Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Freeman
What did any team do in their design process that was specifically pointed at performing a Coop balance? I have seen very few teams that do anything other than drive on the bridge and hope it balances.
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Perhaps the skills developed by teams surrounding the "art of the co-op" are not solely centered around the robot?
In addition to a solid drivetrain, perhaps the skills that separate good co-op teams from those who aren't as regularly able to take advantage of it include the ability to effectively
strategize with the opposing alliance before the match and
communicate an effective co-op plan, and repeat and execute that planning process every match, like clockwork. Knowing how best to:
- Decide which two robots will co-op (there was a standard we used all season that worked very well for us here).
- Decide when the teams would head for the co-op bridge.
- Decide who would tend the bridge.
- Decide how and where the 2nd bot gets on.
- Communicate the balancing method - who "leads the dance".
- Convince the opposition that you would honor the co-op contract and had the driver skills/robot capability necessary to make it work.
- Make it clear that robots violating the co-op contract by continuing to score instead of balancing would incur your graciously professional wrath.
- And accomplish all this within a very short amount of time.
I don't think these things were as easy to accomplish as people make them out to be, especially at events where the pool of co-op partners was filled with more robots/teams with various deficiencies. Navigating that minefield successfully at each regional/district was a learned skill.
I understand why the co-op bridge process has been removed at IRI, but let's not trivialize the efforts of those who were able to grasp what the GDC was intending for teams to accomplish at the bridge and use the system to their advantage.