Quote:
Originally Posted by artdutra04
In many ways (such as program/competition structure), I wish FTC would emulate FRC. Both competitions share many common traits, such as alliances, qualification rounds, alliance selections for eliminations, autonomous-then-teleoperated matches, etc.
But unfortunately, it seems like FIRST is trying to force FTC to be more like FLL in structure. Evidence of this can be seen in their many of their decisions, such as to not include permanent team numbering. Which would lead one to think: why would FIRST implement such a decision? Do they expect FTC to be like FLL, in the respect of having high team turnover rates? (Perhaps they have foreseen the future in that having a volatile platform/competition structure that constantly changes every year would lead to high turnover rates...)
From many of their recent decisions, it seems like FIRST is trying to coerce the FTC program in the wrong direction. Instead of letting the program grow and naturally evolve into a successful program, they are trying to prune (perhaps too much?) it into a mold they wish it to fill. And at least for the two pilot years in which it was the FIRST Vex Challenge, it seemed to be growing and naturally evolving into a mature platform just fine without any external coercion.
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There are many wonderful aspects of FRC that FTC would do well to emulate such as the level of excellence and the communication & encouragement between teams. But the one weakness of FRC that I believe FTC was created to combat is that FRC is inaccessible to certain populations – those with limited finances, and those without a certain level of technical support. Also, because of the high level of technical expertise required, it is rather difficult for rookie teams to break in. It is my impression that while FIRST is not deliberately trying to create an “anti-FRC” with FTC, it is not necessarily trying to create a smaller replica of it, either.
I see the change away from the Vex platform as hurting everyone – veterans who have invested time & money in the system, but rookies as well, who would have benefited from the experience and assistance of veterans familiar with the system. The reuse of team numbers, on the other hand, mainly benefits the higher level teams (of whom a large proportion are veterans), who are in a position to serve as alliance captains. While this doesn’t necessarily hurt the rookie teams, if more energy and money were to be spent somewhere, my biased preference would be to spend it on something that benefits people who are trying to decide whether to try/stay with FTC, rather than hard-core veterans who will come back no matter what. Teams that are far enough ahead to be affected by team branding should be able to come up with creative ways to market their teams, with or without consistent numbers. For those with numbers already on shirts that want to save money, I suggest a nicely designed pin-on or sticky logo to cover the number that can be easily removed. Our team T-shirts cost $2 (plain shirts from the irregular discount bin) and had the team name written in duct tape, which could be transferred to clean shirts each day – on “white” day, those without unprinted white shirts could wear printed white shirts inside out with duct tape pasted on.
Despite coaching 2 FLL & 2 FVC seasons and serving in various FLL administrative capacities, I still consider myself a FIRST n00b and can only imagine how difficult it is for teams with even less experience and fewer connections. The needs of some rookie teams are so far from the needs of veterans that it’s hardly fathomable. For example, in addition to teams that showed up at our regional Championship without the programming template, our second draft pick was a team that completely disassembled their robot prior to alliance selection, not knowing that it was needed in the afternoon, and not knowing that it was “good manners” to decline an invitation if you don’t have a functioning robot. To their credit, they managed to put together something in the 20 minutes before the match that scored in the low goal and pinned the atlas ball. However, team number recognition was probably the furthest thing from their minds.