Don't Ban Can Battles in Offseasons

[Citrus Dad]

Originally Posted by Wayne TenBrink

If it were up to a vote, I would vote against banning the can battle. (I'm on the planning committee for WMRI, so I get a real vote there.)

Teams build the best machines they can to play the game they are dealt at kickoff. In a well designed game, it takes a well rounded variety of bots to form a winning alliance. By fundamentally changing a hardware-specific aspect of the game, you cut the legs out from under teams that built for that task. I understand that losing the can battle puts you in a big hole in short order, but if you aren't competitive then perhaps you built the wrong robot or picked the wrong alliance partners. This game isn't perfect, but it is what it is.

There are ways to address the valid safety concerns that don't involve throwing out the baby with the bath water. This isn't the first game where stored energy devices are a concern. FIRST does a good job promoting many aspects of safety. However, there is a lot of room for improvement regarding stored energy.

I generally would agree with your sentiment, e.g., not changing the 2012-14 games because of the design parameters. However, this year is different. We are perhaps the most salient example of a team that built targeting the middle cans (and 118 might be another example). But for the Capital City Classic we're adopting the IRI/Chezy Champs rules. We see it as a challenge for our team in the fall, but it also makes it more competitive for other teams as well. (I might have approached this differently by changing the scoring, e.g., giving only a double point bonus to RCs instead of triple.)