Week 1 regionals development
 

The first day in Quals this season has already seen some pretty intense development so far. It seems as though some of the pre-regional predictions were very correct. Autonomous has been shown to be very influential to the outcome, and minibots have definitely been a key to winning any matches. It was predicted almost across the board that minibots would be critical to winning matches but that their influence would decrease over time, and we have seen this already (almost a 10-12% decrease after lunch). Scoring on the top row has been pretty influential a to the outcomes of matches as well. Tubes have been flooding the field, as was another pre-regional prediction. However, it still is to be seen manipulator design is this years golden ticket, which was of some debate over the course of the build season.

Comments, further predictions, corrections to the above (I'm not perfect):D , and discussion are encouraged!

Re: Week 1 regionals development
 

I don't have the data about minibots influence. Were there fewer or more deployment attempts after lunch? My theory is that once a team demonstrated minibot capability, not risking it in quals again might be good strategy. that could skew statistics unless you have attempts versus failure data to add to the tube scoring of each alliance. then there is the only two teams may try to deploy, so perhaps there is some graciousness being exhibited in the quals..

Re: Week 1 regionals development
 

There were 0.31 Minibots scored per match before lunch, 0.69 after lunch. In the Week 1 Friday Scoring Breakdown thread I've got more on the scoring.

Before lunch 3.33% of Alliances who scored a minibot (any minibot) lost their match, after lunch it was 18.39%.

If you won the minibot race you would have won 85.37% of the post-lunch matches, it was 93.81% before lunch.

Re: Week 1 regionals development
 

Would you surmise that more minibot scoring in the afternoon had less effect on the outcome? We still don't know the number of attempts, right? It's traditional (and useful) to have the mis-named batting "average" when estimating the potential of your clean-up hitter.

Re: Week 1 regionals development
 

Alamo Regional:
A lot of the early robots were inoperable because of an old version of the driver station software. The Inspector Checklist has instructions to check the latest version, but does not have the version number. Several of the teams that were inoperable had an old version of the Driver Station software.

Recommend that ALL teams make sure they have the latest software on the DS before they leave for their regionals.

Lot of tubes being thrown into the arena. There was really no issue with one team stealing another teams tubes. They would spend all their time picking up tubes near their end of the field. Most HPs are throwing more than half way across the field.

Very few under-inflated tubes on the field.

Teams need to be able to pick up tubes from the field. Going to the feeding station is a waste of time.

Few mini bot deployments. Plenty of mini bots, but few deployments.

Speed is king, getting tubes on the scoring pegs is very important. Also scoring the ubertubes in autonomous is important.

Teams playing defense can definitely slow a speedy team down by making it hard to maneuver and pick up tubes.

It's a fun game to watch. The variety of lift mechanisms is entertaining. I think it is entertaining for the general public to watch. Lots of action with tubes flying everywhere.

The Alamo is hosted in a great venue. 64 teams in the pits and they still look empty. The people running the regional are awesome. I've met so many great people its impossible to mention them all. But everyone is friendly, the vet teams are definitely stepping up to help the teams that need it. I've personally worked with several of them helping teams get running. Special shout out to the guy from NI (Joe?) helping teams get DS software up to date. Big shout out to 16 for helping many rookie teams. Fantastic Week 1 inaugural regional.

Alamo ROCKS!

Re: Week 1 regionals development
 

Well the update is optional. It is possible to use a ver 1.05 DriverStation fine.

Re: Week 1 regionals development
 

We (and two other robots) were disabled our first match because of the classmate firmware issue -- even though we had asked inspectors to verify that it was the correct version and they "did" -- but the teams after us were allowed to fix theirs (delaying their matches) before playing. Hideously unfair, but so be it: done is done.

DON'T END UP IN OUR BOAT! UPDATE YOUR FIRMWARE!!!!

Re: Week 1 regionals development
 

As cyberjoek posted in the tread "Week 1 Scoring Breakdown", there were significantly more minibot deployments after lunch than before. I personally missed some of the regionals, but what I saw was everytime a team deployed a minibot successfully, they won. however, after lunch, the margin by which they won became smaller and smaller, due to an increase in minibot effectiveness to close off a match. I think that as the season progresses, more and more minibots will be deployed, and their effectiveness will decease, but they will be all the more critical to winning matches.

What does everyone think of the view on "defense will be attempted but not really an optimal strategy", as this seemed to be a prevalent view prior to the start of regionals?