Split Champs assignment

[Citrus Dad]

Originally Posted by nuclearnerd

I've already gone on record that I support* the move to bring more teams to champs, even if it means a championsplit. As much as we all love to see the best meet the best here, most students in FRC don't get anywhere near to the best teams from far away, so they won't care as much as we do. So shed a tear for the friends we'll miss, then welcome all of the new entrants!

That said, I am intrigued by the last paragraph of the announcement. It would be cool to have the culminating event be a televised, professionally produced TV series. You could have the Einstein finals be a best-of-7 series, with a few hours between each match to make repairs, changes, and work on strategy and be interviewed. It would be boring to watch live, but that wouldn't be the intent. Instead, the 8 hour day would be condensed into one or more 1/2 hour episodes for a mass audience, the same way they do for Battle Bots. The format works - lots more people around here know about Battle Bots than FRC, even though FRC is a vastly bigger program. Maybe FIRST could entice the same producers...

*Maybe a better way to put it is that I don't oppose the split. If there were a sane way to have 800 teams in one venue, and make things cheaper, I'd probably support that instead.

Problem: getting all of the teams together for yet another trip (especially if it's not externally funded) will be difficult to accomplish before the end of the school year. The biggest problem is the events on school calendars in May and early June. After early June is a non-starter because seniors will have graduated and often are immediately out of hand into summer activities.

The better solution is to properly structure the Super Regionals to turn them into different types of Championships. There's threads on CD that propose viable solutions. (I still haven't seen a rationale argument that the 2 events must be equally diluted other than it might hurt someone's feelings.)

[Citrus Dad]

Originally Posted by Michael Hill

St. Louis
Chesapeake: 33
Indiana: 12
Michigan: 101
Mid-Atlantic: 29
New England: 45
Total: 220

Houston:
North Carolina: 13
Pacific Northwest: 40
Peachtree: 16
Total: 69

So yes, pretty much everyone in Michigan DCMP is going.

This is scary. Divisions may look like glorified regionals in play quality. This implies that the MSC will be more difficult to win than a Super Regional.

[Citrus Dad]

Originally Posted by Conor Ryan

Looks like most of the NASA teams are headed south.

I wonder if NASA understands this as a major sponsor...

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Citrus Dad

I wonder if NASA understands this as a major sponsor...

You do realize that most of NASA's facilities are in the southern area or the coasts, right? Exactly the areas FIRST picked to go to the Houston whatever-you-want-to-call-it-but-not-championship.

[b.arci]

While this post does not exactly discuss the same issue as the other posts in this thread (of which I will not reveal my opinion on—there has been some great discussion, but I do not have much to contribute), I would like to note something interesting.

If you look at Northern Canada on the map, at the Northwest Territories (NT), you'll note that the part of it belonging to the islands are attending St Louis/Detroit, while the mainland is attending Houston. It's just interesting that they followed geographical boundaries, rather than political ones on this. Does anyone have any insight on it? Does it stem from the way FTC teams are assigned to the FTC Super Regionals? Even though there are no FIRST teams from there (I checked - https://my.usfirst.org/myarea/index....ge=searchform).

It's just wierd. (An oversight maybe?) Hmm.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by Conor Ryan

How many matches will teams expect to play?

This would be the question, wouldn't it? Let's say we have 17 hours of qualification matches (what we had this year), and a 7-minute match cycle. That's 145 qualification matches, which with 6 robots per match means there are 874ish robot-matches to play. At 100 teams per division, that's 8.74 plays. Boo hiss.

If that gets down to a 6-minute cycle, it gets to 10.2. That's right on what we have this year, but with the higher team count it does make the schedule that much more of a crapshoot. But you're still playing more than we did at Palmetto, so yay?

If they went to 8 50-team sub-divisions, you could run a 10-minute cycle and play 12. Doubt they go that route, especially with smaller venues, but I'll put it out there for giggles.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Billfred

If they went to 8 50-team sub-divisions, you could run a 10-minute cycle and play 12. Doubt they go that route, especially with smaller venues, but I'll put it out there for giggles.

I'm actually hoping that's the route they go, or 4 100-team subdivisions each with 2 fields (despite the scouting nightmare that results). You could also shorten the hours/day the matches are running.

[orangemoore]

Originally Posted by EricH

I'm actually hoping that's the route they go, or 4 100-team subdivisions each with 2 fields (despite the scouting nightmare that results). You could also shorten the hours/day the matches are running.

It would be nice to see shorter days, with a better Cost per match.

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by EricH

I'm actually hoping that's the route they go, or 4 100-team subdivisions each with 2 fields (despite the scouting nightmare that results). You could also shorten the hours/day the matches are running.

Hadn't considered that angle, and that would certainly make a 6-minute cycle more feasible. However, FLL and FTC have to fit back into the America's Center this year. Can you do that with eight fields?

[sdangelo]

Originally Posted by Billfred

Hadn't considered that angle, and that would certainly make a 6-minute cycle more feasible. However, FLL and FTC have to fit back into the America's Center this year. Can you do that with eight fields?

According to the pit map, FLL is still in the America's Center. The Scholarship Row & Sponsor booths were moved to the hotel instead.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Billfred

Hadn't considered that angle, and that would certainly make a 6-minute cycle more feasible. However, FLL and FTC have to fit back into the America's Center this year. Can you do that with eight fields?

Yep. Remember that you're also losing 200 FRC pits (and crates). That's 200 10' squares (and their aisles) that you now have available for FTC "stuff", plus a little.

Or, to put it another way: The Archimedes/Tesla pits turn into FTC. Move the FRC practice fields (and take out one of each type, maybe?) and you've got a pretty good shot at fitting a fair number of FTC teams in there. Whether it'll be enough is an open question, but it'll be pretty close.

[orangemoore]

Wait did they say FTC was coming back to the Dome?

[Basel A]

Originally Posted by EricH

I'm actually hoping that's the route they go, or 4 100-team subdivisions each with 2 fields (despite the scouting nightmare that results). You could also shorten the hours/day the matches are running.

Trying to get 100 teams into bleachers in Cobo Hall (Detroit CMP) will be a huge pain. Would much rather have 50 teams worth of bleachers at each division field. Also would be great not to have to scout two fields. It's pretty tough to do at MSC. Einstein is taken care of by being in Ford Field.

[Basel A]

Originally Posted by Michael Corsetto

While maybe balanced at the top, I expect Houston to have a much weaker field that STL/Detroit. North 1/2 CMP has 5 (6?) strong districts, while South 1/2 CMP gets PNW and GA, as well as many regional qualifying teams. Additionally, I expect Houston to welcome more teams off of the waitlist than North 1/2 CMP will.

That, coupled with a later weekend, means North 1/2 CMP will likely be more competitive and harder to get in to.

Bummer

-Mike

Whipped up a chart real quick. Houston would definitely have been weaker than St. Louis this year. This is both because their percentiled OPRs are lower, but also because Houston would have had more waitlisted teams (more districts in St. Louis fills it out better, plus more overall 2016 teams would've gone to St. Louis, 243 to 357).

[Edxu]

Originally Posted by EricH

I'm actually hoping that's the route they go, or 4 100-team subdivisions each with 2 fields (despite the scouting nightmare that results). You could also shorten the hours/day the matches are running.

I'm for this as well. As a strategist, I usually meet with my Drive Team 4-5 matches beforehand to detail what we're doing, and at events with short turnarounds *cough waterloo cough*, sometimes the teams that I talk with have a match right before the match that we play with them, making it very difficult to plan matches in advance.

A 10-minute turnaround would be a godsend for pit crew as well, as more space between matches means that you can do more and more of the checkup list between matches, keeping the robot in better shape.

Also fewer pit scouting assignments per person is really nice.