Quote:
Originally Posted by Hjelstrom
I think this year has by far the best implementation of co-opertition that we've ever had. A match with or against a really good team is good for everyone now and there's no disadvantage to doing it. Perfect!
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Hjelstrom, I think you hit the nail on the head. In week 1, it was exciting to see opposing alliances working together at the coopertition bridge communicating ever so subtly through minute movements of their machines.
Having been involved in FIRST for over a decade, this is the first year where I looked at the qualification pairings through a completely new perspective. For the first time, I was excited to see excellent robots on the opposing alliance. Co-op points are the highest reward per effort that I've seen in recent years, so it heavily encourages participation. Further, the importance of Co-op points has discouraged throwing litter early in qualification matches.
With respect to the three different stages of the game, my hat is off to the game design committee. I believe this was done in an effort to create parity between alliances. The criteria for being successful in qualifications is different than the criteria for being successful in elims and finals.
There is a noticeable increase in the importance of scouting this year because one cannot heavily rely on high scores as a barometer for a team's capabilities. The capability to deliver stacks of two yellow totes to the co-op bridge is of great value in qualifications, but has reduced importance in later stages. The importance of being able to throw noodles consistently goes up in elims and up further in the finals. The capability to cap stacks with cans and litter goes up in elims and finals.
Also, remember that this is week 1. During week 1, coopertition points were a high percentage of top teams' total scores. If memory serves correctly (since online results are still not available), the top 8 teams at the Georgia Southern Classis were awarded somewhere around 30-35% of their points from co-op points. Scores tend to increase week-over-week, more so this year because of the lack of proportional increase in defensive activities. In later weeks, I expect that Co-op will still be the easiest 40 points alliances achieve, but there will be a reduction in how much those points skew qualification standings.
In closing, human players will continue to be an important part of this year's game, but their impact (outside of offensively scored litter) is limited to 40 points. The disparity between the best and worst human player throwers will shrink over time to the point where a "noodle jesus" may only have a 10-20 point positive impact on their alliance's total score. As non-litter scores improve at later regionals, district championships, and the world championships, I expect this impact to reduce to around 5% of an alliance's points.
Great game... I wouldn't change a thing!