Priority in Autonomous

[AndyBare]

This is a thread on scoring priority during auto, not during an entire match.

I won't say many teams, but many people have definitely prioritized the scoring of gears over fuel. Many are seeing the simple raw score values, and the fact that there's a clear difference in the amount of each gamepiece that needs to be scored for the ranking point.

I think that prioritizing the scoring of gears over fuel in autonomous will always be a mistake, unless you can also score 10 fuel. Here's why.

RAW SCORE - GEARS
1 gear in auto would give you 60 raw score.
3 gears in auto would give you 120 raw score

QUANTITY
If you score 0 fuel in auto, you would have to score 120 high in teleop, or 360 low. These numbers are very high, and quite distracting. If you ignore raw score for a moment though, this is why it's more important to score fuel in teleop, even if you can't get the gear posted up.

• 10 fuel in auto = 10pts, and 10 kPa. This means that 90 fuel must be scored high, in teleop, or 270 low.

• 20 fuel in auto = 20pts, and 20 kPa. This means that 60 fuel must be scored high, in teleop, or 180 low.

• 30 fuel in auto = 30pts, and 30 kPa. This means that 30 fuel must be scored high, in teleop, or 90 low.

RP
Now that's just if each bot scores it's 10 preloads. Of course, hoppers are around, and will also be stocked with enough fuel to give all 40 kPa by the end of autonomous. This being said, it's possible to have an extra ranking point [RP] through fuel by the end of autonomous, but impossible to get the RP through gear by the end of autonomous. Which now seems more manageable?

RAW SCORE
Back to raw score. If you choose to score 10 fuel instead of the 1 gear, you take a net loss of 50 points. 60-50 = 10. That gear continues to exist though, and can be scored later for 40 points resulting in a total net loss of only 10 points for the first gear scored. Across 30 fuel alone, in auto, you're saved now from having to make 90 shots on high, and 270 shots on low, reducing the requirements to 30 high and 90 low, throughout the match.

If each bot can only transport 10 fuel, each bot must only take one cycle in teleop to recieve and score 10 fuel. When all 3 alliance members have scored their fuel, you will have achieved the RP. You then have then entire rest of the match to focus on scoring gears.

[NShep98]

Originally Posted by AndyBare

DIFFICULT COOPERATION
1 gear in auto would give you 60 raw score.
3 gears in auto would give you 120 raw score, but is also very unlikely until proven not very unlikely. The autonomous codes will be very hard to coordinate for 3 alliance members, each laying a gear, and then moving out of the next bot's way so that they can as well. This also isn't a 2014 situation where gears can simply be touching your robot to be considered preloaded, leaving another (high-caliber) team to do all the scoring.

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. There are 3 lifts, all next to each other. Why would more than one robot have to score on a single lift?

[Giantwalker]

Originally Posted by AndyBare

DIFFICULT COOPERATION
1 gear in auto would give you 60 raw score.
3 gears in auto would give you 120 raw score, but is also very unlikely until proven not very unlikely. The autonomous codes will be very hard to coordinate for 3 alliance members, each laying a gear, and then moving out of the next bot's way so that they can as well. This also isn't a 2014 situation where gears can simply be touching your robot to be considered preloaded, leaving another (high-caliber) team to do all the scoring. Per 4.2 Game Setup - Gear - D. each team ... preload in their ROBOT

granted that there are three lifts on the air ship as stated in both the glossary and 3.4 the task of placing three gears becomes significantly easier than you are stating. To place three gears robots just have to go to separate lifts and place gears on their own designated lift to contribute to a three gear auto rather than all one after another place gears onto one lift.

[AndyBare]

Originally Posted by NShep98

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at here. There are 3 lifts, all next to each other. Why would more than one robot have to score on a single lift?

I fixed it. My point still stands that you only take a -10 net loss on each gear that you don't score in autonomous, as long as you score 10 high priority fuel, and complete the scoring of at least 2 gears in teleop (plus the reserve)

[apm4242]

I agree with you and we are considering scoring as many fuel balls as we can in auto. The issue we keep running into is time - time to get to the hopper, receive the balls, maybe reposition, shoot the balls, and time for the boiler to process the fuel.

Do you think there will be enough time to shoot and count say, 30 fuel balls?

[AndyBare]

Originally Posted by apm4242

Do you think there will be enough time to shoot and count say, 30 fuel balls?

Maybe not if you move to reposition, but say you can move to the hopper in 5 seconds, and start shooting your preloads, as the hoppers contents fill your bot. You've now got a potential score rate of 5 fuel per second over 10 seconds, which could be 50 fuel, if you continuously shoot a fuel per .2 seconds (this would be scoring fuel at the rate they are scored at). 30 fuel in 10 seconds would mean one every .3s. If you shoot a fuel per .5s, it would be 20 fuel in 10s, which in my personal opinion sounds like the most reasonable scenario.

Are these rates doable? Maybe. I don't know to be honest. I don't know reasonable rates for shooting wiffle balls, and I don't know if that distance is reasonable. I will say that wiffle balls become much more accurate with spin. Just a matter of testing.

If fuel is constantly scored through autonomous, from second 1-15, discounting the first full second due to motor starts, there is a potential score of (around?) 70 shots - based off of FRC's fuel scoring rate alone (5/s). If your alliance members shot all 20 of their preloads, it would take approximately 4 seconds to score them, due to this scoring rate which FRC has introduced. If you can be at the hopper, ready to score by second 5, you can start scoring, adding onto the flow. I'd say at least 50 fuel could be scored in autonomous, possibly more, because actual rate is dependent on the amount and packing of FUEL in the GOALS (i.e. the tighter the packing in
a GOAL, the faster the FUEL processing rate). If 50 fuel is scored, it would mean shooting all 30 preloads, as well as 20 hopper fuel. 50 fuel would be processed at a slowest rate of .28 seconds per if each was given an equal processing time over 14 seconds. Because we know that the average processing time is a fuel every .2 seconds, this could be very reasonable.

I hope that's not too scatterbrained, but in short, yes, I think it's possible, but I also think that it'll take hard work and dedication to get there, and I wish that a better more time-accurate scoring system had been presented. Perhaps one will be implemented. Here's to hoping.