Why I like the last 2 games--dual challenge levels

[Citrus Dad]

The FRC Game Design Committee has added an important feature in the last two games that I believe helps promote FRC to a wider potential audience of high school students. Each of these games, had added a less-difficult match-long challenge that teams that are newer or with less resources can accomplish and make a material contribution toward the alliance's goals.

In Stronghold the added challenge was crossing different complexities of defenses. Those crossings contributed to both the team score (and it was possible to win qualifying matches with only crossing points) and to an important ranking point separate from the match outcome.

In Steamworks, it will be placing gears, which should be easier than shooting massive amounts of fuel in the high goal. Again, this task contributes to a separate ranking point.

Kudos to the GDC to create a clear value-added role for teams that sometimes have been seen as much less important in past games.

[TDav540]

The counter argument I have to both those two games is that they are both very complex. While that design makes it super interesting for the majority of participants in FRC, it makes it significantly more difficult to explain to the average sponsor, parent, or newbie. And, at the end of the day, isn't that the target audience?

I'm hoping the GDC will pull out a much simpler game in 2018.

[ollien]

Originally Posted by TDav540

The counter argument I have to both those two games is that they are both very complex. While that design makes it super interesting for the majority of participants in FRC, it makes it significantly more difficult to explain to the average sponsor, parent, or newbie. And, at the end of the day, isn't that the target audience?

I'm hoping the GDC will pull out a much simpler game in 2018.

This is the major problem IMO. Honestly, after over a year, I've finally come up with an explanation of stronghold. "We crossed over various obstacles to put balls in a goal." That being said, this hardly highlights how awesome changeable defenses were. This year, the best I can come up with is "you can either shoot wiffle balls in a goal, or have people lift score gears to activate 'rotors' for points."


In the GDCs defense, the whole 'assist' aspect of 2014 is a bit hard to explain. You leave out a lot of detail by just saying "you put exercise balls in a goal"

[JR0405]

When I saw the title the first that came to my mind was low goals. Last year, our rookie year, all we did was low bar and low goal but we did it well. This year I think for teams out there that want to do shooting and gears but our rookies or on a lower level, the low goal gives them an opportunity for this without having to mess with vision tracking or higher level aiming.

[endreman0]

Originally Posted by TDav540

The counter argument I have to both those two games is that they are both very complex. While that design makes it super interesting for the majority of participants in FRC, it makes it significantly more difficult to explain to the average sponsor, parent, or newbie. And, at the end of the day, isn't that the target audience?

I'm hoping the GDC will pull out a much simpler game in 2018.

"Robots have to drive over, under, or through obstacles to shoot foam 'boulders' into the opponents' 'castle.'" Not that hard, and it opens up for more questions to give longer descriptions and get them more interested.

For this year, "teams bring gears and balls to their respective goals. The balls can go in high or low goals; the high goal is harder, but worth more points." Again, use just a bit of FRC terminology to make them ask questions and get them interested.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by TDav540

The counter argument I have to both those two games is that they are both very complex. While that design makes it super interesting for the majority of participants in FRC, it makes it significantly more difficult to explain to the average sponsor, parent, or newbie. And, at the end of the day, isn't that the target audience?

I'm hoping the GDC will pull out a much simpler game in 2018.

Personally I think both of these games have been very spectator friendly and very easy to explain to people outside of FIRST.

Stronghold: "We shoot dodge balls which are called boulders into a tower. We drive over field obstacles which are called defenses. At the end of the match we climb a bar. It also has a cool medieval theme going on."

Steamworks: "We shoot wiffle balls which are called Fuel into a high goal which is called the Boiler. We also place Gear shaped pieces onto lifts which are connected to a big platform on the field called the Airship. Team members stand on the Airship and retrieve the Gears from the lifts and place them on the Airship for points. At the end of the game we climb a rope. The whole game has a cool steampunk theme."

Explaining FRC games is usually very easy to do if you don't try to throw too much information at people out of the gate.

Each of the last two games have/are going to be incredibly cool to watch. During Steamworks, we're going to see machine gun robots shooting hundreds of wiffle balls in the air. There are going to be fast robots ramming into each other at high speeds. The robots (the designs I've seen and the Ri3D robots) look really cool. Plus both years' robots are going to be incredibly cool for demos.

I love that the GDC has found a winning formula. There's something valuable and impactful that rookie/low resource teams can do with little more than a drivetrain. That's huge because all the students on those teams are going to feel accomplished and proud of their work. It also helps the visual appeal of the game. Every robot should be able to contribute which will result in much more interesting matches. We also shouldn't see a single 0-0 score barring an extreme oversight... With or without the themes, Stronghold and Steamworks are very well designed games.

[dirtbikerxz]

Originally Posted by TDav540

I'm hoping the GDC will pull out a much simpler game in 2018.

nonononononononononononononononononononononononono nono.....NO. I like these complex games. It definitely makes the games more more interesting to strategize, more interesting to build a bot for, more interesting to drive, and definitely more interesting for spectators to watch. I know people who aren't active in robotics, but have gone to a competition in 2014, and also a competition last year, telling me that watching 2016 was much cooler.

Honestly it really isn't that hard to explain games to new people. I mean yes "robots have to shoot big balls in giant goals" is pretty easy, but saying "robots have to grab and place gears, grab and shoot fuel, and climb the rope" isn't that much harder. (Yes I do realize that isn't it, but you get my point.) And if you really want to explain the detailed rules to a spectator, there were just as many in 2014 (for example truss shots, catch points, 3 bot cycles etc.).

[pmattin5459]

Originally Posted by dirtbikerxz

nonononononononononononononononononononononononono nono.....NO. I like these complex games. It definitely makes the games more more interesting to strategize, more interesting to build a bot for, more interesting to drive, and definitely more interesting for spectators to watch. I know people who aren't active in robotics, but have gone to a competition in 2014, and also a competition last year, telling me that watching 2016 was much cooler.

Honestly it really isn't that hard to explain games to new people. I mean yes "robots have to shoot big balls in giant goals" is pretty easy, but saying "robots have to grab and place gears, grab and shoot fuel, and climb the rope" isn't that much harder. (Yes I do realize that isn't it, but you get my point.) And if you really want to explain the detailed rules to a spectator, there were just as many in 2014 (for example truss shots, catch points, 3 bot cycles etc.).

It's just so much cooler to go around doing different things and allows for better alliance building- you need 2-3 really great robots to succeed, and each of those robots is fulfilling a different role (this year especially).

[TDav540]

Originally Posted by Ginger Power

Stronghold: "We shoot dodge balls which are called boulders into a tower. We drive over field obstacles which are called defenses. At the end of the match we climb a bar. It also has a cool medieval theme going on."

Steamworks: "We shoot wiffle balls which are called Fuel into a high goal which is called the Boiler. We also place Gear shaped pieces onto lifts which are connected to a big platform on the field called the Airship. Team members stand on the Airship and retrieve the Gears from the lifts and place them on the Airship for points. At the end of the game we climb a rope. The whole game has a cool steampunk theme."

That's a pretty long description for a "simple" game.

But regardless, I chose the wrong word in my first post. "Explain", the term I really should have used is "introduce".

I have two main examples for this, neither of which involved someone on a team talking to the people involved.

The first was before me (and basically my entire nuclear family) became members of FIRST teams. Every year, my dad and I would go to the NASA/VCU/Virginia regional in Richmond at the VCU Siegel Center. We would walk in with very little idea about the game objective, robot designs, or who was playing, but sometimes (2008, 2010, 2011), the objectives were relatively clear and obvious. Most of the time, it was pretty easy to tell where the majority of points came from, even in 2009 (although that game was easily the worst of the four). It didn't take someone explain the game to us to understand: the result was relatively obvious.

The second is much more recent. My sister has only been paying attention to FRC the past two seasons (2015 and 2016, joined a team this season). Of those, she found Recycle Rush the more interesting game (a travesty, I know). Why? Because it was simpler to understand. The scoring mechanic was obvious. Sure, there's always going to be added complexities to a game. But it was pretty clear pretty quickly what was a score, what wasn't, and how much the score was worth.

I don't disagree with anyone in saying 2016 and 2017 have been and will be fun games. I especially appreciate this year's game. But I can understand how an outsider will enter the arena this year and quickly have a hard time following the match. Simpler games with distinct, followable scoring elements and value correlation (2010-13) can be challenging to participants while still easily understood by an outsider.

[Bkeeneykid]

I think the easiest way to explain these games is the way FIRST usually does it: Explain the story. In various media, frank talked about how they tried to form a goal of the game with some sort of story. So instead of saying "we crossed some defenses and shot boulders" explain it like "We were storming a castle and had to cross their borders and damage their castle". These games are designed around this, so use that to your advantage. Here's how I've been explaining STEAMWORKS:

Two alliances are preparing for a airship race, and must prepare their airship to be the fastest and longest lasting. They can power up more rotors to be faster through delivering gears, as well as shoot fuel to power their airship more. At the end, all the robots climb onto the airship to take off for the race.

[Ginger Power]

Originally Posted by TDav540

That's a pretty long description for a "simple" game.

I timed myself reading the Steamworks description out loud and it was 15 seconds. It's a little wordy, but my point is that if done the right way, explaining FRC games is very easy.

I would also say shooting balls into goals and climbing are very obvious robot objectives that both Stronghold and Steamworks possess. Audience members should easily be able to figure out these scoring objectives because they are very common and easily identifiable.

Scoring Gears in Steamworks is definitely a more obscure scoring objective, but with a few questions/brief explanation, it should be visually obvious to an outsider what is going on.

[GeeTwo]

I definitely like the "dual challenge" nature of these two games. This year's gear/rotor scoring makes it clear that the key to this challenge is in the number of cycles you can run, not the ability to hang one or two gears on the peg. It also forces the majority of teams to make a decision to cut one capability in order to maximize another.

One thing that is definitely different (not as good) this year is that teams who choose gear placement with a passive gearage will not have an exciting demo robot this year. This past year, driving over the obstacles was great fun even if you didn't bring a boulder (though throwing them made an even better one, of course).

At least the rope climb will make a good finale, though teams who tangle the rope up will only be able to do it once or twice at a short demo.

Edit: Spectator access to understanding the game is a good thing, but I wouldn't say they're the "primary customer". It's all about inspiring the students, not entertaining their families. If spectators were the primary customers, FIRST'd be charging them admission.

[Jon Stratis]

My favorite games are the ones where rookies can contribute by scoring points. They could last year with the defenses without too much difficulty. They should be able to this year with the gears. Other years in the past, though, most rookies had no hope of being able to score points, all they could reasonably do was play defense. Of course, there are exceptional rookies every year that surprise us, but I see rookies every year that have little more than a driving robot.

[Siri]

I'm interested in what game mechanic is making gears so much of a better fit for folk on this score than other years' low goals (herein meaning a goal within robot height whose game pieces can be received at a higher altitude than they are scored).

I'd argue that that gear pegging could well end up significantly more difficult even than low goaling frisbees in 2013. I saw more than one box on wheels just consistently collect 4 frisbees in a static tray, run across the field, and ram into the low goal to send them tumbling. A consistent static loader may be around the same level of difficulty both years, but the goal alignment (including the obstructed vision) looks far more difficult at least viewing it from build season. And certainly running two slanted hooks into the bottom rung of the pyramid is far easier than rope climbing. Low goaling in 2014, for its part, was far easier than either 2013 or now. In fact, I'd argue that 2014, between the chair assists and the low goaling and the Aerial Assault defense--and the number of points they were all worth--was the most versatile, valuable, and strategically interesting for Dozer bots in recent years with 2016 also being similar. The actual 2017 low goal (for fuel) is among the more difficult low goals for good throughput that we've had recently. 2015's was less exciting (in oh so many ways), but you could indeed push bunches of single or double totes onto platforms and people did this.

I do agree that gears have a certain je ne sais quoi, but I don't think it's about challenge levels or strategic complexity. We've long had both of those if you knew where to look (and you don't look in Lunacy :P). My current conjecture is that we simply like the balance between the two tasks better in terms of match effects and design prioritization. This, for instance, is something 2013 arguably really struggled with in the point/complexity difference between 10, 20, and 30 point climbs. This year teams that might otherwise say "but we have to shoot high to be worth it" are saying "yay, passive gear mechanism" simply because of the point potential they're anticipating.

[mrnoble]

Originally Posted by Siri

My current conjecture is that we simply like the balance between the two tasks better in terms of match effects and design prioritization. This, for instance, is something 2013 arguably really struggled with in the point/complexity difference between 10, 20, and 30 point climbs. This year teams that might otherwise say "but we have to shoot high to be worth it" are saying "yay, passive gear mechanism" simply because of the point potential they're anticipating.

I totally agree that the balance appears much better this year than in 2013. Teams sometimes chose a dedicated climber because they thought it might be a low scoring game, and that climbing and putting their discs into the top of the pyramid would win matches. They turned out to be woefully incorrect, and ended up losing as a result. This year, it seems that both main tasks have the potential to win or lose.

I've been trying to force myself not to say that I still think 2014 had the potential to be the best robotics game ever. Sorry, I can't help it folks, I still think that.