Quote:
Originally Posted by Alan Anderson
Here it is: qualification matches are intended to rank robots according to their ability to play the game. Throwing a match undermines that intent. Your team is supposed to be seeded based on performance in the robot game, not on clever application of game theory.
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The fact that qualifying matches are intended to rank robots is self-evident. But that's not the same as saying that they are
exclusively intended to rank robots. I don't think it would be far-fetched to say that it would be reasonable for FIRST to intend that a portion of a team's ranking should reflect their strategic prowess, independent of on-field performance.
Moreover, what's to say a team should do what was intended? After all, from time to time, FIRST accepts (sometimes gracefully) the fact that mechanisms are occasionally designed to do things that weren't intended by the GDC. The fact that FIRST didn't rule against 71 in 2002 or 469 in 2010 indicates they're sometimes willing to countenance this, and the fact that FIRST severely restricted 68 in 2003 indicates that sometimes they're not. I think it's fair to assume the same applies to qualifying strategy: sometimes FIRST will permit a strategy that violates their intent, and sometimes they won't. But there's no
a priori right answer, and insofar as we're looking to FIRST's intent for guidance on what's acceptable, we have to wait for their ruling.
So that's why I think the more interesting question avoids trying to read the GDC's minds, and instead asks whether there's actually anything universally wrong with not giving 100% every match, from the point of view of a rational, honourable team.