[EWCP] Presents TwentyFour -- An FRC Statistics Blog

[PayneTrain]

A reason you never see a strong, methodical defense develop is because defense is typically a tertiary objective for powerhouse teams and an emergency, all-or-nothing fallback for weaker teams.

Those that have the ability to play a multidimensional defense now choose to make as many offensive plays as possible, and those that "choose" to play defense are usually forced out of there intended strategy based on design choices that resulted in a robot too weak to play either side of the ball.

Another reason would be that when comparing the offense and defense in conventional sports to FRC, there are key differences in how you attack strategy. In a 3 on 3 ultimate frisbee game, there is one game piece, one goal for each team, and no other objective besides "put the game piece in your goal more than the other guys do for their goal" over a long lapse of time. In Ultimate Ascent, there are over 100 game pieces, four goals for each team, a time and resource-consuming secondary objective irrelevant to the primary, and must be played in a compressed period of time.

If you're developing a strategy that needs to be relevant in late round qualifications at CMP, you don't think "Man, we need to play some KILLER defense." Your strategy guys figure out how to score the most amount of points with the least amount of interference from the opposition. An FRC game has restrictions and key differences that make defense less than a red-headed stepchild in strategy discussions.

Good teams can build a robot to execute a desirable defensive strategy, but the parameters of an FRC game would coerce those teams to build a robot more geared towards putting up a lot of points efficiently.

[pandamonium]

I am aware of the data that you have discussed and the typical low scores
I have a gut feeling that this year may be different. I have been in first for many years and I have seen so many more succesful acurate prototypes than ever before. The dynamics of disks are quite different than balls and these goals are quite large. The math from past years sugests that if a robot can score 20 points reliably they will be quite good. I just dont know though I could see a simple robot in 3 days based robot capable of 40 points consistantly.

[Anupam Goli]

Originally Posted by pandamonium

I am aware of the data that you have discussed and the typical low scores
I have a gut feeling that this year may be different. I have been in first for many years and I have seen so many more succesful acurate prototypes than ever before. The dynamics of disks are quite different than balls and these goals are quite large. The math from past years sugests that if a robot can score 20 points reliably they will be quite good. I just dont know though I could see a simple robot in 3 days based robot capable of 40 points consistantly.

Resources like Robot in 3 days definitely will help bring up the level of competition, but while i've seen many shooters, I've yet to see an efficient intake, storage, and feeder. Granted, many powerhouse teams and others are not showing those (since these are obviously the toughest parts of designing this year's robot) Teams will definitely score more points, but the distribution of points will be the same. Those teams that iterate and practice will still be far above the ones that don't. The "low score" threshold will be raised this year, but so will the mid range and top tier score.

[EricLeifermann]

Originally Posted by Wing

Resources like Robot in 3 days definitely will help bring up the level of competition, but while i've seen many shooters, I've yet to see an efficient intake, storage, and feeder. Granted, many powerhouse teams and others are not showing those (since these are obviously the toughest parts of designing this year's robot) Teams will definitely score more points, but the distribution of points will be the same. Those teams that iterate and practice will still be far above the ones that don't. The "low score" threshold will be raised this year, but so will the mid range and top tier score.

100% agree! Aside from a drive base, a shooter is the easiest thing to do. Acquiring and delivering the discs to your shooter is the difficult part.

Climbing is just insanely tough.

[pandamonium]

I see litle value in floor intake outside of auto mode though. And storage is a relatively easy obstacle in the big picture. The robot in 3 days looks to be capable of 18 auto 5 runs in teleop so 62 if 100 Percent in top and add 10 for the hang 68 points is definately feasible with out climbing above level one and with out colecting off of the floor.

[Peter Matteson]

Originally Posted by pandamonium

I see litle value in floor intake outside of auto mode though. And storage is a relatively easy obstacle in the big picture. The robot in 3 days looks to be capable of 18 auto 5 runs in teleop so 62 if 100 Percent in top and add 10 for the hang 68 points is definately feasible with out climbing above level one and with out colecting off of the floor.

That is a completely unrealistic expectation.

Top level teams would fight to get 5 teleop runs across the field. Look at load time, drive time, and how long it takes to aim. I think you will find you can't do this on an empty field let alone one that has 5 other robots.
This is like the teams in 2011 that could hang 5 tubes every match if you talked to them but really only hung one or 2. Their belief was what they did on an empty practice field was the same as what they could do in a match.

Also Assuming 100% accuracy is ridiculous. The first shoot will rarely be on target unless you using a very good auto targeting system. History i.e this blog shows 60%-80% accuracy would be a high end team.

I think you are drastically overestimating what teams will really be able to do in 2 minutes. What you described is a PERFECT match.

A more realistic look would be 18 in auto and 3 runs across the field at 66% accuracy resulting in 36 pts. Just remember most teams won't even be able to do that.

[coldfusion1279]

Originally Posted by pandamonium

I see litle value in floor intake outside of auto mode though. And storage is a relatively easy obstacle in the big picture. The robot in 3 days looks to be capable of 18 auto 5 runs in teleop so 62 if 100 Percent in top and add 10 for the hang 68 points is definately feasible with out climbing above level one and with out colecting off of the floor.

I agree with Peter. I also think that a whole class of robot has been overlooked. One which picks up from the floor efficiently, and can "shovel" frisbees a few feet in the air regardless of orientation. I foresee many matches with frisbees all over the floor near the goals in the last 45 seconds. A clean-up shoveler can pick up 4 after all the robots have cleared out to go hang, raise a lift, and push them into the 2 or 3 pointer with ease. Last 10 seconds (with a good driver) go grab the bar for 10 points.

I really wanted to build one of these this year. I hope I get to see a good one.

[KrazyCarl92]

Floor pick up is an interesting debate this year. We decided that a reliable floor pickup would make a potential 24 point auto extremely easy, and still leave the possibility for improvement. So that's 6 points*robot accuracy advantage for floor pick up. We also estimated that in a match where the floor was littered with discs, we could expect to score an average of only 5 points*robot accuracy more in teleop with a floor pick up than without. As you get to eliminations or championship, you may expect to see less discs on the floor due to teams hitting their shots at a higher accuracy.

However, you could either send your robot or an alliance partner to the feeder station to send 12-20 discs down to your end at the beginning of the match so as to litter the floor with discs on purpose and very quickly. So if you have 2 otherwise equal robots: 1 with good floor pickup, 1 without, I expect to see a maximum score difference of 11 points, barring any crazy 5-7 disc autos (okay, 5 isn't that crazy). That makes a good floor pickup approximately equal to an additional climbing level, if used strategically.

[pandamonium]

All of my first experience and the data certaintly agrees with you. It all depends how far a trip is. If some robots are shooting full field they can do more than 4 trips.


If there are 5 teams at a regional scoring 70 or more points each match and 20 teams scoring 3 or less points their will be a ton of frustrated people. If you guys are right I forsee a larger spread than we have seen in past years. There will be much more seperation between the classes of teams. If a match is 100 to 6 how much fun will it be to watch?

[Chris is me]

I think if you aren't doing the extended autonomous, while a floor input isn't worthless, it's not worth spending design time on when you could be working on your hanger or tuning your shooter or practicing.

The extended autonomous is REALLY worth it in terms of seeding, but some of us know our software limitations and would rather focus on what we can perfect mechanically.

[Jibri Wright]

Michigan regionals have a lot of good teams. We get Wildstang, Bombsquad, Winnovation, Team Hammond, Techno Kats, and a lot of other teams that score really well. Not only that, but teams around here actually help each other out a lot surprisingly. That plus since the scores get so high every year, a lot of teams fixate on getting their robot to do autonomous really well (you should see the autonomous scores, they are always high and really close) and doing really well in the end game just to get picked for elimination round. The top 8 teams at the regionals normally can do everything.

[EricLeifermann]

Originally Posted by Jibri Wright

Michigan regionals have a lot of good teams. We get Wildstang, Bombsquad, Winnovation, Team Hammond, Techno Kats, and a lot of other teams that score really well. Not only that, but teams around here actually help each other out a lot surprisingly. That plus since the scores get so high every year, a lot of teams fixate on getting their robot to do autonomous really well (you should see the autonomous scores, they are always high and really close) and doing really well in the end game just to get picked for elimination round. The top 8 teams at the regionals normally can do everything.

How are non Michigan teams competing in Michigan? Michigan is a district state...

[MagiChau]

Originally Posted by EricLeifermann

How are non Michigan teams competing in Michigan? Michigan is a district state...

I assume he meant to say Midwest

[pwnageNick]

How are non Michigan teams competing in Michigan? Michigan is a district state...

He definitely meant Midwest Regional.

While some of the things he said are true, there still seems to be a large gap in points scored by robots. More then other regionals I think but that's just my $o.02

-Nick

[Jibri Wright]

Lol ya I meant Midwest