Quote:
Originally Posted by Richard
What is tube stealing? Picking up tubes on your opponents' side of the field?
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Yup, drinking their milkshake as it were. Pretty much taking any tube that a opponent bot would have wanted to grab as opposed to getting an easier tube.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Norman J
I contest that tube starving will be utilized at high-level play. All teams that make it to Einstein will have such practiced human players that they should be able to drop all three shapes into the scoring zone.
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I personally think we have a pretty good human player but he is effectively never able to throw a triangle anywhere but to the end of the feeder lane and give or take midfield. I highly doubt that the HPs on Einstein will be able to throw all their tubes in to the scoring zone. I think the shape of choice to starve would be the triangles, squares depending on the first 15-25 seconds of the match, but never the circles.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brandon Holley
One particular strategy that I feel will be extremely critical in St. Louis is starving one particular tube on the field. For example, your alliance can decide that you will NOT throw any squares on to the open field. You will either human load them, or pick them up from the lane, but you will not place squares out into the open. The defensive team on your alliance will then have one clear mission, and that is to defend all squares. Whether they push them into your lanes, or pick them up themselves, their mission will be to keep squares out of the grasp of your opponents.
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I totally agree. In Virginia tube starving was the only way to win the game in the elims. For example in our first elims match the other alliance was starving triangles and won the match because of it. We couldn't make logos and it hurt. Our alliance then modified our human player strategy to compensate and went on to beat them. Another good example was when in match Q71 we were toughly outmatched but because of a good square starving strategy the other alliance couldn't make logos and we had a 81 to 81 tie. Man was that something.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Phalanx
I'm already in St Louis and our chief strategist will be here as well. I'll stop by and talk to you guys on Thursday about if.
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Awesome! You guys were great to work with in the qualifying matches, I'm looking forward to seeing you there.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris is me
Like all strategies, execution is key. A balance of feeder loading, holding back tubes, selective piece starvation, and tube "stealing" is key. The strategy, unlike most strategies this year, makes full use of all 3 robots on the field.
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The name of the game isn't hanging tubes it's game piece control. If you control the game pieces then you can hang as much as you want and you can stop your opponent from hanging. The good/bad thing is, as you said, it uses every robot on the field. There are a LOT of things factoring in to every decision on the field this year.
A successful tube steal does four things; gets you a tube, takes away a tube from your opponent, wastes your opponent's time, and takes more of your time (then getting a different tube). I think that, generally, the first three factors are greater then the last even when coupled with the risk of being on the losing end of a tube fight. That coupled with a good starvation policy make logos not happen, and if logos don't happen then the game is over.