Mayhem in Merrimack Feedback

[Dan Petrovic]

It being the day after 166's Mayhem in Merrimack, we would like to hear some feedback from those of you who went and participated and all that.

So!

What did we do well?

What can we improve on?

Any other comments, concerns, or anything like that?

Any feedback we get would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks

[ahecht]

Very well run event, and I know everyone from team 190 had a blast. The event was well managed, the food was very good and cheap, and the other activities (human player challenge, DDR, mini VEX field, etc.) were a lot of fun.

The only negative to the event was the numerous delays during the finals. I know most of those were out of your control (whether due to field problem, robot problems, or other issues), but perhaps when planning future events there will be more time built into the schedule for delays, or you could take a page from FIRST's book and give out awards between finals matches.

[sgeorge]

Here are the results from Mayhem in Merrimack.


Champions

1519__Mechanical Mayhem
1519__Mechanical Mayhem 2nd Robot


Finalists

40____Trinity Pioneers
131___CHAOS


Rankings

1519___Mechanical Mayhem
40_____Trinity Pioneers
501____Power Knights
1474___Tewksbury Titans
95_____Grasshoppers
190____Gompei and the HERD
319____Big Bad Bob
1058___PVC Pirates
1519___Mechanical Mayhem 2nd Robot
1073___The Force Team
238____Cruisin Crusaders
131____CHAOS
166____Chop Shop
811____Cardinals
1721___Apollo
1735___Green Reapers

[Dan Petrovic]

Team 166 would like to thank all of the volunteers who helped make Mayhem in Merrimack such a success!

Refs:
Head - Ryan Foley
Greg Perkins formerly of 151
Tim Baird from 126
Elgin Clock from 237
Ted Boucher from 237
Kevin Shaw from 237
fill-in Tom Indelicato from 811

Judges:
Mike Mullinax from 1100
Tom Castelli from 1100

Scorer/Technical Guru:
Michael Dessingue (Dez)

MC:
Andy Grady from 131

Queuer:
Jessica Boucher

Volunteers Extraordinaire:
Julia Metzler
Nick George formerly from 166

Field set-up:
Michael Dessingue (Dez)
Brittany Jennings from 1519
Chris Jennings from 1519
JulieaMetzler

We hope to see you all next year!

[Julia Magoolia]

Thank you, Merrimack, for putting on an event that was so much fun to volunteer at!!
Thanks to everyone from 166 who made this possible.. It was run so well!
I'm definitely coming back next year, I'll do whatever you guys need me to!

And of course the non-166 volunteers- it was SO much fun working with all of you!

[Ken Streeter]

Originally Posted by InfernoX14

It being the day after 166's Mayhem in Merrimack, we would like to hear some feedback from those of you who went and participated and all that.

To start with, I'd like to thank the many volunteers that made the event possible! Our team (Mechanical Mayhem, #1519) had a great time at the event and will definitely be looking forward to attending again next year!

Originally Posted by InfernoX14

What did we do well?

Access to the pit areas for load-in and load-out was great. The covered walkway was especially appreciated when it was starting to rain during load-out!

The tournament volunteers at the table in the pit area did a great job with letting teams know when they needed to queue up.

It was nice having the playoff brackets posted in the pit area so that those in the pits during alliance selections could see how it went!

We loved the proximity of the stands to the playing field -- the cozy venue made it easy for everybody to watch the play on the field.

The referees and field reset volunteers did their jobs promptly and effectively.

Having a practice area was helpful for testing out robot driving and practicing shots on the high goal.

Including 5 T-shirts with each team's registration was a nice touch!

The volume of the music was appropriate -- loud enough to accompany the robots, but not so loud as to be deafening.

The 2-on-2 alliances were an interesting twist on the regular season game.

Allowing teams to bring a second robot for no extra charge was greatly appreciated! (Without that incentive, we never would have known what it was like to build a second robot in 3 days!)

We thought the game-specific trophies were cool.

The name of the tournament is one of our favorite parts -- "Mayhem in Merrimack!"

Originally Posted by InfernoX14

What can we improve on?

Setting a date for the tournament even earlier in the season and getting the word out sooner (say, announcing it at the Granite State Regional) might help encourage more teams to attend.

It always seems that there's never enough time in the morning to resolve field issues. It probably would have been wise to have had a practice match or two before the first real one to work out the bugs with score counting, etc.

It seemed that there was an issue with the two alliances being started at slightly different times -- one alliance always seemed to have about a 3 to 5 second "head start" for most of the qualifying matches. At least this was resolved well before the playoff rounds.

Would be good to have the "projection screen" for displaying round scores available from the start. (Adding the screen later in the morning was greatly appreciated!)

Thanks, team 166, for hosting a great off-season tournament!