[efoote868]

Originally Posted by Citrus Dad

Those two extra usually are needed to manage the scouting system on site--remember that WiFi is illegal in the venue and that the system either needs to be hardwired together or paper passed to a central person after every match. (I'm curious as to your alternative proposal for data management with only 6 people sitting together.) Also in our experience, 6 scouts can only follow a portion of what happens on the field. We had 2 additional strategic scouts and what they provided was the extra part that made our alliance selection strategy work so successfully in Curie. One additional point--the team needs to be able to rotate scouts--there's no way that anyone can pay attention straight through for hours without a break. 10 is a minimum.

My suggestion is a block of no more than 6 reserved "prime" seats.

There is usually a 3-5 minute break between matches. Scouts can get their assignment for say, 6-8 matches, take their notes, then swap out with fresh scouts, deposit their notes at the central location (which doesn't need prime seating and typically will have lots of files / equipment with it, takes lots of room).

Plenty of time. Also, you don't need to watch every robot every match. You could watch one side the entire event, and you should get each robot at least 3-4 times. You could also pair up with another team to take notes, and you'd have a block of 12 eyes on the field. Use the extra 3 people to watch interactions.