Is Defense Back in a Big (Bad) Way?

[Brian C]

While your opponents defensive strategy is always something to be concerned with when planning your offensive moves and this years game does indeed provide for some interesting scenarios.

I believe this year will see a very steep learning curve in Robot Robustness for those teams that have never competed in a game like this. There are many teams out there that have never had to deal with conditions they will see this year. To me this harkens back a decade ago when bumpers were first optional and even further back when there was indeed a fair amount of robot to robot contact.

I expect to see lots of loose parts strewn about on the field and at least a battery or 2 or 3

I have a hunch the broken parts box we keep on the scorers table at the competitions this year may need to be a tad bigger than in recent years.

[Keefe2471]

Originally Posted by tindleroot

I've been noticing similar trends about defense (and maybe Karthik has too?).

As far as I've seen low, ranged shooting robots are going to be extremely common since those designs can easily cross the low bar and shoot in the high goal. However, there is an inherent flaw in that design in that given how long it takes vision (or manual alignment) to line up a shot, those robots can easily be blocked by a tall robot or by a pool noodle blocker. And, if a robot has a decent drivetrain but a poor scoring mechanism, they can play this role in a match and be extremely effective.

Winning in quals is more important than the other ranking points since winning is worth 2 RP, plus you deny the opponent 2 ranking points, which helps you advance farther than the competition. I can guarantee that any smart alliance will do their best to shut down a high-potential scoring robot if it is easy to stop them, as is the case with the low-shooting robots. This will happen in both quals and elims, and it will definitely happen if the team in question is high-ranked.

I agree with this. I would add that I don't think defense is going to be as difficult to play as people think. The Refs have (at any competition i was at) emphasized exactly how pinning will be called and what to look for to avoid committing the foul. The only other penalty that defenders will have to look out for is G43;

ROBOTS on the same half of the FIELD as their ALLIANCE TOWER may not interfere withopponent ROBOTS attempting to traverse OUTER WORKS (regardless of direction). A ROBOT isconsidered traversing the opponent’s OUTER WORKS if any part of its BUMPERS are within theopponent’s OUTER WORKS and no part of it is in their opponent’s SECRET PASSAGE.

If defense is played between the outer works and the tower (which will be an effective spot to block low shooters and interfere with short range shooters attempting to reach the batter), it will be played 10-15 feet in front of the alliance station. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acDqfZZLWV8 POV from a human player at a real field week zero if you want to see how easy it will be for drivers to see their robots. They should be able to see all the edges of the defenses marking the "safe zone". The vision advantage and the need to protect the secret passage from poaching should make a defense robot very powerful (if not required) in eliminations at most of the regionals and districts.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by Brian C

I expect to see lots of loose parts strewn about on the field and at least a battery or 2 or 3

Yep

[GeeTwo]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

I hope teams considered how often are they would get 2 rank points in a match they lose in their strategy.

We definitely targeted our strategy at the non-zero-sum breach and capture rank points at least as heavily as the WLT points. We may well be in the minority.

One of our top design goals was a solo BREACH in case we show up to a match with partners who have negligible scoring capability. This was actually the most important reason we decided to do the low bar; it's easier and faster to cross solo than the category C doors.

[CTbiker105]

Originally Posted by mrnoble

I am very concerned about broken bots on the field and in the pits.

Here, here. A lot of teams at week 0 events could easily manage getting over defense after defense, but that was largely without any opposing robots playing defense. I saw only a handful of bots that seemed robust enough to withstand the damage they'll most likely receive during an actual competition.

[MooreteP]

It's the Playoffs now, not Eliminations.
A kinder, gentler FIRST.

That being said, defense. The opposing Drive team will have the advantage with a very clear view of their actions.

Breaching the Outer Works will guarantee an RP.
Must do this, and can't be prevented from this task by defensive action.
Three Robots crossing a defense in Auto would be 30 points.
Crossing the rest of them in tele-op could be worth another 30 for 60 total.
You can't ignore these points that a a defense cannot stop. No boulder holding required.

Best score from scoring in the high goal on the tower is 60 in autonomous and 25 in tele-op for 85 points. (assuming no two boulder autonomous, just enough to weaken the tower, both of these may change, I know....) But with an effective defense, this becomes 10 in the low goal, which equals 70.

If after that, you can capture the tower, which can't be stopped by defense the score increases by an additional 15 for 3 Robots on the batter, up to 45 if each of them can scale.

Defense IS back in a big GOOD way.

A good defense can prevent a tower capture, which could lead to a scoring advantage of 25 in the playoffs.

The math is making my head spin.
I am loving this game.
God Bless the referees.

[BrennanB]

Originally Posted by Mr. Lim

I'm a bit worried that boulder scores might be awkwardly low in any match where there's a defense robot - unless one of the elite teams is on the field.

Basically this. But that's been pretty much what I thought from day 1. Any mediocre defense can shut down/significantly slow down the average team. It's even worse than 2010 though because of the close proximity of scoring objectives. If you are a close shooter/lowgoaler you have to outplay the defender significantly to have a chance of getting around them. There are however protected zones, and some teams will have had the foresight to tune/design/play the game on that idea.

There are still some clever things that teams can do to overcome this, and I don't think it's a fault of the game really, just adds some strategical depth to the matches. People will probably catch on to the easiest ones end of week 1/mid week 2.

What I am most curious about is the robot driving up robot action. Likely flips and such. What about these penalties? Robot frame rule?

There is plenty of defensive meta that people aren't thinking about, and as that slowly comes out I think people will have to adapt even further from the basic courtyard defense. Very excited to see what I think is a very even playing field for alliances, much like 2014 was. I suspect we shall see some very successful low seeded alliances taking out the big guys.

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by tindleroot

I've been noticing similar trends about defense (and maybe Karthik has too?).

As far as I've seen low, ranged shooting robots are going to be extremely common since those designs can easily cross the low bar and shoot in the high goal. However, there is an inherent flaw in that design in that given how long it takes vision (or manual alignment) to line up a shot, those robots can easily be blocked by a tall robot or by a pool noodle blocker. And, if a robot has a decent drivetrain but a poor scoring mechanism, they can play this role in a match and be extremely effective.

Winning in quals is more important than the other ranking points since winning is worth 2 RP, plus you deny the opponent 2 ranking points, which helps you advance farther than the competition. I can guarantee that any smart alliance will do their best to shut down a high-potential scoring robot if it is easy to stop them, as is the case with the low-shooting robots. This will happen in both quals and elims, and it will definitely happen if the team in question is high-ranked.

You hit the nail on the head. I can see a team with a great linear shooter who is low, get shut down because they could not forsee this. This especially for teams that did not experience previous games such as 2010, 2012, and 2014.
However, more experienced teams that chose to go low understood this, and made sure a max 54" robot or pool noodle blocker was ineffective in blocking their "arching" shot.
148's reveal is an example of such a robot.

[Michael Rossi]

From the Pittsburgh practice field. The strategy was very much based around breaking all defenses then shooting. After all the defenses where broken what would happen was the 2 best shooters went to the opponents courtyard. While the third robot shuttled boulders underneath the lowbar while playing some light defense. So while defense is back if you have at least 2 robots in your opponents courtyard it should minimilize defensive effectiveness.

[Citrus Dad]

A couple of points of how defense differs this year from the 2012-14 period. The first is that it is much more difficult to flow from offensive to defensive ends of the field. A robot is less likely to spend time defending as part of their scoring cycle. With a good HP feed, they may not need to go beyond the neutral zone, and may be able to poach balls in the front court.

The second is the limit of one defender. A 3 on 1 attack will minimize defensive effectiveness. Yes the defender might focus on the best scoring robot, but the truth is that the better scorer will be able to outdrive the robot left behind to defend. (The only exception might be in the Champs Subdivision finals and on Einstein. But then all 3 offensive bots will be highly effective.)

We'll see how the defenses play out. This will be a much different flavor than recent games though.

[Conor Ryan]

Speaking of Penalties, with all the field elements, will the Referees have Line of Sight issues?

[IronicDeadBird]

Originally Posted by Citrus Dad

A couple of points of how defense differs this year from the 2012-14 period. The first is that it is much more difficult to flow from offensive to defensive ends of the field. A robot is less likely to spend time defending as part of their scoring cycle. With a good HP feed, they may not need to go beyond the neutral zone, and may be able to poach balls in the front court.

The second is the limit of one defender. A 3 on 1 attack will minimize defensive effectiveness. Yes the defender might focus on the best scoring robot, but the truth is that the better scorer will be able to outdrive the robot left behind to defend. (The only exception might be in the Champs Subdivision finals and on Einstein. But then all 3 offensive bots will be highly effective.)

We'll see how the defenses play out. This will be a much different flavor than recent games though.

The 1 defender limit exists only in the courtyard.