3-team offense
 

Just curious: have there been any alliances with 3 robots scoring tubes yet? If not, is there a reason, aside from not being able to get an alliance with 3 capable robots, why there haven't?

Re: 3-team offense
 

Once you get into the scoring zone there isn't a whole lot of room to move around with three robots, it is ultimately more efficient to have two scoring and the third doing something else productive such as playing defense or herding tubes closer to the scorers. That being said I see room for a change in strategy when we get to Championships where almost all alliances will be able to score efficiently from the floor. When it gets to elimination rounds it has already been demonstrated that top teams may resort to lane feeding. If this situation arises a third scorer may fit into the cycle between feeding and scoring allowing it to be a more efficient strategy than it currently is. I still think that most alliances will be composed of two scorers and one defensive bot.

Re: 3-team offense
 

I was thinking about this the other day. Maybe, if you had some kind of rotation where two robots score while the other one is on the opposite end of the field taking the opponents tubes. That robot then goes and scores while another one rotates to the other end of the field. Three robots scoring at once just gets really crowded.

Re: 3-team offense
 

We had a match in elims at Liviona where 326/1250/818 all scored a tube within a 10 second mark

Re: 3-team offense
 

This is not unheard of. We did it more than once at FLR, though the off-rotation robot rarely strayed past midfield. (Not so hot on active defense then, but average scoring tempo was slower.)

I consider it a trade-off in scoring speed. If 1-2 or even 3 robots are slow enough at pickup (even with a feeder bot), your coaches are really in tune, and/or you're playing tube-scarce, it may well work. If you've got faster scorers and/or need to play defense, 2's usually the way to go. There's also the "feed us, but score if you get a shot" method, which was what we usually did if coaches were in tune enough to stay out of each other's way.

I don't expect to see many 3-offense alliances, at least not that play that way the whole match. There certainly are some, though, and we might see a few victorious underdogs yet with it. All I'll recommend is: communicate with your coaches.

Re: 3-team offense
 

FLR: 217, 340, 1126. Although it was only a qualifying match, the three of us were good scoring robots.

Re: 3-team offense
 

GSR regional winners 175, 176, and 1519 all scored during their eliminations all the way to a win. :)

Re: 3-team offense
 

As we found out this past weekend at North Star... a good defensive robot can really change the outcome of a match. We would not have won our last match at North Star without some great defensive play.

Re: 3-team offense
 

On Thursday (Practice day) at the St. Louis Regional, 1985, 1178, and I think it was 1329 (memory not quite clear, even though I was a driver) were all on one alliance. Our score was 114* (one minibot deployed, the other didn't**) and had filled the top and middle racks. One strategy used later on in the competition was if all 3 robots could place, you divided it so each robot only went for 2 pegs (side by side). That way, robots didn't get in each others' way and you knew which tubes you needed.


* The highest score at St. Louis, too bad it was not during a qualification or elimination, and therefore did not count
** If the other had deployed, it would have been a huge win (I am slightly disappointed with our success (read: no successful deployments) of getting our minibot off our robot)

Re: 3-team offense
 

One of the cooler "when your coaches can do it" demonstrations. Awesome strategy and epically executed. Can't find a video of it, but FLR Match 47. 122-19 (no surprise there).

Re: 3-team offense
 

Absolutely!
Contrary to what has been said above, I think this is the way to go if you can get three quick scorers.
If you have an extra robot hanging tubes, each robot can traverse longer each trip to offset the time and as a result, you throw less tubes and steal more opponent tubes. IF you steal enough tubes, it can severely limit the opposing alliance. In this case: The best defense may be an offense that is precise and stealthy in its tube usage.

Also, if the robots can score quickly, they will only be in each others way for a small amount of time.

PLUS:
Contrary to popular belief, three robots do fit in the scoring zone, as long as they are not trying to score on the same peg.

Re: 3-team offense
 

at las vegas, 8th seed was 3 defensive robots, but i have yet to see 3 offensive robots (all playing offense) get to finals

Re: 3-team offense
 

We had a practice match at Toronto West with 2056 610 and us (781). and it was really crowded to try and have three scoring robots.

Re: 3-team offense
 

It baffles me how much sitting around happens in the last 15 seconds. Team Hammond at Smoky was the first time I've seen a team often going for tubes during the end game.

I think we'll see a lot more triple offensive teams with one relegated to defense at the division elimination matches because the winning alliance will need 3 ubertubes up every time. When 15 seconds are left, the robot not deploying (though fully capable of it) will be scoring more tubes.

Just a hunch I have.

Re: 3-team offense
 

Thank you. So yes, it is possible, and can work out well, providing the effort is well coordinated. At FLR, there were times when robots not meant to score (and on our own allaince) got in the way of the scoring robots.

It would appear that the key to any successful match is knowing where your partners are and working together. But this probably holds true for any game....except maybe Lunacy :p

Re: 3-team offense
 

As did their opponents in the finals (131,40, and 20)

Re: 3-team offense
 

As noted, it happened in week 1.

the finals at GSR were 175,1519,176 vs 40,131,20

all 6 were scoring robots, playing offense.

Re: 3-team offense
 

It's irresponsible to make sweeping generalizations, though. Good strategy changes based on alliance and opponents. Likely, in one eliminations round a well-rounded alliance will have three scorers, and in the next will dispatch one scoring robot (probably the weakest, or the one with the strongest drive-train) to be a "pest" to prevent another offensive powerhouse alliance from outscoring. The strategy will, I think, change match-to-match, and I've seen that firsthand at our competitions.

Re: 3-team offense
 

....I'm honestly quite sure how they planned out that last seed alliance to work with 3 defenders, but it was amusing going against.

They shut down 2984 hard. But when the other alliance can't score, it doesn't take much...

Re: 3-team offense
 

It's possible to have a 3-team offense, but the various members of the alliance need to be communicating. It’s easy to get stuck in the field with no way to score if other robots in your alliance aren’t working with you. And, if the bots aren’t that fast I don’t think it’s as effective a strategy as having 2 offensive bots and 1 defensive one.

Re: 3-team offense
 

In week 2, 177 / 3125 / 1100 played a 3-offense game. 1100 would sneak in and try for a tube when 177 and 3125 were busy loading.

The most successful alliances though played a strictly two scorer game. Not because defense is all that powerful but simply because the rack is a two-robot dance.

Re: 3-team offense
 

They did in a few rounds. Mostly 20 was used to move tubes up the field/play some interference in the middle.

Re: 3-team offense
 

There's definitely been matches with three very well-scoring teams, but we found in our very first time experiencing this at our first regional that it just doesn't work. People get in the way if there's no coach-to-coach communication and help from the analyst. We found that if it's close to evenly matched teams, the one with the best drive system for this and a reliable minibot (but mostly the right drive train) should stay within the box formed by the four towers to defend actively without getting yellow-carded or even red-carded. Worked really well for teams from what we saw! Anyone going to the Championship with their robot, that box is a really good tip to know. Also, at the end, whichever one robot is not deploying while the other two are should go score more tubes! People seemed to forget that they could when they were primarily defensive in these scenarios and just stayed in the middle of the field.

Good luck everyone! I'll be at Championships as a volunteer :).

Re: 3-team offense
 

Three robot offense work. I have seen it in both the Washington and Chesapeake regional's. Although do not attempt a three robot offense unless you talk to your other alliances and create a strategy.