Are 8 play regional reasonable?

[Jaci]

Originally Posted by pilleya

Australia is a big country, there is currently only 1 regional, which is a week three event which is located in Sydney, on the otherside of the country from teams like 5333,5663 and 4788. For those teams to come to the regional in Sydney the only option is to fly as it is a 4000km(2500 mile) journey by road. Australia is roughly the same size as the USA, so it would be like travelling from the West Coast to New York to attend a regional, and flights are quite expensive because of this. Currently the other nearest regional is Hawaii and a few Australian teams attend, this year team 3132 competed at Northern Lights, and will compete at the Australian Regional and Hawaiian Regional in the coming weeks and team 4613 is competing at the Australian Regional and then the Western Canada Regional

As a member of 5333, I'm more than aware and agree. Over the next few years, we are planning to start more FRC teams in Western Australia, however I stick with my point that going to more than 1 regional is quite a hefty expense. Looking at the TBA page of the Australian Regional you can see that the large majority of teams do choose to only compete in the Australian Regional. For these teams, I'm sure you'd agree that only 8 matches to play (assuming they are not picked up in alliance selections) is very few

[pilleya]

Originally Posted by Jaci

For these teams, I'm sure you'd agree that only 8 matches to play (assuming they are not picked up in alliance selections) is very few

Yes I completely agree, also the 8 match system means that teams who might have a problem with their robot in a few matches, or as can be a problem in Australia due to the young age of teams, teams which have capable robots can receive low rank because they have ended up in poor alliances during qualifications. For example at the 2015 Australia Regional, we encountered some issues with the Logitech game pad, and as a result we were unable to use our stacking mechanism for the entirety of the match and we were the only team on our alliance whose robot was moving.

[Jaci]

Originally Posted by pilleya

Yes I completely agree, also the 8 match system means that teams who might have a problem with their robot in a few matches, or as can be a problem in Australia due to the young age of teams, teams which have capable robots can receive low rank because they have ended up in poor alliances during qualifications. For example at the 2015 Australia Regional, we encountered some issues with the Logitech game pad, and as a result we were unable to use our stacking mechanism. We were the only team on our alliance whose robot was moving.

I recall this being quite common. 4788 was having a similar issue with their gamepad, and so we had to share our Xbox controller between two teams, which got interesting when both teams had to compete at the same time. I also recall many teams having software issues, as most of my time was spent running around getting other people's robots up and running. Hopefully we see some good alliances made this year. I pray to the FMS gods

[Chief Hedgehog]

As far as Minnesota is concerned:

In NO WAY can the MSHSL League be discounted. They were incredible enough to include FRC as a legitimate organization. I cannot state enough how much respect I have for MN FIRST as well as the MSHSL to make this happen. A third partner in all of this (the UofM) cannot be overlooked as they provide the space and time for the MSHSL FRC Tournament to happen. As we move forward - there must be only ONE state championship, otherwise it will be watered down.

And for those of you that discount the MN State Tourney as a mere off-season event - you are incredibly wrong. I can speak for all the teams involved as they take this event as seriously as any other FRC event. 4607's initial goal every season is the MSHSL Tournament.

In fact, Becker High School takes FRC seriously as it hangs TWO banners for our FRC team in the Gymnasium for our 2013 and 2014 state title runs. The community thinks it is important as well - when you enter Becker via US Hwy 10 you will see FRC 4607 State Champs 2013 hanging proudly on the sign.

When MN FIRST goes districts, the format must be a MSHSL tourney event.

[HurdFIRST]

Gonna level with you guys, there's a lot of text walls in this thread and I did not read all of them. I'm just gonna comment on my unique experience.

As a key volunteer I'm currently writing this post while laying on the floor of a Kettering University student's dorm, next to the gym I just announced a district in for the second straight week. I did 11 FRC events in total last year and plan on doing 8 more this year.

The volunteers in Michigan aren't aquaintances, we're family. That's why Zach Orr flies from Atlanta to Flint just so he can introduce teams on my shoulders, that's why FTA's Rob and Eric are superman and batman respectively, and it's why I'll always have a couch (or floor) to crash on within the borders of the mitten state.

Your key volunteers might not have the time to do 12 events, but your college students are young proffesionals who are passionate about impacting lives like their volunteers did for them. These college students have the time to do 6 weeks of events, and they understand how to keep the competition experience relevant since they understand what it's like to compete as a student.

Dave Verbrugge and Tom Nader do not do 6 events a season in Michigan as an MC/GA duo, but they're still directly responsible for showing me how to make incredible formative experiences for the students at the combined 19 events I've participated in these past two years.

Changing lives as a key volunteer is not a right reserved for the "elite" among us anymore. If you're afraid that someone's going to be "just meh" at scorekeeping more than you're afraid that some kids at an inner city Minneanapolis school won't be able to participate because of the price, then you need to reavaluate why you're even here.

Did the DJ at today's St. Joseph event play smooth jazz dinner music before the final elim match? He sure did and it kinda killed my buzz. Did it stop the students on Stryke Force from making a memory they'll always remember as they won that blue banner? No it sure didn't!

I'm not here for the vibe, I'm here to impact lives.

#BringOutYourDead

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Ryan,
I don't want to blame rural teams, I am just pointing to the issue that some have. That is one or perhaps two mentors working incredibly hard to bring FRC to their small school. I cannot ask a mentor in that situation to volunteer when they are already working harder than I am, to insure their small team has a quality program. My hat is off to those teams and their dedicated mentors.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

Ryan,
I don't want to blame rural teams, I am just pointing to the issue that some have. That is one or perhaps two mentors working incredibly hard to bring FRC to their small school. I cannot ask a mentor in that situation to volunteer when they are already working harder than I am, to insure their small team has a quality program. My hat is off to those teams and their dedicated mentors.

I fully agree. Sorry if I implied that you were "blaming" rural teams. There are teams in Minnesota that can't do anything more than field a semi-functional robot. I have a huge respect for those mentors that make that happen from little to no resources.

I just meant to say that MN FIRST shouldn't let the limits of some teams limit the improvement of the organization as a whole. When districts happen, if there is a volunteer requirement, exceptions will have to be made in the cases of these hard-working, yet small teams.

[Boe]

Originally Posted by Chief Hedgehog

And for those of you that discount the MN State Tourney as a mere off-season event - you are incredibly wrong. I can speak for all the teams involved as they take this event as seriously as any other FRC event. 4607's initial goal every season is the MSHSL Tournament.

No you cannot speak for all teams involved. When I was a student the MN State Championship just another off season for me, compared to the real prize of going to and trying to win at worlds, or even going to IRI. I would much rather go to my first event sit dead on the field during every match and not go to states, if it meant having all issues worked out for our next event and doing well and going to worlds. I have spoken to a number of students who share this same opinion. Perhaps part of the reason I feel this way is that I dont agree with how teams advance to the state championship (I feel it should be your best event or the average of all your events), this comes from my idea of what the goal of the state championship should be which doesn't necessarily align with MN FIRST.

Originally Posted by cadandcookies

Honestly, at this point I'm not sure what the deal is. It seems like everyone is acting according to what they believe to be the program's best interests at heart, but somewhere along the line the community here lost an entire set of people who could have been welcomed into helping FRC in Minnesota move forward, but have instead been pushed away from volunteering (or in some cases even being a part of the program). I know people who have been called up and told not to post here about districts in MN, or to be told that they would not be assigned to a volunteer role because of posts on social media or CD. I know that there are incredibly talented and passionate people who have just flat out given up on volunteering here in Minnesota because they no longer want to deal with the "Minnesota drama."

This is extremely troubling and very disappointing that this is something that happens in Minnesota, though from the way I've heard certain people in MN FIRST talk about districts it is not entirely surprising. During my time in Minnesota I talked to many people mentors and students from large teams, small teams, teams with large budgets, teams with small budgets, ect. and the vast majority of people I talked to were in favor of districts (and 100% of the students were in favor of them, once I explained what they were).

Also the MN-ND-WI-IA region is basically at capacity for how many play spots there are vs how many are desired, if not for the addition of the Iowa regional there would have been a fair number of teams not able to get a second play, which is very discouraging for teams that work hard to fundraise enough for that second play only to find out there isn't a spot for them.

To add on as someone who competed in MN throughout highschool and now attends school in Michigan I can attest to one of the biggest arguments for regionals vs districts arguments.

Venues: While competing at Mariucci or the DECC is awesome and I would argue some of the best venues in FRC they lose some of their charm when your in a giant stadium and there are four dead/broken bots on the field. After volunteering at the Kettering district the I didn't really noticed the smaller and more personal size of the space but it did not detract from the event.

I may post some of my other thoughts on having now experienced a district event after doing for years of regionals if I get some time with all the studying for finals

[hutchMN]

Originally Posted by Chief Hedgehog

As far as Minnesota is concerned:

In NO WAY can the MSHSL League be discounted. They were incredible enough to include FRC as a legitimate organization. I cannot state enough how much respect I have for MN FIRST as well as the MSHSL to make this happen. A third partner in all of this (the UofM) cannot be overlooked as they provide the space and time for the MSHSL FRC Tournament to happen. As we move forward - there must be only ONE state championship, otherwise it will be watered down.

And for those of you that discount the MN State Tourney as a mere off-season event - you are incredibly wrong. I can speak for all the teams involved as they take this event as seriously as any other FRC event. 4607's initial goal every season is the MSHSL Tournament.

In fact, Becker High School takes FRC seriously as it hangs TWO banners for our FRC team in the Gymnasium for our 2013 and 2014 state title runs. The community thinks it is important as well - when you enter Becker via US Hwy 10 you will see FRC 4607 State Champs 2013 hanging proudly on the sign.

When MN FIRST goes districts, the format must be a MSHSL tourney event.

All teams in MN have different goals. Speaking to the captains on 2502 tonight, they would much rather win a regional than win the state championship. Our goal for this season is to make it to Einstein after our fairly good 2015 season (so we would much rather qualify for worlds than play in a offseason event). I also don’t believe the state championship point system is fair. The ranking system in qualification is broken in MN events due to the lack of qualification matches making parts of the state championship’s ranking system broken in return. I do believe 2502 is a good example of this, they had the highest goal points per match average in FRC for week 1 and showed how dominate they were in eliminations (second highest alliance average for weeks 0.5 and 1 with the help of our great alliance partners 2883 and 5232), but they ended up seeding 31st at the event during qualifications (5172 is another great example of how broken the ranking system was at northern lights due to the lack of qualification matches). I know there is at least some teams in the state that view the state championship as just another offseason event. Not saying either side is right, but I don’t think it’s as cut and dry as you’re making it out to be. You also don’t speak for all the teams in MN.

[pntbll1313]

Originally Posted by hutchMN

All teams in MN have different goals. I also don’t believe the state championship point system is fair. The ranking system in qualification is broken in MN events due to the lack of qualification matches making parts of the state championship’s ranking system broken in return. I do believe 2502 is a good example of this, they had the highest goal points per match average in FRC for week 1 and showed how dominate they were in eliminations (second highest alliance average for weeks 0.5 and 1 with the help of our great alliance partners 2883 and 5232), but they ended up seeding 31st at the event during qualifications (5172 is another great example of how broken the ranking system was at northern lights due to the lack of qualification matches). I know there is at least some teams in the state that view the state championship as just another offseason event. Not saying either side is right, but I don’t think it’s as cut and dry as you’re making it out to be. You also don’t speak for all the teams in MN.

All teams do have different goals. Trying to qualify for State is very important to us. Our school isn't a perennial powerhouse in sports, so bringing home a MSHSL championship gets us noticed. Any recognition we can get from our school to legitimize robotics and put us on a more level playing field with other activities like football is a win to me. We've been fortunate enough to qualify for State every year and we'll continue to try to do that.

I agree the ranking system isn't great, but don't they use a similar structure to the districts? As far as I know your seed doesn't factor into how many points you get to qualify for State. Even your W/L is weighted pretty low compared to how early you get picked and how you perform in eliminations.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by pntbll1313

I agree the ranking system isn't great, but don't they use a similar structure to the districts? As far as I know your seed doesn't factor into how many points you get to qualify for State. Even your W/L is weighted pretty low compared to how early you get picked and how you perform in eliminations.

The ranking system is essentially the same the district ranking system to my knowledge. The biggest differences are that Chairman's Award winning teams qualify automatically, and only your first event counts.

I'm not sure how I feel about CA winners automatically qualifying... I like that we're rewarding the teams that win the most prestigious award in FIRST, but it doesn't necessarily bring the best teams to the competition. Although if your team is winning CA, you probably have a competitive team anyways, at least that's what I gather by checking out past winners.

I definitely know how I feel about a teams second event not counting. If the goal of the state championship is to have all the best teams in the state competing to figure out the best of the best then you have to count a second regional. You can do an average of the results of the first and second regionals to maintain some parity, but the teams that go to 2 events will get better at their second event.

If the goal of the state championship is anything other than figuring out the best of the best... then don't call it a state championship.

I know this thread is about 8 regional plays being fair or not, but let's be honest, it has evolved into an open discussion about FIRST in Minnesota. A discussion that is important, and should happen.

[nfhammes]

Originally Posted by Ginger Power

I'm not sure how I feel about CA winners automatically qualifying... I like that we're rewarding the teams that win the most prestigious award in FIRST, but it doesn't necessarily bring the best teams to the competition. Although if your team is winning CA, you probably have a competitive team anyways, at least that's what I gather by checking out past winners.

I definitely know how I feel about a teams second event not counting. If the goal of the state championship is to have all the best teams in the state competing to figure out the best of the best then you have to count a second regional. You can do an average of the results of the first and second regionals to maintain some parity, but the teams that go to 2 events will get better at their second event.

If the goal of the state championship is anything other than figuring out the best of the best... then don't call it a state championship.

I think there's a little nuance you're not bringing out here. If the goal is to have the best teams, teams who win RCA at their first event seems like an excellent way to ensure you get some of them. If the goal is to get the best robots, it obviously misses the mark, but that particular goal seems to do less to inspire kids and be what FIRST is about, that I would ignore it. (Admittedly, I wasn't there last year but...) I would love to see the MSHSL State Championship hand out awards to teams. Maybe they would be similar/the same/analogous to the normal FIRST set, or whittled down to a few important ones due to judging constraints, but I think that would go further in "figuring out the best of the best" in the right ways.

The problem with counting second events or not is fairness. If teams simply got credit for the better of the two events, (or even both events!) that would be obviously unfair in favor of teams with more resources. Averaging the two dampens the effect, and certainly allows a second event to harm teams, but many teams do tend to do better at later events, both through iteration, and sheer student experience, so you're still advantaging teams with more resources. Picking the first event seems to be the closest to rewarding "competitive" teams, while giving all teams a fair opportunity.

And on the topic of you "speaking for all teams" when saying that winning state is a big deal, it obviously isn't all of them, but the last time I was in MN, there were a good number of teams who see Winning State as a big deal, whose relationships with their districts and schools would be improved by winning an MSHSL banner, and would be further legitimized in their community. And I'm not sure those folks are well-represented on CD. I think it's not universal, but should be taken seriously. And MNFIRST knows this, and maintains a positive relationship with the good folks at the MSHSL.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by nfhammes

I think there's a little nuance you're not bringing out here. If the goal is to have the best teams, teams who win RCA at their first event seems like an excellent way to ensure you get some of them. If the goal is to get the best robots, it obviously misses the mark, but that particular goal seems to do less to inspire kids and be what FIRST is about, that I would ignore it. (Admittedly, I wasn't there last year but...) I would love to see the MSHSL State Championship hand out awards to teams. Maybe they would be similar/the same/analogous to the normal FIRST set, or whittled down to a few important ones due to judging constraints, but I think that would go further in "figuring out the best of the best" in the right ways.

The problem with counting second events or not is fairness. If teams simply got credit for the better of the two events, (or even both events!) that would be obviously unfair in favor of teams with more resources. Averaging the two dampens the effect, and certainly allows a second event to harm teams, but many teams do tend to do better at later events, both through iteration, and sheer student experience, so you're still advantaging teams with more resources. Picking the first event seems to be the closest to rewarding "competitive" teams, while giving all teams a fair opportunity.

And on the topic of you "speaking for all teams" when saying that winning state is a big deal, it obviously isn't all of them, but the last time I was in MN, there were a good number of teams who see Winning State as a big deal, whose relationships with their districts and schools would be improved by winning an MSHSL banner, and would be further legitimized in their community. And I'm not sure those folks are well-represented on CD. I think it's not universal, but should be taken seriously. And MNFIRST knows this, and maintains a positive relationship with the good folks at the MSHSL.

In my post, I meant "best teams" as in the best teams on the field, aka best robots. Should've made this more clear.

I'm not sure why getting the best robots to the State Championship would inspire fewer kids. You're just inspiring a different group of students. Having the most competitive competition would inspire more students in my opinion by showing them the game being played at a high level.

With the current state qualification system, great teams (sometimes the best teams) miss out on qualifying for a competition that is supposed to (in my mind) determine the best robots. I won't pretend to know the solution to this issue, but I know taking a second event into consideration in some way would help.

I don't think "fairness" should be a factor, because I don't believe it's unfair to consider two events. Teams that attend two events worked hard to raise funds to do that second event. They put in the effort, they should be rewarded for doing so. The teams doing two events are iterating, and improving their robots in between events. When they show up at a 2nd event with a fantastic robot, they should be rewarded for that extra work that they've put in. If anything, it's more fair to consider a 2nd event.

I really like the concept if doing awards at the State Championship. Brilliant idea.

The question we really have to answer is: What is the purpose of the state championship? Is it to determine the best robots? The best teams? Is it to showcase FIRST in yet another off-season event? If we want to think of FRC as a sport, I think the purpose of the state championship should be to determine the best robots (athletes) in Minnesota.

Also, I wasn't the one who was "speaking for all teams", although we do share the same logo. Chief Hedgehog has taken back his comments, because nobody can speak for everybody.

[jessss]

Originally Posted by Ginger Power

With the current state qualification system, great teams (sometimes the best teams) miss out on qualifying for a competition that is supposed to (in my mind) determine the best robots. I won't pretend to know the solution to this issue, but I know taking a second event into consideration in some way would help.

The question we really have to answer is: What is the purpose of the state championship? Is it to determine the best robots? The best teams? Is it to showcase FIRST in yet another off-season event? If we want to think of FRC as a sport, I think the purpose of the state championship should be to determine the best robots (athletes) in Minnesota.

I think one reason the MSHSL tournament misses out on some of the best teams each year is because of the chairman's system we have set in place. If like you said we want to be a competitive tournament then we should not give 10 points towards every team that submits chairman's or even give teams that win chairman's at the regional level a spot to the tournament. Honestly I have my team submit chairman's every year even if we do very little outreach because we know we will get those points towards the state tournament.

I think the goals for the state tournament was that it is meant to showcase FIRST in Minnesota and usually when you have media personnel at events like these, you have them talk to kids who can inspire others through communicating with the news or a journalist. It normally makes for a better story if they are talking with students that can coherently convey the message of FIRST and do stuff for there community. I'm not in anyway saying that other teams cannot do this but usually you'll find that teams that produce chairman's submissions or have a strong speakers know how to make FIRST look good.

I think Minnesota needs to figure out their goals before going forward and changing their qualification system. If we want higher caliber teams at the state championship level then maybe implement something like you said, average of all the regionals a team attends. But if our goal is to inspire more like a showcase system and less like a competition it might be better to keep with the same system, from my experience a team are more likely to change their ways (from one regional to multiple) if they are invited to events like the MSHSL's competition or champs. If the state competition instead limits that opportunity for teams that for some reason do not currently go to more than one event there might be less of an attempt to try to get better.

[nuclearnerd]

I'm a bit late to this topic, but I have a left-field idea that keeps growing on me.

Would a 6 play regional, with 6+ minute long matches be so bad?

The pros are that the matches could be far more interesting and dramatic, with time to run more complex strategies (and to fail and adapt). They would also be more spectator friendly too, with gameplay to reset time ratio increased from worse than 1:1 to better than 2:1. The overall play time per team will not go down, in fact it will go up since less time per regional is spent doing field reset.

The con is that it is much less likely that the robots will seed in order of how "good" they are. Playoff alliances will be influenced strongly on luck and schedule strength, and what I see in this thread is that people consider this "unfair". Also we'd need batteries that can hold more charge, but that is trivial imho.

I would argue that unlikely playoffs are not a con at all! If we are so concerned that the "best" robots win, and we all seem to know what makes a good robot, lets just have them run a demo in front of a judge panel like show dogs. On the other hand, if we want robotics to be a sport, with all of the drama and excitement that entails, we need to open the space for underdog teams to catch a lucky first-seed pick and ride it to champs. Imagine an exciting, 6 minute finals match between two rookie teams with power-house teams as their first picks!

So, have I made my case? Who else is on team 6 minute matches?