The Dark Side of the 2013 game

[Hoover]

Last year in Rebound Rumble, the Coopertition Bridge offered a way for alliances to help each other on the field. It was a real crowd pleaser when it happened.

It offered a bit of a chokehold too. We were a rookie team last year, bad shooting percentage (almost non-existent), but we could climb a bridge. In post season play we actually made it to rank 2 one time by climbing the Coopertition bridge more times than anyone else, so it may have been weighted a bit heavily. (we were 96/99 in our district in regulation play!)

But this year there is no such way to cooperate on the field. And what I am seeing is, in elimination matches the game is getting a bit rough. There is a lot more bumping then, pinning, *brushing by* a robot which is sticking partly out of the tower cage to make it miss, and even some occasional robot toppling. Yellow cards. There are interactions which are not for the faint of heart. You hope you built your robot tough enough to be ready for the next match.

I am hearing the comments in the stand, in contrast to last year, things that can't be repeated here.

Since this is only our second year, what are some of the long timers take on this considering past years? Is there any cooperation action they could have added to the game?

[Akash Rastogi]

Even I'm relatively new to FRC still (06/07 season), but I think you'd need to watch even older match footage to see really rough match play

I actually love that this year finally allows for rough and defensive play. More so than the last few seasons. I love it! Imagine this without bumpers, oh how awesome that would be.

As for the coopertition/cooperation stuff: I was not a fan of that last year. It did not always allow for proper seeding of the best robots in the top and it isn't fun when your ranking depends on your opponent being able to balance with you or not.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Akash Rastogi

Even I'm relatively new to FRC still (06/07 season), but I think you'd need to watch even older match footage to see really rough match play

I actually love that this year finally allows for rough and defensive play. More so than the last few seasons. I love it! Imagine this without bumpers, oh how awesome that would be.

05 still allowed defensive wedges. This led to a lot more flipped robots.

04's step saw a fair number of robots that would get shoved off.

03 was full on autonomous ramming on top of a ramp.

Bumpers? What are those?

This ain't rough guys. Our bot took a bit of a beating in Orlando but nothing like the damage robots used to take.

[Steven Donow]

The past few tears, defense has always seemed relatively light compared to this year. As Aakash said, older FRC is A LOT more brutal than even this year. I love this years game and think the amount of defense allowed is great,and very excellent for forming the game's own "meta game"(pro League of Legends fan here). This overall leads to a much more dynamic game.

I loved the coopertition bridge last year, but I don't see any way something similar could be used in this game.

As for negative comments in the stand,that'll happen every year no matter what, and sadly its an unavoidable inevitability.

[DjScribbles]

Coopertition was a great showcase of FIRST values, but it really hurt elims play. While it was great for newer/less-capable teams to make it into elims, I speculate that very few of the teams that ended up as alliance captains without effective scoring found much success; since the alliance captain and first pick are the primary scorers on an alliance, if the captain is a defender w/balance they have a severe handicap. I wouldn't mind if co-op added a second order sort criteria (sort robots based on QS, then co-op, then auton) or a fractional amount of QS, but I like this years system better.

A lot of the reason defense is so aggressive this year is because of the open field; not the lack of coopertition. Last year the bump limited many robots to primarily one side of the field (bridge traversal worked but wasn't good for running back and forth). This years game encourages alliances to leave their own turf for easy game-pieces, and the game pieces don't obstruct traffic when they litter the floor.

I personally like the visceral game play (as long as nobody gets hurt), it adds a lot to the action.

[jee7s]

I wouldn't call defense "the dark side"...that sounds far too ominous.

My experience goes back to 1998, when there weren't even alliances much less coopertition. Oh, and no bumpers either.

I can remember seeing steel framed robots designed to punish. I remember teams rewinding motors to get the performance they wanted. I remember collisions so hard that steel welds broke and bolts went flying.

FIRST has come a long way since then. And, yes, I've observed that newer teams have been surprised when good defense shows up. But, if it's clean defense (no contact inside the frame perimeter, no long distance ramming, etc) then it's part of the game.

Speaking specifically about my team (FRC 2789), we play hard stifling defense. Heck, we've cleanly played defense under our opponent's pyramid. The bot has dents and scratches galore. And yes, there is risk to this strategy. We've accidentally committed penalties, we've had disagreements with referees, we've had arguments with teams. But, after actually looking at the rules and discussing the situation, emotions tend to die down and things generally go in our favor. Oh, and we've been picked by a #1 and a #2 seed, and been Finalists and Winners this year.

So, just because it lowers the score, don't think defense is all bad. Actually, it can lead to some more exciting matches when a good defender can shut down a good scorer by exploiting a weakness.

All part of the game.

[Shane 2429]

Defense is beautiful this year it allows for younger teams and teams with less resources to out play,out defend older more expirenced team that arnt used to having to think multi demensionaly.forcing these teams to take defense into mind and strategy that was close to non existent last year

[connor.worley]

I don't feel that the defense has been too heavy this year, especially considering that penalties have been very harsh.

[thefro526]

Originally Posted by connor.worley

I don't feel that the defense has been too heavy this year, especially considering that penalties have been very harsh.

I think a lot of it has to do with where you're playing.

In MAR, specifically the portion of which that once would have been The Philadelphia Regional, Defense this year is something else. On one hand, it's really nice to finally be able to 'escort' a robot around the field without fear of penalties as long as you steer clear of the protected zones, but on the opposite, fixing your robot after every match (especially Eliminations) gets old really fast.

In our 20 or so matches played at Chestnut Hill, I think 6 or 7 of them ended with robots tipped over or otherwise immobile from 'legal' contact. A few teams got rammed into the pyramid in such a way that they were more or less high centered on the 10pt bar which was really, really interesting to see. IIRC, in one match of our qualification matches, two of three robots had been rendered immobile by the 1 minute mark.

[Trent B]

As someone involved in FRC since 08, it doesn't seem to be any rougher than the average, the only aspect that seems to add to it is the pyramid.

In one instance we pushed an opposing bot out of our way so we could shoot and they got stuck on the pyramid but I believe we got penalized for that as well.

There was a lot more opportunity for carnage in breakaway with the potential to flip bots near the bump.

[Jared Russell]

There were some nasty collisions in the pre-bumper, pre-red card era, but I've seen some collisions this year that are just as violent as in the 2002-2007 heyday of defense. That's what you get with a relatively wide open field (to <28" tall robots) and a proliferation of 6+ motor, high traction, and inexpensive 2 speed drives. The drive train arms race is at an all time high level of escalation.

[Rich Kressly]

Originally Posted by Jared341

... and a proliferation of 6+ motor, high traction, and inexpensive 2 speed drives. The drive train arms race is at an all time high level of escalation.

No doubt this is a key factor, Jared. You and I both began in an era when many (if not most) FRC robots were two-motor two wheel drivetrains. Not too long ago teams looked at 4 motors in the drive as "expensive" in terms of money and allotment. Then came the CIM, and the first real kit gearbox ... and now the improvements and pricing make lots of teams think a 4 motor drive isn't "enough". Exciting times for sure and I wonder what my old team's 2007 bumper-less robot would have looked like at season's end with 2013 options and rules applied.

[dodar]

Originally Posted by Rich Kressly

No doubt this is a key factor, Jared. You and I both began in an era when many (if not most) FRC robots were two-motor two wheel drivetrains. Not too long ago teams looked at 4 motors in the drive as "expensive" in terms of money and allotment. Then came the CIM, and the first real kit gearbox ... and now the improvements and pricing make lots of teams think a 4 motor drive isn't "enough". Exciting times for sure and I wonder what my old team's 2007 bumper-less robot would have looked like at season's end with 2013 options and rules applied.

After reading this and giving it a thought to our 2005, 2006, and 2007 robots all I can say to myself was, "Oh my God!" lol

Those robots would have been ridiculous. 2006 bot: 6 CIM drivetrain + 2 miniCIM for shooter = auto-victory.

[Lil' Lavery]

Originally Posted by dodar

Those robots would have been ridiculous. 2006 bot: 6 CIM drivetrain + 2 miniCIM for shooter = auto-victory.

I don't know about that. There was a maximum muzzle velocity in 2006, so putting more power on the shooter isn't going to increase your range. Keep in mind that the 2006 KoP also had Fischer Price motors and the Minibike CIMs, neither of which are available anymore. You could put just as much wattage in your drivetrain and shooter in 2006 as you could today, and there were plenty of teams who did.

What the greater CIM limit (and BAG and MiniCIMs) are really great for is applications that involve stalling motors. The greater durability of these motors has the potential to simplify arm/elevator/manipulator design for low and mid-level teams, in order to better avoid the stall conditions that cause failure in fan-cooled motors (Fischer Price, Banebots 550 and 775, RS-9015, etc.).

[dodar]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

I don't know about that. There was a maximum muzzle velocity in 2006, so putting more power on the shooter isn't going to increase your range. Keep in mind that the 2006 KoP also had Fischer Price motors and the Minibike CIMs, neither of which are available anymore. You could put just as much wattage in your drivetrain and shooter in 2006 as you could today, and there were plenty of teams who did.

What the greater CIM limit (and BAG and MiniCIMs) are really great for is applications that involve stalling motors. The greater durability of these motors has the potential to simplify arm/elevator/manipulator design for low and mid-level teams, in order to better avoid the stall conditions that cause failure in fan-cooled motors (Fischer Price, Banebots 550 and 775, RS-9015, etc.).

I did not know that; my freshman year was 2007.