[Wayne TenBrink]

I am not entirely surprised, but very frustrated by this significant rule change, and the way it was announced.

If they were going to ban closed loop scoring, I wish they would have done it explicitly and in the original rules. I can't believe that FIRST didn't anticipate this strategy. In Michigan, qualifying events start in early November. We are well into the design process and were just about to order parts when we stumbled across this "statement" (I wouldn't call it an "announcement"). How many teams are still unaware of it??

I believe that closed loop scoring would make Velocity Vortex a much better game. In my judgment, "closed loop" is the only way to make particle scoring a meaningful strategy. Without it, a strategy focused on autonomous and end game, skipping particles entirely in teleop, offers the highest scoring potential. With closed loop scoring allowed, the ideal playoff alliance would include one particle scorer and one capper/button pusher - a complementary alliance where each team does its task and the opposing alliance plays the game as they wish. Furthermore, closed loop scoring presented a fresh engineering challenge that we were excited about.

Furthermore, I think the logic used to ban closed loop scoring is flawed (or at least being applied very selectively and arbitrarily). Using the same logic, it would be impossible to lift the cap ball during end game. The very act of lifting the single cap ball denies the alliance partner the opportunity to do the same.