Future First Championship News

[MrRoboSteve]

Some things to think about.

1. An event can get too big for any one city to support, hotel-wise.

2. Recruiting enough volunteers for our style of event in one city can be an issue. I know I've been hit up several times to sign up to volunteer at champs.

3. Having >1 champs is consistent with FIRST's mission around reach

4. This could be a first step toward a multi-tier playoff model leading back to a single championship in the future.

5. There's nothing about this that can't be changed back to a single event in 2021. At that point, though, you'll have teams used to 1000ish slots for Champs and complaints that it reduces access.

6. Having 2 events does increase the number of teams within driving distance, particularly the DET event. The west coast would not be a logical second location, if you are using driving distance as your metric. If the model is successful, I'd expect a championship in California to follow. Houston is a curious choice for the second location if you use transportation costs as a metric; I'm wondering whether there were facility availability reasons for that, as 2017 not very far away in the world of venue scheduling.

7. I could see 1,000 spots for champs in 2017 (600 in STL and 400 in DET)

8. I'm glad that they're willing to try something new, even if in the end it turns out to be less successful than expected.

[Munchskull]

I was waiting for a late April Fools...

This is just not right.

[BigJ]

Well, I can only hope that we qualify for the last real world championship (for now)...

[The other Gabe]

I'm just surprised that they couldnt put FLL & FTC at one event, FRC at the other.

I'd also like to see a "super finals" where the winners of the two Championships face off to crown the true world champ.

seeing my question addressed and having that second thing happen would make me OK with this

[DCA Fan]

You want to burn out key volunteers? This is how you burn out key volunteers.

I don't get the whole "geographic convenience" thing - sounds more like an excuse than an actual fact - my costs, coming from California, certainly won't be going down any. Frankly, if they were shooting for geography, they should've gone east-west.

While I'm excited that more teams will be able to participate, I thought that was what the 8 divisions was for. Did we outgrow that model before it even had a chance to show itself?

[AlecMataloni]

I hate this.

I hate this so much.

Never have I ever questioned my involvement in this program more than I have now. Taking the community and slicing it in half may have benefits, but they are absolutely outweighed by the negatives. I don't even know where to begin.

I hope this nonsense is short lived. Otherwise, I'll be finding a different program to invest my time in.

[Eugene Fang]

Originally Posted by AlecMataloni

Taking the community and slicing it in half may have benefits, but they are absolutely outweighed by the negatives. I don't even know where to begin.

This. I don't always attend champs, but when I do, I look forward to catching up with familiar faces from across the country. With this change, I would have to choose seeing one half over the other each year.

[CalTran]

FIRST is 80% of why I even have friends around the country and internationally, and now if I want to see them I'd have to set aside 2 weekends plus whatever else I'm mentoring and volunteering for? Good grief.
On top of this, you only become the best of the half of whatever first deems you the best of. I don't like the split, I don't like the doubling down on awards, and I don't like how much of a hassle this will be.

At what point do they announce which championship you get to go to? A lot of teams, mine included, set aside plans in the fall on where we would stay, how much it'll cost, and how we're going to get to the Championships. Now that we potentially have to create 2 separate plans, one possibly costing more, would be such a pain.

At the very least, since one "Championship" is a week ahead of the other, what're the chances they could bring the winning alliance from that one to the one after for a crowning match?

[Boltman]

Originally Posted by CalTran

FIRST is 80% of why I even have friends around the country and internationally, and now if I want to see them I'd have to set aside 2 weekends plus whatever else I'm mentoring and volunteering for? Good grief.
On top of this, you only become the best of the half of whatever first deems you the best of. I don't like the split, I don't like the doubling down on awards, and I don't like how much of a hassle this will be.

At what point do they announce which championship you get to go to? A lot of teams, mine included, set aside plans in the fall on where we would stay, how much it'll cost, and how we're going to get to the Championships. Now that we potentially have to create 2 separate plans, one possibly costing more, would be such a pain.

At the very least, since one "Championship" is a week ahead of the other, what're the chances they could bring the winning alliance from that one to the one after for a crowning match?

Would not be fair would it?... two different preferred pools what if one even is super easy in comparison...that winning alliance would have been weeded out. Its all about pairings and when you only half half or so of a pool all champions are suspect....even more so than the usual preferred qualification pool seeding to get well know teams an edge.

Just look at top bot alliance qualification partners and you will see this in action...cream rises to top by "random" design. Less known teams always have a harder road in quals due to this qual alliance pairing in action. You don't notice it until you do.

[Hallry]

I would much rather have gone the Super Regional --> World Championship route...

[Kpchem]

Originally Posted by Hallry

I would much rather have gone the Super Regional --> World Championship route...

I'd completely forgotten about this! I remember seeing this when it was first released and I loved the concept, even if the regions seemed to be too large in some places.

What happened to this, and has it ever been discussed that this wasn't the plan (until now)?

[jlmcmchl]

Originally Posted by Kpchem

I'd completely forgotten about this! I remember seeing this when it was first released and I loved the concept, even if the regions seemed to be too large in some places.

What happened to this, and has it ever been discussed that this wasn't the plan (until now)?

On the Contrary, this seems to be a step towards Super Regionals; FIRST is introducing the North and South Super Regional as Championships for now. There's just not enough teams that would get a berth from super regionals to justify a championship smaller than both of them.

Once FRC has expanded to justify the addition of the East and West Super Regionals, they will add those, and reinstate a true championship.

Change hurts, and I my own concerns about the system for the time being, but I'm excited for the path they are taking towards a more scalable system.

[JohnSchneider]

Originally Posted by jlmcmchl

On the Contrary, this seems to be a step towards Super Regionals; FIRST is introducing the North and South Super Regional as Championships for now. There's just not enough teams that would get a berth from super regionals to justify a championship smaller than both of them.

Once FRC has expanded to justify the addition of the East and West Super Regionals, they will add those, and reinstate a true championship.

Change hurts, and I my own concerns about the system for the time being, but I'm excited for the path they are taking towards a more scalable system.

Where are you getting your info? Inside guy?

Because in my opinion it would have made more sense to actually start the super-regional structure instead... and have the framework in place for future growth always under 1 championship. Not multiple championships....

[Drakxii]

Originally Posted by jlmcmchl

On the Contrary, this seems to be a step towards Super Regionals; FIRST is introducing the North and South Super Regional as Championships for now. There's just not enough teams that would get a berth from super regionals to justify a championship smaller than both of them.

Once FRC has expanded to justify the addition of the East and West Super Regionals, they will add those, and reinstate a true championship.

Change hurts, and I my own concerns about the system for the time being, but I'm excited for the path they are taking towards a more scalable system.

I feel that FIRST could make a super regional system with 600 teams without much a problem...

[mwmac]

I was eagerly awaiting the release of division assignments for 2015 when this news broke. Now I am waiting to see how the 2017 Championship assignments will work in our favor monetarily. Will the trailer get dragged to Houston (1939 miles) or Detroit (1963 miles) vs. St. Louis (1626 miles)? Already counting the money Tators will save with this change...

BTW, can't wait to see the design for the FRC World Championship Participant Trophy that will be coming in the KOP for 2017.

Very surprised that First HQ did not try to gauge public sentiment to such a sweeping change....