Should the Number One seed be Alloud to pick the Number Two seed?

[c.shu]

If your two teams managed to place first and second. I would say they both deserve to win. Not just one of them.

[BrennanB]

Originally Posted by SpaceBiz

Ok, so don't do any wild card....

The wildcard system is the best thing that has happened to FIRST in a very long time. Especially in Canada (As you gave Waterloo for an example). Wildcards are awesome!

I think part of what you are saying is that the 24th pick gets a free ride and that these teams perhaps aren't as deserving as say, the 5th best robot who may not qualify because they are just out of wildcard spot.

Instead I will give you a few examples of teams that have been 3rd picks at Canadian regional and 1325 - Inverse Paradox is a great example.

1325 was a team that wasn't really a top contender for eliminations for many years. They were finalists at GTR W in 2011 as a third pick, but they were largely unselected at events that they attended. In 2013 they were selected by 2056 and 1114 at GTR E and won the event, and then attended world championships for their first ever time. 2014 they significantly stepped up their game fielding a very competitive robot, captaining the 8th seed at GTRE, and being drafted in the other two events that they attended in 2014. While they did not qualify for champs again, they did attend a 26 hour offseason event (WVROX) and came out winners as second pick overall. As some may have noticed in 2015 they captained the 6th seed at GTR C and 2nd seed at GTR E, where they went to the finals with some very close matches against a heavily favored #1 seed, and won the chairman award. Talk about inspiration!

Not to mention the many, many other teams that I have seen inspired by qualifying for champs, that I have seen a huge impact on their students, and their team as a whole. Like 5076, 4914, and 2198 from 2014. Hey, who can forget the rookie 4814 who won as a 3rd with 1114/2056 at GTRW 2013 and went on to captain the number 3 alliance on Curie and take it all the way to the division finals with 3 matches. They had a largely successful 2014 season being knocked out in the semis at Windsor in 3 against the powerhouse 1285/1241 combo. 865 3rd robot at Waterloo 2014 has a very impressive machine this year. 4069 Waterloo 2013, went on to captain the 7th seed at North bay in 2014 and pulled upset after upset and nearly took the finals to a 3rd match. 4001 of 2012 has been fielding better and better robots every year and recently went to the finals at GTC. 3756 Waterloo 2011, has a unbelievable season in 2012, and has been putting out great robots ever since.

There are so many examples, and heck that's just Ontario.

[Knufire]

Don't bring the top down. Instead, bring the bottom up.

[Chief Hedgehog]

Originally Posted by BrennanB

The wildcard system is the best thing that has happened to FIRST in a very long time. Especially in Canada (As you gave Waterloo for an example). Wildcards are awesome!

I think part of what you are saying is that the 24th pick gets a free ride and that these teams perhaps aren't as deserving as say, the 5th best robot who may not qualify because they are just out of wildcard spot.

I have to say that in the MN NorthStar regional this is especially true. If the stars align - the entire Finalist Alliance could be wildcarded to the Championships. In other words, there could be 9 different teams from North Star that make it to championships. With the RAS, CA, and EI - 3 different teams could make it. If by chance 2826, 3130, and 2220 end up on the same alliance and win it, then the entire Finalist alliance could get wildcarded. Or if the 2826/3130/2220 alliance ends up as finalist - well a horse a piece.

The wildcard makes for a great selection process as well as allowing great teams an outside shot at championships where they can do damage.

[artdutra04]

Originally Posted by SpaceBiz

Silly me.

I forgot my main point (woke up at 5:20 for greater dc reigonal today)

There are about 55 regionals
There are now 600 spots at the championship
There were 400 last year, so 200 extra

Insted of giving them to random teams, give them to the 1 through 4 seeds. 55×4 minus the teams that are in 1 thru 4 that also win the competition is less than the 200 extra spots created by the new format.

They don't win the event, just a guaranteed spot at worlds, which they deserve.

Your main point is already solved. The solution is called districts.

In districts, your team earns points based on a number of factors, but most heavily on robot performance. You get a lot of points for being high seeded alliance captains or the first picked team. The points you earn are used to both advance to District Championship, as well as for winning open slots to the World Championshp.

At each District Championship, there are a number of open merit-based slots allocated to teams based upon their points, given to teams in descending order of total points. So if you are a #3 alliance captain at one district event, a first pick by the #2 alliance in a second district, and you make decent progress into the playoff bracket at both districts and the District Championship event, you'll likely earn enough points to qualify for an open spot to the World Championship even if you never come home with a blue banner.

[RunawayEngineer]

Originally Posted by PVCpirate

Here are some numbers, do with them what you will:

2015 Event Wins By Seed
1   42 wins   63%
2   11 wins   16%
3    3 wins    4%
4    2 wins    3%
5    4 wins    6%
6    5 wins    7%

67 total events, no 7 or 8 seed has won an event yet.

This is amazing to me.
I thought that in previous years, the #1 seed won close to 90% of events. If anything, I would have thought the QA ranking would give even more power to the #1 seed.

[tindleroot]

Originally Posted by RunawayEngineer

This is amazing to me.
I thought that in previous years, the #1 seed won close to 90% of events. If anything, I would have thought the QA ranking would give even more power to the #1 seed.

A little surprised that 7 and 8 have never won. At one of our districts the #7 seed was a finalist, and at the other the #8 seed was a finalist and won the first match in the finals against #1 seed.

[Loose Screw]

I thought we already had a discussion about letting the 8th seed get the first pick?

Anyways, while it is true that #1 picking #2 will win most events, I think at higher levels of play (FIM States, Worlds) we'll see teams pick robots that better suit their playstyle. If a chute door robot seeds 1, their priority would be to pick a RC-focused robot rather than another chute door feeder. If a landfill robot can clear the whole landfill and seeds 1, they won't pick another landfill bot even if they are ranked #2.

[rsegrest]

Several years ago I made the same observations and had the same feelings as the OP. I too questioned the alliance selection process in elims and proposed altering it. What many of us (esp those of us who have only come to FIRST in the past 5 – 10 years) may not know is that there was a time when alliance selection was very different. EricH had some interesting history and I think it bears reposting here.

Originally Posted by EricH

I prefer to say that you are attempting to repeat history (and should you succeed, the traditional "doomed" will apply in big, bold letters). I think I would much rather deal with powerhouses forming within the top 8/multi-regional winners than deal with teams throwing matches to drop out of the top 8.

In 2001, FIRST didn't just prohibit the top 8 from picking each other. They REQUIRED it. There were only 4 alliances of 5 teams in the eliminations (1 backup team), but at regionals, the top 4 were assigned the next 4, in order. (At Nationals, it was the top 2 in a division.) Rumors of match-fixing (in a 4v0, it's not throwing) to drop out of the top 8 abounded, by all accounts. Or to secure your position within the top 8.

This had about the same effect as disallowing picking within the top 8 would have. It's not necessarily difficult to intentionally lose a match and make it look like an accident--not that anybody necessarily would, but it wouldn't be surprising, at least to me.

As far as the multi-event winners and the single-event teams, I think the solution is coming. District events give each team two events (and thus two chances for that banner, playing against different teams most likely). The Wild Card gives Championship bids to teams who do very well but come up just short when a multi-event winner is playing already.

Not allowing a team to compete as an AC when they've earned the spot by seeding is problematic. Do you treat it as a decline, and bar the team from eliminations altogether? (insert your own uproar here) Do you prevent them from being a captain, but allow them to be picked? (Guess who will probably be in one of the top 3 alliances by selection.) Do you force them to be a 2nd-round pick? (See above, but now it's bottom 3.) If the team chooses not to compete as an AC, then presumably they've withdrawn from competition--but that's their choice to make.

Am including the link for your reference. Hope this sheds more light and that minds wiser than mine can come up with better answers.

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/showthread.php?t=116848&page=3&highlight=alliance+ selection

[Lij2015]

Originally Posted by BrennanB

The wildcard system is the best thing that has happened to FIRST in a very long time. Especially in Canada (As you gave Waterloo for an example). Wildcards are awesome!

Agreed! The wild card system is allowing for 7 teams to be sent to championships from the VA regional. Team 384 generated 3 spots(winning a chairman's, the regional, and a 2014 Gallileo EI) and sent two members of the finalist alliance to Champs along with the VA EI winner (4481).

It allows for teams to dominate their regionals and not hog championship slots like has happened in the past.

[iVanDuzer]

Originally Posted by SpaceBiz

Ok, so don't do any wild card, and only give a ALMOST guarenteed spot to top THREE teams, giving you 495/401 spots.

Ok, first off, by eliminating the Wildcard, you are saying that playing well in Qualifications (ie seeding high) is more important than actually performing in the Playoffs (ie actually assembling an alliance that plays a strategy and then executing that strategy). You are saying that your chances to qualify for Champs is heavily based on having a favourable schedule, rather than performing in a high-pressure environment. What if a 7th-seed alliance makes it to the finals and gets a wildcard slot?

Also, to expand on Brennan's excellent post above...

The Wildcard is a fantastic and amazing innovation and has completely changed the culture of FIRST in Canada. In the years before the Wildcard (and when there was only 2 regionals in Canada), there was a LOT of toxicity in the community at large towards 1114 and 2056. Being on one of those teams as a student, I experienced the following: boos during Alliance Selections, snide glances every other weekend, offhand yet actually hurtful remarks (your robot was built by mentors), and way more angry posts on Chief Delphi. A lot of this hate came from middle-of-the-pack teams, teams that knew that no matter what they did, they couldn't get to World's because 4 of the 6 qualifying slots from Canada were taken up by two teams.

Then the Wildcard system came in, and there was a change almost overnight. No more boos at Alliance Selections! People were actually cheering during Eliminations! Some prominent posters on CD who were quite anti-1114/2056 suddenly became some of their biggest supporters. Teams actually got way better because suddenly, they didn't have to beat 1114/2056 (an incredibly daunting task), they just had to beat everyone else (still daunting, but way more manageable).

At the aforementioned Waterloo Regional, all six teams that were in the finals qualified for the Championship Event. Before the Wildcard, only four of those teams would have qualified. The Wildcard allows teams that were oh-so-close from actually winning the competition to go to Worlds, to get inspired, to talk to the best teams in the world, and to get the tools and insight they need to become better teams. Hopefully they won't need the Wildcard next year, because they'll be the teams that win.

[philso]

The second letter in FIRST is for Inspiration. It does not make this program more inspiring to handicap #1 and #2 in eliminations. It is inspiring to watch #1 and #2 work together and perform to very high levels, possibly higher than seen before at that tournament. It is even more inspiring, though infrequent, when a lower ranked alliance digs deep and wins against an alliance containing #1 and #2 (i.e. Galileo 2013).

[Bongle]

Originally Posted by SpaceBiz

Ok, more so in the game this year, but it seems the first seed alliances who select the second seed are winning every regional. Is it just me or does it seem like this is not really in the spirit of FIRST?

If the two best teams almost always win together, why let them do it every single time? It makes it really hard, or at least overwhelmingly unlikely, for the number 7 or 8 eliminations alliance to win, while one lucky team that gets picked by the number 1 alliance in the second round basically gets a free ticket to worlds?

A perfect example of this is 1114 and 2056 at the waterloo regional. Their elim alliance scored about double that of the seccond best alliance.

Think about that.

1114 and 2056 would have both possibly made the finals each in an alliance by themselves. And the rules allow them to be in the same alliance together.

I think the number one through four seeded teams should not be allowed to pick each other. Thoughts?

See post 22 for the part of the argument I forgot.

(This post in no way represents the views of team 2537 as a whole. It is only an opinion of one of its members)

Ontarian here: You mean that it's possible for any alliance other than the #1 alliance to win? What a strange concept...

Joking about the unstoppability of 1114/2056 aside, I think things are fine the way they are. I agree with the others that this would just cause pre-planned diving/throwing of matches. For those that say it'd never happen, look back to 2012 when wilful unbalancing of coopertition bridges was a thing. Heck, even this year you hear of people refusing to cooperate in attempts to affect the ratings.

The combination of this year's qualification system and the wildcards made this year feel like the fairest chance a non-elite-but-still-strong team had of qualifying for CMP in forever. If you were a good alliance, you could make it to finals and pick up some wildcards without having to worry about getting steamrollered in quarters or semis because of an unfavourable bracket.

[CalTran]

Originally Posted by RunawayEngineer

This is amazing to me.
I thought that in previous years, the #1 seed won close to 90% of events. If anything, I would have thought the QA ranking would give even more power to the #1 seed.

Haha on this note, people should check out Greater KC's matches. Everyone there, myself included, at the end of Selections thought that 1730 and 1806 were going to run away with the Blue Banner, but out of seemingly no where (actually just excellent scouting), the #6 Alliance put together teams that could not only keep up with their score, but exceed it during the Finals and take the regional.

[hrench]

I agree that it seems unfair, but someone pointed out to me the best rationale for this is your regional doesn't want to send less than the best to Championships...that second seed team may be the second best robot at the regional and if they don't end up at Champs, you'll be represented less well. These teams represent Your regional.

Also I realize that the statistics are way-in favor of the 1-2 seed team winning, but it doesn't always happen. At Greater Kansas City this year, I watch Team Driven 1730 pick SWAT 1806, the second seed and that group (with 1777) seemed to be dominating when they went on to be defeated in the finals by the SIXTH seed. Congratulations to 1785, 1723 and 1710.