Are 8 play regional reasonable?

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by BrendanB

Sorry to jump back a few pages I didn't have the time to post until now.

Do you think it would be worthwhile to create a video on the inspection process to walk teams through the checklist? For the most part it stays the same from year to year with new additions due to updated games/rules but a lot of the big issues like weight, size, and bumpers have been pretty consistent with a few small changes.

I know for a newbie in FIRST the inspection process was a mysterious part of competition until you go through it the first time. Sending a video like that with the inspection sheet a week before bag (if it can be made available that early) to teams could help them catch problems they might not have seen until then.

Imagine a field tour video but of a robot going through inspection.

It might help, but it's also difficult to give good advice without the robot sitting in front of you. As an example, the 8" bumper rule has been really rough this year, but what can we do other than repeat the rule in such a video? If someone didn't understand it while reading the rules during the season, they won't understand it while having the rule read to them. And I personally won't release a video that contains anything that could be labeled as an "interpretation" of the rule. Interpretations are just too malleable. For example, take a look at the issue over Velcro on bumpers this year, or the question of legal pressure regulators. In both cases, my interpretation of the rule was changed twice in mid season, due to what I was told by HQ and the Q&A. I would support HQ doing such a video, but wouldn't want to do one all by myself, on my own initiative.

What we do already for teams, however, is offer inspection services during the build season. We have inspectors at the week-0 events (and usually an LRI at each of them!) performing inspections. I've driven to teams build spaces (up to an hour or so away) to perform inspections on them and their neighboring teams. We have inspection presentations at all of our December training events (led by an LRI) that informs teams of the biggest issues we see year to year, and covers most of the rules that generally don't change. I get emails and phone calls all season long about the Robot Rules, asking if something is legal or not, and am able to point those people to the specific rules that are most applicable, or recommend they get on the Q&A if it really is something ambiguous. All of that helps. I know there were teams competing in Minnesota that avoided serious issues at competition because those issues were identified in week-0, when they still had some time to fix them.

[Michael Corsetto]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

As an example, the 8" bumper rule has been really rough this year, but what can we do other than repeat the rule in such a video?

Just an aside, the 8" bumper rule is, quite possibly, the most horribly communicated, critical-to-design rule in the entire game manual. Pains me to see so many rookies miss this mark.

I'm sure someone in this thread will just tell me to suggest a better a way to communicate it. Or if I care so much about it, to do it myself.

Alas, the internet.

-Mike

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Originally Posted by Michael Corsetto

Just an aside, the 8" bumper rule is, quite possibly, the most horribly communicated, critical-to-design rule in the entire game manual. Pains me to see so many rookies miss this mark.

I'm sure someone in this thread will just tell me to suggest a better a way to communicate it. Or if I care so much about it, to do it myself.

Alas, the internet.

-Mike

Mike,
By far and away, more veteran teams had issues with the 8" rule than rookies (OK maybe 50/50). It has been very distressing that teams did not interpret the rules correctly, even after the Team Update #5 that added to the bumper drawings came out in Week 3 of build. There is a big arrow pointing to a bumper segment that is "<8 inches" as being "not OK".

[Mr V]

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

Mike,
By far and away, more veteran teams had issues with the 8" rule than rookies (OK maybe 50/50). It has been very distressing that teams did not interpret the rules correctly, even after the Team Update #5 that added to the bumper drawings came out in Week 3 of build. There is a big arrow pointing to a bumper segment that is "<8 inches" as being "not OK".

I agree that the 8" minimum bumper width was a problem for Veteran teams not just Rookies. Granted there are far fewer Rookies but I only had one Rookie that showed up at the events I was at that had significant bumper problems and there were a number of Veterans with similar or bigger problems.

[Mr V]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

As an example, the 8" bumper rule has been really rough this year, but what can we do other than repeat the rule in such a video? If someone didn't understand it while reading the rules during the season, they won't understand it while having the rule read to them.

Originally Posted by Michael Corsetto

Just an aside, the 8" bumper rule is, quite possibly, the most horribly communicated, critical-to-design rule in the entire game manual. Pains me to see so many rookies miss this mark.

I'm sure someone in this thread will just tell me to suggest a better a way to communicate it. Or if I care so much about it, to do it myself.

Alas, the internet.

-Mike

In the PNW District we were blessed that Frank Merrick attended the DCMP. I took the opportunity to discuss the problems that we experienced with the 8" min bumper width rule this season. We came to an agreement that part of the problem is that the person writing the rules knows what they are trying to communicate and thus they are highly predisposed to read what they have written as clearly communicating the idea. That is because they know what they are trying to communicate and thus read into the words the intention behind the rules, that is present in their mind.

So I agree that reading the rules word for word will not do anything to make it clear to person who doesn't understand them by reading it themselves, because they don't have their own knowledge on what the intention was.

I do believe that a video that showed what defines a "side" and more importantly for this season a segment of a "side" if done properly, could go a long way to furthering the understanding of the rules by everyone.

A great example was with a team I saw at an event this season. Their mentor's argument was that there is no magic number that defines what creates a bumper that provides adequate protection. Their Robot had ~6" bumpers and they covered the full length of both frame segments on the front of their Robot. Extending the bumpers 2" in the direction of the center of the robot on both sides would have meant that they had an opening smaller than the diameter of the ball. So the conversation quickly turned to "making our bumpers wider will make our robot useless, so maybe we should just go home". (not the only time I heard that argument this season)

Once I explained to him that I agreed that their bumpers fully protected their robot, BUT that the 8" bumper width was created in part to make teams decide on the trade offs of their choice of robot size. Fact is that on the one hand you want as wide of an opening as possible to make it easier to acquire a ball without the need for perfect alignment, but on the other hand you want as narrow of a robot as possible to make fitting through the defense dividers and to fit on the batter/scale w/o interference from the batter dividers or an adjacent scaling robot, without perfect alignment, he accepted it. We then went to work creating a plan for a robot that was wider at the front that it was at the back to meet the rules.

Now to be frank I don't know for certain if that was the intention of the people who wrote the rules, but it did work to diffuse the situation and move from "you are making our robot worthless", to accepting my idea to increase the width of the front of the robot to be within the rules and still be able to intake a ball with their current opening and intake system.

So adding a little more explanation of the intention of the rules would also help to ensure that the reader fully understands what is required to be compliant with the rule.

[Al Skierkiewicz]

Originally Posted by Mr V

Once I explained to him that I agreed that their bumpers fully protected their robot, BUT that the 8" bumper width was created in part to make teams decide on the trade offs of their choice of robot size.

This was in part a design challenge to make you think about picking up boulders and adjusting your frame opening accordingly. However, this is not the first year that 8" segments were the rule.

[Jon Stratis]

I don't help write the rules, so I can't know for sure... But I've always been under the impression that 8" was used to accommodate 4 digit team numbers. 8" plus 3.25" from having a noodle in the corner is enough room at a common font to fit a max sized team number (and many teams I see do fill the space on the bumper entirely with their number). This came from several years ago when they first introduced the 8" rule, and that year splitting team numbers was prohibited (which was also a headache to explain to some teams).

And as you said, it does help to force design tradeoffs, and encourage critical thinking about the game challenge.

[Richard Wallace]

One simple change of nomenclature would help teams understand the bumper rules more easily: stop calling the measurement FRAME PERIMETER. Call it something else, without the word "frame".

Maybe GIRTH. Or CONVEX PERIMETER. Either of these would remove the ambiguity behind many teams' misinterpretation of the bumper rules; i.e., they are mis-led by poor nomenclature, and believe the edges of their frame on either side of the robot's intake slot are "sides", which can be protected by bumper segments along their entire length if that is less than 8 inches.

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My apologies -- this should be in a separate thread. I agree that bumper rules in games with floor level ball intake are a repeating issue for teams and inspectors. Some of the more difficult examples I saw this season were not on rookie robots.