Quote:
Originally Posted by Koko Ed
Good teams make sure the human player understands the rules and do everything to a teams chances of victory. Bad teams human players do not understand the rules (If they are asking volunteers before the match "What do I do?" that is a very bad sign) do not have a sense of urgency and seem commit alot of penalties. A human player may not win you a match but they can sure lose you one and there is no excuse to have a bad one if you take the time to train one by having them read and understand the rules and teach them simple tactics to avoid penalties.
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Attended Midwest, a Week 6 event. On Friday, right before matches started, a student asked one of our adults "What does the human player do?" Later found out that our human player was asked to explain the basics of the role to at least two different teams on Friday. I'm sure this was not an isolated incident for our team or the volunteers.
Then on Saturday (Day 2 of a Week 6 event) in what I believe were teams' 11th or 12th quals matches I observed:
- Human player being instructed from stands where she needed to locate herself. She stood outside the box and immediately got a penalty.
- Human player being instructed by an alliance partner where the human player needed to stand. Student did not move to the box. Eventually his own mentor gently pushed him down the sideline and he walked slowly to the human player box as the match started. No one noticed and he did not get a penalty.
- Two human players occupying the same human player box for the duration of the match, leaving the box on the opposite side of the field empty.
- Another entire match played without a human player in one of the human player zones. This time no one doubled up though. No idea where the third human player was.
Unfortunate for students to find themselves in these situations as they could easily be avoided.
Some teams bring bumper supplies and build bumpers for rookie and other teams. Perhaps a few teams could also "build human players" on practice day - just checking in with teams to make sure they have someone assigned the role and understand the basics of the role. Certainly should be on teams' pre-match checklists - Do your alliance partners have a human player? Do they at least understand where to stand? Something we'll discuss during prep for next season.