[Citrus Dad]

I think the concern this year is over the level of cheesecake that we saw. I will reiterate a point made by several people: This is entirely in response to this year's game and rules. The best way to limit the amount of cheesecake is create a game in which the least experienced teams can make an effective contribution to the game at all levels. I and other have pointed out that the GDC did not accomplish this objective in this year's game, and statistical analysis of the OPR distribution supports this contention. This was obvious to us on the day of Kick-off; the GDC should have seen that as well. (I would like to know the composition of the GDC, but I urge that it have a number of non-engineers involved in game development.)

I've pointed out in earlier threads that an absolute prohibition would have prevented us from working with two rookie teams on Newton last year that greatly improved their games in qualifications. FIRST wants strong interaction across teams at the Championship (see the justification for going to 2 Championships.) Why remove one of the frequently used means of facilitating that interaction? Remember that competition really is only a secondary objective of FIRST; this is not the NFL. Promoting cultural change is the primary focus.