**PLEASE NOTE:**
We know it's too late to change anything; regionals ended yesterday, but we want to bring it to your attention that we don't think FIRST's scoring software is working correctly. Here's why:
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As of Friday evening (the second day of the AZ Regional event), the FIRST Robotics scoring software was down, due to a program malfunction. The score board was back up on Saturday morning, and all was fine...or so we thought. Throughout the course of the day, our scores were messed up, including at one point on Friday as well. It was brought to our attention by one of our mentors that they had messed up on the win-loss-tie portion of our score, which subsequently misplaced us in the ranking. We spoke to the judges and the error was corrected, no problem. We had a running tally of our points and ranking on a huge white board at our pit, so we knew where we stood in the game at all times. On Saturday afternoon before it was time to choose alliances, we noticed that again, our score was messed up. We were posted as having won 6 matches, lost 6 matches. Instead, it should have said that we won 7 matches, and lost 5. So, a friend and I from the team went up and spoke with a judge, and we were told that due to software malfunctions, the scoring that was currently up was incorrect and considered void, and not to worry because it was going to be corrected.
Well, it came time to pick alliances, and in the whirl-wind of it all, I was chosen to represent my team on the field and we were, in turn, picked by Chandler High to be in alliance with them for the finals. I was under the impression that we were in 11th place at the time, because that was how we we were told that we finished...but during alliance picking, the top 8 teams became consolidated, and so #9 and #10 were called in to be alliance captains. I expected us to be #11, and when it came time to call in an 11th captain, there was a debate...the FIRST officials pulled off to the side and had a discussion for a few minutes as to who was to move up in the ranking list...and we weren't called. It struck me as odd, but I let it go. I guess my gut was right and I should have asked a judge what was going on. Thanks again to Chandler High though, we were picked and made it to finals, even though we didn't win.
Here's the catch: the final scored posted for the AZ regionals put us in 15th place, with 6 wins and 6 losses. Unless the judges changed something without my team's knowledge, we are all still under the impression that we won 7 matches and lost 5. If you check out this site of the final scoring positions:
http://www2.usfirst.org/2005comp/Eve.../rankings.html , you will see that we should have come in 9th place, or even tied for 8th. That means that with the way alliance were chosen, we would have been team #8 or #9, making me, (as representative for my team #698), an alliance captain.
I've spoken to my mentor. He told me I could take this to FIRST (and I am) to at least find out why the scores are incorrect, or if they changed it for a valid reason. I know it's probably to late for any hope of nationals (we lost the final matches), but at least maybe this will be an effective word of warning to other teams about the scoring.
**IF YOUR SCORES COME UP INCORRECT, FIX IT IMMEDIATLY! YOU MIGHT EVEN CONSIDER TALKING TO AT LEAST TWO JUDGES TO BE SURE OF YOUR POSITION.**
Best of luck to all teams that are preparing to compete, and watch out for that scoring software!!!