[Devin L.]

Originally Posted by Jake Mazotas

I follow this forum regularly but I don't usually post. I've made an exception as this thread has really gotten under my skin.

I can assure everyone that the 177 alliance in no way violated any rules during the UTC regional. To say that our team intentionally violated rules to block your shooter in autonomous is reckless and I seriously hope that you do not represent the opinion of your team. The only time that you were blocked you was in SF1-2, and you didn't even run the same program that you ran in SF1-1, so you obviously changed something. We have the utmost respect for your team and it is unfortunate that you see the elimination in such poor light.

i would like to assure you that you did violate a rule. In the FIRST manual it says:
<T09> Prior to each match, teams shall indicate to the queuing manager their choice of available starting positions for that alliance. Once starting locations are selected, teams must place their robot in the selected location. Robots may not be repositioned in response to robot positions of the opposing alliance. During elimination rounds, teams may orient their robots within the selected locations once the robots are placed on the field. The higher seeded alliance will have the last opportunity to orient their robots within the selected locations.

during SF1-1 we saw your robot aimed diagonaly to intercept us. we decided to run the auto mode that had the robot stay in its starting box and shoot balls. during SF1-2 you lined the robot up so it was aimed directly at us. upon seeing this we selected the mode that has the robot drive out a few feet then shoot. all 6 teams then went behind their respective driver stations and the announcer was about to announce the teams when your team went back onto the field and angled your robot, which obviously meant that you violated rule T09 as you did not give us, the 1st seed, the final opportunity to reallign our robot in respect to your orrientation. im sorry for your confusion, but i just wanted to make sure that you understand that rule.

i can assure you that we will not let this rule slip by us next time as we will step forward and let the refs know that we need to reposition our robot in respect to our opponents. this is a very critical rule, as it could determin the outcome of the game. wining autonomous mode and gaining the 10pt bonus is a critical strategic manuever in this years game.

my two cents

congrats to teams 177, 176, and 1124, see you in atlanta!