Posted by colleen - T190 at 03/15/2001 6:12 PM EST
Engineer on team #190, Gompei, from Massachusetts Academy of Math and Science and WPI.
In Reply to: Cap'n John's Strategy/Driver Forum...Post your thoughts!
Posted by JVN on 03/14/2001 11:23 PM EST:
I can honestly say I never saw 250's Bible.. but I trust it's existence.. that's what faith is, right?
There are several SIMPLE keys to doing well in the competition and strategy:
1.) Know you're own robots abilities and lack thereof and be TRUTHFUL about it to other teams. Good scouts know the real deal, good teams give it straight to you.
2.) Have one person who coaches your drivers
3.) Have one person who calls "Hit the button!!" for your team.
4.) As John said, have one person who hits it.
As for coaches/drivers...
The drivers should be concentrating on how to execute.. how the robot's been performing.. and how to not make any mistakes they may have made the match before again.. operators doing the same.. and coaches talking to them.. HP's should be talking to the other HP's seeing who is best, who's feeding, etc..
Alliance coach should be talking to 3 other people.. the 3 other "allaince coaches" from the other team.. keys to this:
1.) The should respect experience (both in this year's game and past years) because it tends to pay off..
2.) They should be willing to achieve what's 'best' for the alliance.. if that (and it sometimes does) means your robot just has to go to the endzone and clock out.. or be hanging around to 'trouble shoot' and other robots can better handle other tasks, don't be ashamed to do it (263 was our partner in the finals, and that was their only job.. and we NEEDED that.. teams got stuck, they gave them a push.. it couldn't have been done w/o them!)
3.) Spread the tasks over the robots. That is why you have four.. if you can clearly do it best, do it. But DON'T try to do everything, even if you can. It pays to spread the work out (and usually increases time multipliers)
Basically.. on your stage crew, and on your alliance, it pays to have each person with a specific job.. and if everyone executes that job properly.. things will work, and they will work WELL..
I can say enough for our alliance in the finals.. we relied A LOT on each other.. and the strategies we came up with involved everyone executing their tasks.. interdependancy probably doesn't work as well in qualifying..but it is the KEY to big points when choosing your partners.
We all did our thing.. did it well.. and helped each other out.. saw the same thing in UTC. You can see the difference. Accept help from your partners; THAT's WHY THEY ARE THERE! Admit that your robot isn't the best of the job.. or your robot can do the job more efficiently if you have help with this part.
It works.
