[Travis Hoffman]

Proposal - Modify the rules such that any goals scored for the opposition are not counted. All other seeding/ranking rules remain as written.

What this would change -

1. Any "boosting" collusive actions would be eliminated, as the vehicle for such collusion would be removed.

2. Spectators - all the ones Dean is urging us to bring to the competitions to get them excited about FIRST - would be far less confused as to what the heck is going on down on the field.

3. Those alliances who cannot score due to functional difficulties will not suffer the additional public embarrassment of having the opposition score for them.

Many have witnessed all 3 of the above in action at the Week 1 regionals. Discussions and interactions revolving around the above have generated many emotions - anger, disappointment, confusion, embarrassment - that do not contribute to the otherwise "inspirational" atmosphere present at a FIRST event.

What this change would preserve -

1. The apparent ability of this system to let the cream rise to the top of the rankings.

2. The promotion of offensive activity during qualifying.

3. The disincentive to bogart all the game pieces and slaughter your opponents if you are on an excessively-capable alliance.

Your thoughts? Please don't debate the logistics of actually implementing this rule change into the scoring software. I am only interested in opinions on how this would affect strategy and gameplay.