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I was honored to be asked to give a story.
What I wrote above really was the tip of the iceberg with regard to alliances in 1999. FIRST went out on a long limb when they introduced alliances, and many people had alot of grief over it. Up until that point, every team only worried about how they performed, and they had to keep secrets from other teams in order to give yourself a competitive advantage.
Before alliances came along in '99, scouting was still important. However, if someone came up to your pit and asked you about your robot, you didn't always tell what it could do. Students had to check with their strategy leaders to see what could be said and what was kept "hush-hush". Also, inter-team relationships were not needed as they are now with the alliance structure.
The whole process of "getting picked" by marketing your talents was a new thing. Some teams assumed that everyone saw what they could do on the field and did not "sell themselves" to their competitors very well by building these relationships. I remember seeing many threads on this site after 1999 which said "we went undefeated at Nationals... but no one picked us!!".
Also, picking partners was a new thing to teams. The top seeded teams put in alot of effort to make lists and pick partners who supported their competition strategy. I think that there are just as many confused pickers at competitions this year as there were in '99. This always amazes me when a top seeded picker is clueless about who they should pick.
Thanks again for asking me to give a story. I'll have more.
Andy B.
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