Lesson Learned 2016 - The Negative

[Nuttyman54]

I don't have a lot of complaints about this season. The biggest one is that, once again, reffing and scorekeeping NEED to be separated for games like this (and 2014) where there is full real-time scoring and a lot of interaction and potential fouls. It's just too much for refs to keep track of.

My second major complaint is that the field was way too complicated. I get that it was cool and the different movable defenses provided a big challenge and a lot of strategic depth, but it also made it very expensive and space-consuming to build field components for prototyping. I think half of our storage space is field parts right now, and I'm very much looking forward to reclaiming our closet. I will also echo comments that there at least needs to be an intermediate option to build team versions of components that are a better approximation for the real field. The portcullis and drawbridge specifically were WAY different. In general, dynamic game elements to not translate well to wood (ala the 2012 bridges).

I was not a fan of audience selection. The ability for large teams to influence other teams' matches is not desirable, especially since "rounds" are only approximately 1 match for all teams. 971 had the opportunity to cheer for an audience selection that wouldn't go on the field until after their final qualification match. 5803 played two consecutive matches with Rough Terrain in the middle because of a short turnaround. I get that it engages the audience, but it provides a huge strategic advantage, especially in playoffs. Also the fact that in quarterfinals, the 1v8 matchup literally has almost no time to finalize their match strategy after audience selection is absurd.