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Originally Posted by MikeDubreuil
I would agree that top 8 teams can pick "oddball" robots and win a regional. This is because the current ranking system rewards high scoring offensive rounds. Which is unfortunate because the skills needed during the finals are a little different. Offense wins #1 seed, defense wins championships.
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I agree with everything you said (especially the last thing), except I have an example of something contrary to high scoring offensive bots being rewarded. At Pittsburgh (granted, the smallest regional, and therefor statistically less reliable), the top three seeds could not shoot for the high goal at all. All three, however, were pretty good dumpers, but their top quality IMHO was their strong defense.
Another point I think has already been brought up: the #1 and #2 seeds may have too much in common for them to do well by picking each other. The alliance that wins will be the alliance whose members best complement each other's strengths and weaknesses, as well as work together cohesively. From Chesapeake, the only loss for our #1 alliance (1629, 175, and 1184) was due to an offsides penalty that resulted from miscommunication, from not working together. We had three very different bots, two of which could shoot, dump, and play at least some defense. One could dump and play excelent defense. The thing I love about this year's game is the number of different strategies that can win. You have to adapt your strategy for every single game, more so than last year...and that's why I carried a giant bottle of Tylenol all weekend!