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Unread 30-04-2010, 09:17
Travis Hoffman's Avatar Unsung FIRST Hero
Travis Hoffman Travis Hoffman is offline
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FRC #0048 (Delphi E.L.I.T.E.)
Team Role: Engineer
 
Join Date: Sep 2001
Rookie Year: 2001
Location: Warren, Ohio USA
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Re: Thoughts on CoOpertition

Quote:
Originally Posted by Bob Steele View Post
Travis you have GREAT ideas!! You need to be on the GDC!!
Oh, I bet certain people would just LOVE that. Thanks for the laugh.

Quote:

[snip]

I really miss the old days (read... before this year...) when coopertition meant giving selflessly....by helping another team with no regard for your own stature in seeding.
That still happens behind the curtain in a number of different ways. Some teams spend hours with other teams helping them get up and running. Others bring additional parts with them that are just what other teams need to add a new feature to their robot, or correct an emergency situation. I don't believe what's happening on the field this year has impacted that practice.

The behind the scenes coopertition is just so unfortunately overshadowed this year by the overemphasis of this contrived brand of "coopertition" on the field. If they would keep the seeding system (save for whatever changes it took to eliminate 6v0 and de-incentivize scoring for the other team) and ditch the artificial connotations they're trying to attach to it, I think people would accept it better.

I still like the idea of 1 + (L*constant) for the winner, only teams are NOT allowed to score for the losing team. I also like the idea of somehow getting the match schedule in the hands of teams earlier in the competition - say mid-day Thursday. If you want maximum incentive for the better-functioning teams to help ALL the struggling teams behind the curtain prepare for competition, then this combination would certainly go a long way toward achieving that.

Quote:

[snip]

coopertition as we have seen it is akin to playing a basketball game between the Lakers and a high school team.... with the Lakers scoring all of the points ....the opposing team needn't even come on the floor....how is that really helping a team...
Thank you for introducing an NBA reference into this thread, because it leads nicely into my next example. Consider the first two rounds of the NBA playoffs as equivalent to FRC qualifying. Last season, the Cleveland Cavs faced two absolute duds in Detroit and Atlanta. One team was old and didn't care. The other team was injured. Neither team provided a true challenge to Cleveland. The Cavs swept both teams. Fun times for the team with the best record in the NBA, no? WRONG. The Cavs finally met a tough test against the Magic in the conference finals, and promptly got their butts kicked. They got complacent. They weren't PREPARED for the eliminations, because their matchups during "qualifying" weren't of elimination round intensity.

Fast forward to this year. The Bulls were the Eastern Conference's playoff doormat this year. They gave the Cavs everything they could handle, including on the defensive side of the ball. The Cavs now face a Celtics team that will be an even greater test. If they survive that battle, they will be much more seasoned, hardened, and ready to face the elite teams in the league.

Why do I offer this NBA parallel? Because many have attempted to use the existence of the coopertition model as a "mandate from above" to suggest that regardless of your team's abilities at the time, playing defense within this model is akin to "tearing teams down", "not reading/understanding the rules", etc. And soccer is played without goalies, right? This coopertition model is blinding many people to notion that regardless of the seeding rules, the elimination round style of gameplay - the most heralded style of gameplay - could be the way this game is played all the time! Einstein matches are hailed as the best thing ever witnessed, while qualifying matches either go without discussion or are publicly excoriated. Unfortunately, which matches are the ones spectators must bear witness to the majority of the competition?

Many are sacrificing the quality and appeal of this awesome game design due to their worship of this seeding system and its various quirks and exploits.

While I totally feel that you should always strive to improve your robot to play the offensive aspects of the game better, the reality is, at any given time, during many of the matches at an event, there are going to be teams who CAN'T play the game that way, for whatever reason. We were one such team this year - many of our continuous improvement efforts did not pan out on the field, save for improving our drivetrain reliability, but we look forward to the additional time in the offseason we have to keep trying to improve the other systems. Why is it honorable for top-performing teams to "gently bully" the lesser robots into "trying their best" (this is also equivalent to "helping us seed higher at your expense" in the current system) and "not tear down other teams by playing d", when in fact they have alternate strategies available to them that would make the match MORE competitive and MORE of a preparatory challenge for the good teams and MORE interesting to spectators? If I am a team on an extremely weak alliance that would have no chance of winning the match in a straight up you-score we-score offensive fight, how in the heck is it doing ANYONE any good to just go through the motions and let the better alliance receive a huge seeding score?

Also in defense of the appropriate use of qualifying defense, what if you are on an alliance whose offensive strength is a level below that of whom you are facing. Are you just going to hope the better alliance chokes, or are you going to go out there and provide some defensive resistance to help swing the result in your favor?

I can tell you that we and our alliance partners elected to use defense within the alliance strategy several times when severely outgunned by quality opposition.

I can tell you that in our alliance with 175, we arranged to play defense against 111's alliance when we felt outgunned, but not out of it. We won the match in a close struggle, contributing to one of Wildstang's two losses (I think they did pretty well after that match - maybe it lit a fire under them?).

I also can say we pursued traditional offensive strategies (herding well and kicking...poorly) in the remaining matches where we felt the matchups were balanced.

If I'm strategizing with an alliance before a match, and I can't score well, but I can at least drive well, does it not benefit both me AND the great teams I face to go out and give the competition a more elimination round level of defensive effort? Will their seed score be hurt by a more defensive tilt? Possibly - but if they are TRULY an elite team, they will find a way to overcome it. More importantly, will that team's drive team have received a better test of their skills that is more like what they will face in the elimination rounds? Sure thing. I'd rather be honorable in promoting my robot's best abilities and giving my opponents a true test of executing through defensive pressure than playing dead and giving them a FAKE sense of accomplishment.
__________________

Travis Hoffman, Enginerd, FRC Team 48 Delphi E.L.I.T.E.
Encouraging Learning in Technology and Engineering - www.delphielite.com
NEOFRA - Northeast Ohio FIRST Robotics Alliance - www.neofra.com
NEOFRA / Delphi E.L.I.T.E. FLL Regional Partner

Last edited by Travis Hoffman : 30-04-2010 at 11:17. Reason: Saving it for the internet podcast debates. *rolls eyes*