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Originally Posted by RallyJeff
Scoring a goal and ending the cycle doesn't just light the pedestal. It also clears the posessions from the tablets of the refs tracking that alliance and the "assist" indicator LEDs (both the ones on the goals and the ones in the driver stations). For all this to happen seamlessly, it all has to be linked through the FMS.
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I'm not suggesting any of those functions be severed from the FMS; just the pedestal light.
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It's not as simple as you make it sound. There are many situations where a ball through the goal doesn't - and shouldn't - cause a lit pedestal: an illegal goal, for instance, or clearing a dead ball that got freed.
And there are cases where lighting of the pedestal should be legitimately delayed. Balls don't count as scored if they're touching an alliance bot, so if the scoring robot is still reaching into the goal and contacting the ball, the ref can't end the cycle yet even if the ball is completely through the goal. Also, one of the requirements to score is that the ball remains in the goal, so the ref can't count it as scored until it's clear that the ball won't bounce out.
Even if a ref was only worried about monitoring scoring, they'd still need to be aware of what's going on over the entire field, and there could still be perceived delays in illuminating the pedestal.
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I like the low tech flag method mentioned earlier, combined with a manual pedestal light. Referee signals somehow that end cycle is complete (heck who needs a flag - they could just put their hands up in the ay-ahhh like they just don't cay-ahhhh...whatever). Pedestal attendant/ref/drone/whatever then turns the dang light on. Due to the overt and flamboyant (jazz hands???) action of the scoring ref, the pedestal attendant/ref/drone/whatever doesn't have to guess what scoring ref is thinking re: any of the situations you mentioned above.
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Overall, I think the system we have takes some practice to use quickly, but it's pretty good. I understand that Week 1 events reported a system lag, but the updates since then seemed to have dealt with that issue. At GTR East, when I could, I'd try to check how quickly the pedestal would illuminate. Every time, it would already be lit within the fraction of a second it took to raise my head and look after hitting "end cycle".
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Canada must be a magical fairyland of FMS functionality and wonderment!
