Game piece availability
 

I just got a note back from Andy - still no word on when the game pieces will be available for purchase (he had listed today as an estimate on the website). We've been very careful with ours so far but things are about to get a little rougher in testing.

Re: Game piece availability
 

It now says the 24th on his site.

Another year, same issue...

Re: Game piece availability
 

One of these years we'll get a commercially and widely available game-piece.

Re: Game piece availability
 

Hopefully.

I think 2005 was the best year... Teams had to build their game pieces. It worked out real nice.

Re: Game piece availability
 

Last year wasn't TOO bad, if you didnt mind practicing with a generic soccer ball, as opposed to the official one from DTI.

2005 was also good.

Yay for FIRST choosing a small manufacturer every year that massively underestimates the demand and is swamped come the second week of January.

I think we'd all go a little loopy if there were a FIRST game piece that didn't immediately become unobtainium. It would be so foreign we wouldn't know what to do.

Re: Game piece availability
 

Nothing screams sanity quite like finding out the already-obscure gamepiece is no longer in production, forcing you to create it yourself. (I'm looking at you, Lunacy!)

Re: Game piece availability
 

Lunacy was particularly bad, considering that many mechanisms depended on their ability to deal with large numbers (20+) of balls, and the availability of the balls meant that basically no one had access to that many.

Re: Game piece availability
 

That and 2003, Sterlite bins. :D

Re: Game piece availability
 

Except for the junction pieces...

Re: Game piece availability
 

Auugh!

Or at least I'd say Auugh! if I were playing the game this year.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.

"Hey! Let's use custom and obscure game pieces that break. Teams will like that THIS year!"

Jason

Re: Game piece availability
 

What I can't even begin to understand is that unlike many years when AT LEAST a FEW of the game pieces were around and were picked up in the first few days....

This year... game pieces were NOT available even BEFORE KICKOFF... and then not available until at least 2 weeks after kickoff...

Well I do have to give FIRST kudos for putting a set of three in each kit...

Imagine if that hadn't happened!!!

oh well
I have bigger problems than this... like building a robot...

Re: Game piece availability
 

I think the GDC are hipsters... using obscure objects you've never heard of and can't find anywhere as game pieces, and only use common objects just to be ironic.

Re: Game piece availability
 

Awww, now that would be to easy and against pop culture. I just may be able to stand the wait, but our pieces are already taking beating/need repair.

I just find it ridiculous that the game pieces aren't available until week 3 for order! I mean its not like they knew what the game pieces were in November or anything! ;)

Re: Game piece availability
 

Once the GDC lets teams get past the "Where can I get that thing?", they will say "Now that we have an unlimited supply, how many should we buy?"

Has anyone looked at the FTC game piece. It's PVC. No FRC FIRST team has ever had trouble getting PVC.

Re: Game piece availability
 

We had PVC game pieces in 2005. Except to make them into tetras you needed to buy these plastic joints from IFI, which had a very nasty habit of cracking. You can't win!

I think this year is good in that you still only need one of each game piece, and barring serious damage, a little tape will keep it inflated. It's not like you need 10 or 15 to accurately find out storage dynamics like you did with the Orbit Balls.

I think Dave went into this at some point -- even though the GDC knows early if they need a custom game piece, lead times for the manufacturers are even longer.

[EDIT]Hmm... can't find it. I did find this where he talks about how FIRST does try to ensure teams have adequate access to gamepieces.[/EDIT]