2015 IRI Invitation List

[Coach Norm]

FRC 2468 Appreciates the opportunity to compete at IRI again.

We are looking forward to seeing old friends and meeting/making new friends.

It is going to be a blast to be on the field with some many high quality teams as it always is at IRI.

[mwmac]

Team Tators greatly appreciate the invitation from the selection committee to participate for a second time in the IRI tournament. We look forward to playing with some of our old friends and meeting new ones.

PS. Coach Norm, we are bringing Stoller....

[Bennett548]

548
1023
1711

Cool to see the whole Michigan State Championship winning alliance made it on the invite list. It doesn't look like any of the other districts have all three winning alliance members going.

Makes me wonder if there are any regional winning alliances that will all be there together.

[SoccerTaco]

Team 3824 can't wait to stack some trash cans with ya'll.

Steve


(That statement would sound so weird outside of FIRSTville...)

[Cory]

Originally Posted by AndrewPospeshil

Congrats to all the teams who've been accepted! I know this year will be a great event as usual.

One thing I noticed is the absence of a few powerhouse teams - namely 254 and 987. I heard that 987 will be in China during this time; I assume the Poofs are also committed or simply won't be traveling so far this time, seeing as they didn't send in an application. Regardless, there's still an incredible number of powerhouse teams from around the globe on this list, and I'm excited to see all of them once again!

We're not busy. Unfortunately this game sucks and is not worth the added expense (and time off work, for mentors) to travel to Indiana for.

We will miss seeing our friends and look forward to a game worth playing, so we can see them next year!

[MARS_James]

Originally Posted by Cory

We're not busy. Unfortunately this game sucks and is not worth the added expense

Man this quote should be included in the history book when talking about this game

[seg9585]

Originally Posted by Cory

We're not busy. Unfortunately this game sucks and is not worth the added expense (and time off work, for mentors) to travel to Indiana for.

Wow, after all that work you guys put into re-vamping your robot for SVR and then Champs, suddenly the game is not worth playing!

Everyone's entitled to their opinion I guess, but that's definitely not an attitude I've encouraged students to have when participating in any engineering challenge, regardless of how interesting the project is. Definitely couldn't get away with saying that at an engineering job even if the project isn't the most interesting you've worked.

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by seg9585

Wow, after all that work you guys put into re-vamping your robot for SVR and then Champs, suddenly the game is not worth playing!

I can imagine the conversation went something like this:

254 Student 1: "Hey man, want to spend thousands of dollars to fly out to middle-of-nowhere Indiana, do the same thing on the field that we've been doing in the shop for 4 months, and then maybe loose in the end because some kid can throw a fun noodle further than 35 feet?"

254 Student 2: "Not really..."

254 Student 1: "Yeah, me either..."

[Mike Marandola]

Originally Posted by seg9585

Wow, after all that work you guys put into re-vamping your robot for SVR and then Champs, suddenly the game is not worth playing!

Everyone's entitled to their opinion I guess, but that's definitely not an attitude I've encouraged students to have when participating in any engineering challenge, regardless of how interesting the project is. Definitely couldn't get away with saying that at an engineering job even if the project isn't the most interesting you've worked.

The thing is that it's an off season event which is 2000 miles away from them, that costs real money and time to attend.

[artK]

Originally Posted by seg9585

Wow, after all that work you guys put into re-vamping your robot for SVR and then Champs, suddenly the game is not worth playing!

254 knew they would be attending CVR, SVR, and Champs (qualified by winning champs last year and Hall of Fame) before the game was released. To back out of a regular season event because of the game would be silly.

Picking which offseasons to attend is like choosing which regionals/districts to attend. Some teams (359, 341, and 233 come to mind), choose to travel across the country for regionals. Why? Because they believe travelling would benefit their program and the students within it, despite the additional costs of travel. 254's decision to not apply to IRI demonstrates that they believe the costs outweigh the benefits (It's almost like the decision was made by a bunch of engineers). Should they attend other offseason events, it would because the cost benefit analysis comes out with positive results.

[MARS_James]

Originally Posted by artK

254 knew they would be attending CVR, SVR, and Champs (qualified by winning champs last year)

They are hall of fame they qualify every year

[seg9585]

Originally Posted by artK

254's decision to not apply to IRI demonstrates that they believe the costs outweigh the benefits (It's almost like the decision was made by a bunch of engineers). Should they attend other offseason events, it would because the cost benefit analysis comes out with positive results.

Yes, and what you describe is the cost benefit analysis we used when we decided not to go to Champs this year (we had a wild card spot). And deciding not to go for the reason of cost/time is perfectly reasonable, rather than saying "this game sucks so we're not going".

Obviously the cost-benefit analysis from prior years led to the decision to go, and Cory even followed up with the plan to attend next year in anticipation of a more positive cost-benefit analysis. With all else the same, that leaves the single variable here as "this game sucks" as the reason they are not attending. So be it, doesn't really matter. Just hope this doesn't translate to several years in a row of the same decision point because the game didn't meet the team's hopes and desires.

[SenorZ]

Originally Posted by Cory

We're not busy. Unfortunately this game sucks and is not worth the added expense

Great advertisement for Chezy Champs...

[AGPapa]

Originally Posted by SenorZ

Great advertisement for Chezy Champs...

Chezy Champs has a dramatically different rule set than IRI. I'd also be shocked if any team from Indiana flew across the country to compete there.

[The other Gabe]

Originally Posted by AGPapa

Chezy Champs has a dramatically different rule set than IRI. I'd also be shocked if any team from Indiana flew across the country to compete there.

I wouldnt say dramatically different. I'd say goes further than IRI in changing the game.

on an unrelated note, I'm sad to see no PNW teams, but that's probably a cost/distance issue (I imagine we'll see a few at Cheezy Champz)