[FIRST EMAIL] Stop Build Day Survey

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by asid61

That would be too broad of a definition IMO. One would keep withholding to prevent massive robot-sized mods to their robots. Withholding could stay, thus forcing a lot of teams to do nothing more than driver practice once they hit that 30lb limit.

But if we don't have stop build day, the robot doesn't go into a bag... why would I stop working on it just to practice? And if the robot is not in the bag, how do I, as an inspector, determine what is withholding and what isn't? Say a team brings in a 50 lb manipulator. If it's detached from their robot, do I call it withholding? What if it's held onto the robot by a zip tie, or a single bolt?

Without a bagged robot, "withholding" loses its entire definition. Besides, as the rules are now, I could bag hundreds of lbs of spare parts and it would be just fine.

[marshall]

Originally Posted by FrankJ

Marshal? Here is your chance.

Two L's.... people with one are weird.

[FrankJ]

Originally Posted by marshall

Two L's.... people with one are weird.

Sorry about that. But having 2 L's in your name doesn't stop you from being weird. (I have 2 L's in my last name as a point of reference.)

[RoboChair]

Originally Posted by tjf

However, if they were to remove bag day, you get into the whole Ship of Theseus problem of "if they change every part of their robot, is it still the same robot?" Where is the line drawn between "improvements" and "totally different" robot?

In 2013 we went to 2 regionals and Champs. We built 2 robots(second was mostly just a drive base). At our first event we didn't like how our shooter performed so we made an entirely different shooter and that was our 30 pound withholding. At our second event we didn't like how our intake was working so we made a completely different one and took off our shooter so we could keep working on it. At champs we had a completely different robot than what we originally bagged. The only part of that robot that was not changed was the drivetrain.

Withholding and bagging is only really a hindrance to teams without a second robot and who only go to one event. 1678 stops working on our robot when we leave from Champs. I believe every team should get the same time advantage we have because of how we choose to use our resources.

[Hoover]

Asking if Advantage or Disadvantage. The only one's who see this as an Advantage are those that can finalize a robot in 4 weeks or less and 2 weeks of driving.

So I predict it will lean heavily towards Disadvantage.

Does FRC want this to be more or less of a challenge?

FRC: More

So a 6 weeks build is a disadvantage?

FRC: Then our job is done here.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by marshall

Two L's.... people with one are weird.

>wears zebra pants
>calls people weird

[Dan Petrovic]

In all seriousness, it does seem like it was deliberately written so that they can pull some data that says "Hey! A lot of teams like what the 6 week build season brings!"

At least the most important question is cut and dry. Eliminate Stop Build Day or Keep Stop Build Day. It's hard to spin those numbers in a certain direction.

[FrankJ]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

Without a bagged robot, "withholding" loses its entire definition. Besides, as the rules are now, I could bag hundreds of lbs of spare parts and it would be just fine.

Without bag day, there is nothing to stop you from bringing a different robot to every competition. Not really a complaint just an observation. But with the existing rules some even built a new robot at a competition to replace the one they brought.

True under previous years rules you could bring two robots + unlimited parts if they were bagged. Well they had to fit into 2 bags. I expect 2017 rules will have a Zebra clause to address that.

Nixing the bag, I would like something in place to prevent teams from bringing the equivalent of multiple robots to one event.

[edit] Different line of thought. Writing good surveys is difficult. Must I see are mediocre to bad. Not that I would do any better. We should give First the benefit of Occam's Razor[/edit]

[marshall]

Originally Posted by FrankJ

Sorry about that. But having 2 L's in your name doesn't stop from being weird. (I have 2 L's in my last name as a point of reference.)

It's all good.

Ok, in all seriousness, this survey is kind of terrible and reminds me more than a little bit of the two championship survey so I can't wait for them to roll out a graph and blog post in a month or so explaining how everyone voted to keep stop build day...

I'm not going to make another case for getting rid of it but I sure would like to see it relegated to the dust-bin of FRC history along with stupid rules about pneumatics, spinning incandescent bulbs, and D-Link routers. Or hey, we can keep eating our young and ensuring that new teams have a hard of a time as possible.

[EmileH]

I responded to the survey with the most "I hate stop build day so much" perspective as possible.

And it was very hard to do.

EDIT: The grammar in this post is almost as bad as the survey.

[Jon Stratis]

Originally Posted by FrankJ

Nixing the bag, I would like something in place to prevent teams from bringing the equivalent of multiple robots to one event.

I definitely agree with this... That has to be a very hard rule to write, though! How would you differentiate between a spare robot and a collection of spare parts? Under the definition of ROBOT that's been used in the past, it would be relatively simple to turn something from a ROBOT into a MECHANISM. Remove the radio and it's no longer a ROBOT, as it no longer has communications included.

ROBOT an electromechanical assembly built by an FIRST Robotics Competition Team to perform specific tasks when competing in FIRST STRONGHOLD. It includes all of the basic systems required to be an active participant in the game: power, communications, control, BUMPERS and movement. The implementation must obviously follow a design approach intended to play FIRST STRONGHOLD (e.g. a box of unassembled parts placed on the FIELD or a ROBOT designed to play a different game would not satisfy this definition)

[marshall]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

I definitely agree with this... That has to be a very hard rule to write, though! How would you differentiate between a spare robot and a collection of spare parts? Under the definition of ROBOT that's been used in the past, it would be relatively simple to turn something from a ROBOT into a MECHANISM. Remove the radio and it's no longer a ROBOT, as it no longer has communications included.

Why is this an issue? It's not an issue for FLL or FTC or VEX... I've never seen someone complain about an FTC team switching out robots between events... granted, I don't pay a lot of attention to FTC but I have asked FTC student participants about it and they like being able to modify their robots and see improvements.

Also, I'd like to point out that a team can build two robots now provided they follow the weight and out of bag rules (it's a lot easier for district teams, trust me). They can't compete with both of them at an event and thanks to us they can no longer walk in with both of them but they can leave one bag at home and bring one with them and then switch them out after an event.

Which actually goes back to the original point, there is already a rule (new-ish) that a team cannot bring two things that look like robots to a reasonably astute observer to an event (Thanks 900!).

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis

I definitely agree with this... That has to be a very hard rule to write, though!

On page 25 of this document (page 27 of this PDF) you will find a rule that has already been written that satisfies this need under <R1>. On page 9 of this document (11 on the PDF) you will find another great rule in <G1> that I am sure the writers of the document would love FIRST to steal.

[cadandcookies]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

On page 25 of this document (page 27 of this PDF) you will find a rule that has already been written that satisfies this need under <R1>. On page 9 of this document (11 on the PDF) you will find another great rule in <G1> that I am sure the writers of the document would love FIRST to steal.

FTC has had equivalent rules for ages now. Don't even need to borrow it from VEX:

<T7> Each registered Team may enter only one Robot (a Robot built to play the current season’s game
challenge) into the FIRST Tech Challenge Competition. It is expected that Teams will make changes to their
Robot throughout the season and at competitions.

a. It is against the intent of this rule to compete with one Robot while a second is being modified or
assembled at a Tournament.
b. It is against the intent of this rule to switch back and forth between multiple Robots at a Tournament.
c. It is against the intent of this rule to register and attend concurrent Events with a second Robot.

Violations of this rule will immediately be considered egregious, as they would be considered a deliberate
violation of the rule.

Obviously doesn't include all the subsystems stuff, but I'm not entirely sure that's necessary anyways.

[Hitchhiker 42]

For now, I think removing stop build day will give too much of an advantage to district teams, who will be able to see how they perform before iterating it more and more, as compared to 1-regional teams who only get to play one event and can't really improve more. Because of this, removing stop build day will favor district teams even more when Champs rolls around.