2015 Week Zero Lessons Learned

[JamesBrown]

Originally Posted by mega900997

The field at Suffield was not right for half the time. After lunch they fixed it but the human player station is supposed to be flipped. We brought this up to the FTA there and they decided to just play with it flipped. Also the noodles at the shakedown were not official ones, the ones used were stiffer then the official ones received in the KOP.

What do you mean it was flipped?

[Christopher149]

Originally Posted by JamesBrown

What do you mean it was flipped?

The chutes were on the "outside" of the field when they should have been on the "inside", ie they were farther from the driver stations than they should be.

[orangemoore]

Originally Posted by Christopher149

The chutes were on the "outside" of the field when they should have been on the "inside", ie they were farther from the driver stations than they should be.

You wouldn't happen to have a picture of what you mean?

[Christopher149]

Originally Posted by orangemoore

You wouldn't happen to have a picture of what you mean?

Compare the stream with the field drawings.

[orangemoore]

Originally Posted by Christopher149

Compare the stream with the field drawings.

So the Tote shoot was closer to the outer edge/wall than closer to the driver station, where it should be.

[Chief Hedgehog]

-The field is small - cluttered.
-The view from the driver stations become very limited quickly (especially if 3130 is on your alliance)
-Coopertition is key.
-Drivers will have to make those robots dance! Hope you get enough time to practice (or have a robot ballerina that can pirouette)!

*Plus many of the robots at CenturionKrawler (2472&2052) were the size of horses - ours included.

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by Chief Hedgehog

-The field is small - cluttered.
-The view from the driver stations become very limited quickly (especially if 3130 is on your alliance)

After practicing a while and making stacks, we realized quickly that it is very hard to see if you start making stacks in front of your driver station.
The field seems very small using just 1/2 of it.

Too bad we didnt get transparent totes!

One thing we noticed, where we made adjustments to our devices that grab the totes.....Some of the totes have tabs on the sides that are smashed in. We got them like that when shipped to us.
It makes a difference if teams are inserting "tabs" to grab/lift bins.
We are now accounting for it not knowing what kind of totes will be on the playing field at various events.

[jojoguy10]

The Corvallis (Oregon) High School Week 0 event went quite well for us!

Here are a couple things I noticed:

• The field does get quite messy
• There are some teams that specialize in one thing (e.g. just getting RC's)
• Getting totes from the feeder station is a lot easier than getting them from the Landfill (for our team)
• We were able to make 2 stacks of 3 totes (with an RC and litter) within the Teleop time
• Throwing the litter is pointless. It just gets on your side of the field and none of the robots we able to move it into the landfill
• Looking at the point above, I hope nobody will try to throw the litter and waste it (when they could go into RC's)
• For feeder station bots (like ours), it's hard to line up perfectly with the angle that the driver station is to the feeder

That's all I can think of for now. I think we learned a lot about strategies (e.g. working with specialized alliance partners to save steps) as well. Very informative!

[AlexD744]

Originally Posted by waialua359

One thing we noticed, where we made adjustments to our devices that grab the totes.....Some of the totes have tabs on the sides that are smashed in. We got them like that when shipped to us.
It makes a difference if teams are inserting "tabs" to grab/lift bins.
We are now accounting for it not knowing what kind of totes will be on the playing field at various events.

Can you elaborate on this? Do you have any pictures of what you're talking about?

[Chief Hedgehog]

From MN's Event today - I agree with some of your points, but have differing opinions on others.

1. Yes - the field will be a mess.
2. We had exactly '0' RC grapplers work (although 3130 had the apparatus - just didn't get to see it work). So if you are seeing success in your area, that means there is hope!
3. In our Week Zero a few had success with HP Loading zone - most were field pick-up without a lot of success.
4. Cycling (3-4 totes stacked) is difficult with most teams.
5. throwing litter can be effective if you practice. We had a lot of litter at the end of the day in each match.
6. Lining up with the HP Station is EXTREMELY difficult just using the perspective from the driver stations.

About 80% of the teams were Ri3d clones - many were Greenhorns. We did see a number with the Team Indiana forks.

Nice to see things working in the Pacific Northwest! Good Luck to your team this season!

Originally Posted by jojoguy10

The Corvallis (Oregon) High School Week 0 event went quite well for us!

Here are a couple things I noticed:

• The field does get quite messy
• There are some teams that specialize in one thing (e.g. just getting RC's)
• Getting totes from the feeder station is a lot easier than getting them from the Landfill (for our team)
• We were able to make 2 stacks of 3 totes (with an RC and litter) within the Teleop time
• Throwing the litter is pointless. It just gets on your side of the field and none of the robots we able to move it into the landfill
• Looking at the point above, I hope nobody will try to throw the litter and waste it (when they could go into RC's)
• For feeder station bots (like ours), it's hard to line up perfectly with the angle that the driver station is to the feeder

That's all I can think of for now. I think we learned a lot about strategies (e.g. working with specialized alliance partners to save steps) as well. Very informative!

[GeeTwo]

Originally Posted by AlexD744

Can you elaborate on this? Do you have any pictures of what you're talking about?

It sounds like he's talking about the misshapen tote flanges being discussed at the Warped Yellow Totes thread.

[MooreteP]

One more thought about Week Zero Events from the Suffield Shakedown:

With the new control system, we weren't able to use even FMS Lite.

A decision was made to do 5:00 minute matches, we scrapped the schedule, and basically did a filler line approach. Some Robots were on the field every 15 minutes.
While a longer match time doesn't prepare a drive team for the time constraints of an actual competition, this gave teams a substantial amount of practice throughout the day and every match had a full complement of 6 teams. Batteries were exhausted and mechanisms well tested in a match environment.

There was unanimous praise from the mentors and students for this approach.

[Alex2614]

This game is incredibly boring to watch... but I think most of us suspected that. Hopefully I'm proven wrong in the coming weeks.

[PayneTrain]

Possible strategy for week one events: get your human player to grab all 10 noodles at the beginning of the match and either a) clutch them and curl into the fetal position or b) jump into the can holding the noodles (potential G16) just to make sure no overzealous partner starts chucking them 5 feet in front of your HP station and damaging your calm.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by Alex2614

This game is incredibly boring to watch... but I think most of us suspected that. Hopefully I'm proven wrong in the coming weeks.

Proven Wrong