Thread: Dangerous precedent set by Q&A 461: Loaning Parts/Assemblies to other teams
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Unread 17-03-2015, 16:58
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AKA: Adam Smith
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Re: Dangerous precedent set by Q&A 461: Loaning Parts/Assemblies to other teams
The point I think that's being missed in most of this discussion (excuse me if I missed it in the 13+ pages) is that no one is being FORCED to add things to their robot.

Maybe you find it more inspiring to find and correct that flaw that has been holding back your design. Great! Do that! Maybe you could even ask one of these "elite teams" to help you (I know that many will, having had some interaction with them). Also great!

I'm willing to bet that most of the "cheesecaked" (more on this later) teams started in this way. With members of the "elite" team trying to make their robot work. At this point said "elite" team finds that "Hey this team is pretty good, and are easy to work with, maybe we could suggest a relatively easy change that would make our elimination alliance stronger"

It is at this point that the team to be cheesecaked can say yes or no. "Sorry, we're comfortable with our now-working mechanism and will take our chances at getting picked" Or even, "Our students would prefer to continue working on our mechanism than spend the time adding the cheesecake". Great! Awesome! More power to you! However, this team to be cheesecaked could just as easily say "We've had a lot of fun and learned a ton from working with you so far! We'd be happy to do whatever is needed to help win."

I very much doubt that any of the "powerhouse" teams have randomly chosen a robot from the field without talking to them, and steamrolled their student and mentors in to changing their robot against their will. I also very much doubt that any of the cheesecaked had no discussions with the "elite" before alliances were selected.

We can't make broad generalizations (in either direction) about what is inspiring for a particular team. Some may be inspired by seeing their design come to life, and others may be inspired by doing whatever it takes to win. Neither view is wrong, they are just different.



As a side note: Isn't cheesecake really more of a pie? And isn't Boston cream pie really more of a cake? I propose making this trade.
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