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Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery
An interesting thought inspired by Jesse's post. What if the wait list spots were prioritized to go to teams who attended the same event as teams who earned multiple bids?
For example, since 2056 grabbed four championship bids (three regional wins and a RCA), the three spots created for wait list teams would be awarded to teams that attended the same regionals as 2056 (GTR-E, GTR-W, Waterloo). It could be done via a points system or simply by first to register (as it is now).
In essence, this is accomplishing a similar feat to the District championship point system, allowing a set number of robots from each event to attend the championship. It also opens the door for teams that are perennially "stuck" behind high end competitors that dominate events.
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I was going to suggest this. Getting off the championship waitlist is something that's kind of a black box. As it stands, we know it's not based entirely on performance, but it's not entirely random nor is it entirely in the order of signup (at least so I and several other people have been told/have personal experiences with). While it's too late in the season for a true points-based, awards-based or performance based system to be put in place, it might be very easy to implement a simple system that would reward top-performing teams on the waitlist with championship berths. I do like the idea of berths being given to teams at events where the champions already qualified in some manner, but I don't think this is enough because teams at Week 1 events could get shafted like this. IE, teams A competes in week 1, seeds #1 but loses in the semi-finals. This was their only event. Team B is also competing at the same week 1 event and wins. They also proceed to win a second event later on in the season. If you're going by the re-qualification metric, Team A would never be given a chance to qualify, because Team B "re-qualifies" at their second event, so a team from their second event would be given the berth.
I don't like the idea of "selection" by the re-qualifying teams, because this invites a biased system. I'm not saying teams are dishonest, but many teams may prefer to select their friends to go for several reasons, when by the pure performance numbers a lesser known or rookie team might deserve to go.
A system like this would allow great teams and robots like 177, 1983 and 3256 to qualify for championships with their phenomenal robots. We all know 177's story. They haven't won a regional since 2006 but they made 6 straight trips to Einstein, and they've clearly built one of their best robots to date this year. It would be a shame not to see them go.
1983 has been #3 and #1 seed are their two events, and finalists both times. The second instance was largely due to massive lag of both 1983's and 488's controls systems in match 2 of finals (having won match 1) resulting in neither team being able to use their camera targeting systems. While they still have another chance to qualify, they clearly are deserving of a championship berth (currently #6 overall OPR I believe) regardless of what happens at Spokane.
3256 reached the finals at both Sacramento and Silicon Valley, losing to 971 both times. They were the 2nd overall pick at SVR and very very good. It's also noted that all 3 top seeded teams (971, 1868 and 254) had already qualified for championships as regional winner, RCA and HoF teams respectively.
These are just a few stories of many, but the point is that it would be really great to see a transparent method put forth by FIRST that would reward currently CMP waitlisted teams with a spot at the championships who are most deserving of going, for whatever reasons may be.