding bagged robots before you say anything more about them. Teams attending a two-day "bag & tag" regional or district competition get six hours of access to the robot during the week before that competition. See section 4.8.3 of the game manual for the specifics.

Re: FIRST Rule Changes

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson (Post 943389)

That's good information, but the fact still stands that if you are attending a Michigan district event, you get 6 hours before each District event in your own workshop which is an HUGE advantage. Seeing as most teams are attending 2 or 3 districts plus the State Championship that does give the Michigan folks quite a big advantage.

I do stand corrected though and thank you for pointing out that it wasn't as crazy an opportunity as I thought it was. Still an advantage but not ridiculous.

Back on topic though, even if the rule had been changed by week 2 I don't see where it would really have done much good. And like some have pointed out, if it had been this way from the beginning then you would have had 84" wall bots blocking the view of the field. You aren't likely to do that on your own side of the field so I am glad to see this rule was fairly well thought out.

Re: FIRST Rule Changes

So, Who's seen Rule Update #20?
The GDC met in an emergency teleconference meeting last night. Breakaway is a game designed with the idea of high mobility and interaction. For this reason, blocking the tunnel us now considered a form of pinning, as it restricts some teams to only one zone. A team may not block a tunnel for more than five seconds during regular gameplay. This rule does not apply during the finale.
And remember, teams, this update was published April 1, April Fools Day.
[the MC announced this during opening ceremonies at the Michigan State Championship today]

Re: FIRST Rule Changes

Quote:

Originally Posted by sircedric4 (Post 943418)

Just to be clear, there was no access period before the MI state tournament. Reason is because it is a 3 day event.

Re: FIRST Rule Changes

Quote:

Originally Posted by RRLedford (Post 943341)

I never said it would be simple or easy, but certainly a lot more possible to overlap your hardware with theirs in the 60"-84" zone within the flow path of the balls. I was not suggesting impacts with their chutes, only interference with ball flow WITHOUT CONTACT. At least with expansion both horizontal and vertical possible, there are a lot more creative options open for interference with the looping balls' flow paths.
-Dick Ledford

I assume you would be blocking 469 from this tactic by sitting in their zone on the opposite side of the tower? If so, you would be the defending robot and 469's team mates would be free to score at will.

I also see it being more feasible to make a looper robot than one that keeps it from scoring. That way, the complex mechanism that you make can be used in all matches, not just ones against loopers.

No matter which way I look at it objectively, I always come to the conclusion that "fixing" the rule would *not actually be useful.

*EDIT: forgot that word...

Re: FIRST Rule Changes

Quote:

Originally Posted by RRLedford (Post 942661)

Bad analogies - these sports make no pretense of having balls come back into play in any type of an "equal opportunity" way. Breakaway is modeled on soccer. The soccer throw-in does not give any positioning advantages to the players on the field for either team. Hockey is similar to soccer - face offs have equal access to the puck. Are ya getting the picture yet?

So I'm a little confused. Yes, ball return is in favor the offense. But at least by my reading of the rules, the fairness of the game isn't supposed to come from ball return--it's supposed to come from the fact that each and every one of us could have tried making a looper, or any other type of bot for that matter. I say this because, to the best of my knowledge, the GDC/rules have never claimed that ball return should be basketball-like or soccer-like or hockey-like, etc, or equal opportunity at all. It seem to me it just has to be Breakaway (;)) and apply equally to the red and blue towers, which it does. Is that an incorrect interpretation?

Personally, if I were a looper who'd worked that hard to determine and implement the strategy, I'd consider changing the rule to be unfair. All of us had the equal equal opportunity to do it, so personally I see no reason to expect an equal outcome if we didn't take the same course. They, I presume (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong), chose that course based in part on the offensive advantage. Changing it now throws off their cost-benefit analysis in a way that affects them considerably more than the rest of the population. To me that seems more unfair than allowing them to take advantage of a rule that all of us could have attempted equally.

Now, would I like it if I could stop them? Well, that depends who's alliance they're on. :P But in all honesty, no, because I hope that one day when I help build an awesome gamebreaker, no one will change the game for me. Just my $0.02. If you'd like to see equal opportunity in ball return, more power to you, I'm just not sure it's actually in line with GDC intentions. (And I believe this is historically why rules are changed: to bring them more in line with their intention, not to reflect a change in their goal. I could be wrong, of course.)