How can you help GDC make this game better?

[billylo]

Let's get our creative juices going. It's week 1 and make no mistakes, it's a tough game for students, mentors, volunteering referees and others.

If you would suggest the top 3 changes you can imagine so that week 2-champs would be better, what would they be?

Reminder: keep them brief, supported by facts, and include expected benefits. It will help all of us digest the ideas.

Ready? Go!

[MooreteP]

1) Scorekeepers separate from refs.
However there would need to be a reconfiguration of the touchscreen input system, possibly adding two more screens. And you thought fixing the High Goals was expensive. They could always have a separate scorekeeper paper sheet like last year with the load cell debacle, but that may increase reset times. We used paper at the week zero Suffield Shakedown and it was quick enough, but it messes with the value of the Real Time Scoring. Ensuring that the pedestal lights up the moment a ball is scored in a goal is critical to the flow of the game.

2) Adjust penalty values.
Reduce G40 to a foul. Call possession of the ball by an opposing alliance.
I saw many instances of opposing alliances touching a ball twice or "herding" during defensive moves. This will improve the flow of the game by making it harder for a defending Robot to recklessly attack any Robot in possession of a ball.

3) More cowbell.
'nuff said.

[Wayne TenBrink]

Proposed wording for updated rules on inbounding:

<Proposed G21> ROBOTS may not extend outside the HUMAN PLAYER BARRIER.

The current rule prohibits extension beyond the SAFETY ZONE. The HP barrier is the 20" wide zone above the field perimeter pipes.)

<Proposed G40> TEAMS may not extend any body part into the FIELD during the MATCH.

The current rule prohibits reaching beyond the SAFETY ZONE.

G41 (no HP/robot contact, no HP/Ball/Robot contact) should remain as is.

This would make the HP barrier a "transition/neutral zone" where either robots or HP's could reach, but there could be no contact between them. You still couldn't lay a ball directly into a robot.

I think the same objective could be accomplished by re-defining the SAFETY ZONE to match the HUMAN PLAYER BARRIER.

[Tom Line]

It must be emphasized to every single ref during training that one robot cannot force another to take a penalty. This has long been a core tenet of FIRST except in very special cases. Being pushed into goals, into opposition balls, and out of field perimeter by another robot should not be a foul.

In addition, the rule regarding penetration inside the bumper perimeter needs to be enforced correctly. Damage needs to occur, or it needs to be clearly intentional to generate a foul.

[Ken Patton]

1. Need to free up the Refs to allow them to watch the action - not manage the sidelines and the input devices. It was sadly comical to watch how overloaded the hard-working refs were at Southfield, with keeping the iPad stands from tipping over, handing balls to human players, getting out of the way of reset workers, occasionally ducking from errant shots, watching the action, communicating to each other, and entering input into their iPads. It made for inconsistent calls because many infractions were unobserved, while other infractions were observed and called. Solution: scorekeepers with iPads set back from the field.

2. Improve consistency of calls by better training for the Refs in three specific types of infractions: opposing teams controlling another alliance's ball (please just be consistent), inconsequential robot protrusion outside the field (either call it all the time for all robots, or let teams get away with it when it has no impact on a catch or an inbound), and intrusion into other robots (Southfield was horribly inconsistent on this). Solution: better training for refs who are enabled by 1. to watch the action.

3. Improve consistency of the lighting up of the pedestals. The "reaction time" of the field seemed to range from instantaneous (no visible delay at all) to long (~~5 seconds), with the occasional situation where hundreds of people in the stands are shouting "ball!" and the refs hardly seem to notice. (We had an FTA tell us to take the ball off an unlit pedestal after waiting ~15 seconds one time). Solution: be consistent in how you light up the pedestal, every time, and move the pedestals to somewhere more visible to all (I heard someone suggest this yesterday - a great idea).

Consistency is the most important thing in my opinion.

Ken

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Ken Patton

It was sadly comical to watch how overloaded the hard-working refs were at Southfield, with keeping the iPad stands from tipping over, handing balls to human players, getting out of the way of reset workers, occasionally ducking from errant shots, watching the action, communicating to each other, and entering input into their iPads. It made for inconsistent calls because many infractions were unobserved, while other infractions were observed and called. Solution: scorekeepers with iPads set back from the field.

Ken, I WISH those touchscreens were iPads! Then we might not have to deal with lag, and maybe the pedestal issues would be resolved.

I also think that two more refs would be very handy, focusing on human actions, but that might just be me.

[DGMentor]

A lot of good action in Week 1. It appeared to me that the "strategy" of upsetting apposing alliance robots was somewhat successful resulting in survival of the fittest. Not sure if that meets the GP goal of FRC though. Maybe increase number of balls on the field to give the robots in waiting something else to do. Make your robots very durable and ready to take some big hits is suggested.

[Peter Matteson]

1. Make the human player box bigger and further from the field. A 6 foot tall hp can easily violate the line.

2. Add 2 refs to call HP violations. HPs are grabbing balls off the pedestal before it lights up in addition to violating the tape line.

3. Make it clear to field reset they are an integral part of the game and train them well before the start of the first match.

My suggestion to just make it better, are you listening IRI committee?

Allow multiple balls to be played at once in teleop, but make the trade off if you have multiple balls on the field you lose the bonus cycle. You will see real strategy discussions and variations on game play and end game if this was the case...

[Mark Sheridan]

Bring back the 2013's safety net. I hope FIRST still has some. It would ease the burden of returning the ball to play. Only the human players stand inside, and there are openings to impound the ball at the start of the cycle. Also put a net behind the goals to catch shots and make it easier for the volunteers.

This may not work, there are teams with launchers that would obliterate last years net.

[mgurgol]

Disabled robots may be used to gain an assist by having the ball deflect off them. An alliance is at a large disadvantage in gaining assist points if one of their robots become disabled.

Many matches in Central Illinois had disabled robots, and the alliance was only able to obtain a maximum of two assists.

[Carolyn_Grace]

Originally Posted by Mark Sheridan

Bring back the 2013's safety net. I hope FIRST still has some. It would ease the burden of returning the ball to play. Only the human players stand inside, and there are openings to impound the ball at the start of the cycle. Also put a net behind the goals to catch shots and make it easier for the volunteers.

This may not work, there are teams with launchers that would obliterate last years net.

The nets would been to be seriously reinforced physically. They fell down often enough when just a small frisbee hit them. Imagine a huge ball, going 30 ft per second? The whole system would collapse, especially if one hit a pole.

[themccannman]

Reduce G40 to a foul. Make the field barrier the line not to cross. It's incredibly hard for human players to keep their hands behind the safety zone. If you stand with your heels at the back of the box and stick your arms out straight in front of you your arms cross the edge of the safety zone, that's silly.

Refs need to be reallocated. They have too much to do and frequently forget to relight the pedestal until teams remind them.

[sodizzle]

As it's been stated before, the refs need to be better trained in certain situations like forcing a penalty and they need to freed of most of their responsibility. It's absurd to try and make the referees watch up to 6 robots and keep score and keep track of assists and keep track of penalties and keep track of pins and keep track of the pedestal and... the list goes on.

Scorekeepers are absolutely needed. The referees have too much on their plate and it was very apparent. Missed calls after missed calls, with a thrown in miscalled call. These people are volunteering. We might have all forgotten that recently.

[Anthony Galea]

Here's a new one, but it's not something game breaking:

Original text:

If an ALLIANCE’s BALL becomes stuck in an ALLIANCE’S ROBOT, the ALLIANCE may signal to the Head Referee that the BALL is “dead” by holding the yellow “DEAD BALL” placard against the DRIVER STATION acrylic.

I feel that if a disabled robot on any alliance is blocking the path to the ball, preventing a team from reaching the ball, a dead ball should be able to be called. It happened at least once during qualifications, where one of our alliance members lost communication about a quarter of the way through the match, and we spent the rest of the match trying to retrieve the ball. I know it isn't major, but we lost a qualification match due to that.

[pandamonium]

1.
I was looking at the different definitions of possession and this seemed to be ignored both for the alliance and when the opponent did it.

“trapping” (overt isolation or holding one or more BALLS against a FIELD element or ROBOT in an attempt to shield them).

Perhaps add a time much like the pinning rules like the ball needs to be held for approximately X seconds. Perhaps I am interpreting this incorrectly but I saw tons of robots pressing the balls against robots and field elements and no possession called.

2. G25
ROBOTS on the same ALLIANCE may not blockade the FIELD in an attempt to stop the flow of the MATCH. This rule has no effect on individual ROBOT-ROBOT interaction.

The defense in many cases was intense and if two robots were defending one it seemed to me to be bordering on blockading. I suggest that they expand on this to limit defense to 1 on 1 defense.

2 robots ganging up on one just is not fun.

3. add a coopertition bonus:
If an alliance achieves 60 or more assist points in a match they receive a bonus. The assist value seems too low in point values considering that is what the game is named after!