[dtengineering]

Rather than changing a rule, perhaps it would have been sufficient to add a rule:

"Any discs thrown by a human player that are seen to leave the playing field will result in a 10 point penalty to the offending alliance."


Human players would learn very, very quickly to keep their discs within bounds. Teams could still safely throw discs downfield to floor loaders, and could even aim for the low goals.

Actually, to ease reffing, it could probably be extended to a penalty for any disc leaving the field, whether fired by a robot or thrown by a human. It would be consistant with the guidance that discs are to remain within the bounds of the playing field.

And I'll cut the GDC some slack on this one... they probably tried throwing discs downfield to hit the goals as part of their game testing. They probably didn't do it, however, with the "enthusiasm" of a half-dozen excited teenagers with nothing to lose. I'll even grant them the fact that after observing a potentially dangerous situation that they were obliged to act to limit the danger. I just don't know if they chose the least disruptive way to go about it.

Jason