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  #16   Spotlight this post!  
Unread 24-01-2017, 22:15
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Re: Vetting defensive picks

Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian Maher View Post
Thank you all for the excellent advice and comments, though none of them address one piece of the puzzle I am curious about: interacting with prospective defenders to make sure they're on board with playing defense. I've heard of situations where a team isn't exactly thrilled to be playing defense, despite being picked for them to do so, or is unwilling to put a blocker on their robot for defense purposes. I am looking for advice to avoid situations like this.
If you're looking at a specific robot only in terms of it's capabilities to play defense, I think it would be a good idea to stop by their pit before alliance selection and ask if they would be okay with playing defense and cheesecaking a blocker. If they say yes, that takes care of that problem. If they say no, you know you probably shouldn't pick that team.

In 2014, my team's robot was effectively just a tall drive base, but we did a good job of playing defense* (see a pattern here?). Before alliance selection at both of our competitions, teams came to us and asked if we would be willing to play defense for them if their alliance strategy called for it. Of course we said yes. It only took 2 minutes and they had the answer you're looking for.


* We actually played defense so hard that we were breaking our opponents' robots. This was the year of the white Clippards, so we burst a few of those. We started keeping a tally in sharpie on the side of our robot of the number of robots we broke, turned off, or otherwise disabled throughout the season. IIRC that number got into the double digits.
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Unread 24-01-2017, 22:28
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Re: Vetting defensive picks

Quote:
Originally Posted by Brian Maher View Post
Thank you all for the excellent advice and comments, though none of them address one piece of the puzzle I am curious about: interacting with prospective defenders to make sure they're on board with playing defense. I've heard of situations where a team isn't exactly thrilled to be playing defense, despite being picked for them to do so, or is unwilling to put a blocker on their robot for defense purposes. I am looking for advice to avoid situations like this.
To learn this, you will need someone who is good at reading people's attitude, and ask the prospects frank questions. The person asking and the person "reading" do not necessarily need to be the same person. For example, if you have one person ask the the questions in a routine way and obviously take notes of the words, while someone else gauges responses of both the coach and the driver and makes notes after leaving the discussion, that well selected "reader" is likely to produce the info you seek.
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Unread 25-01-2017, 00:56
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Re: Vetting defensive picks

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ari423 View Post
* We actually played defense so hard that we were breaking our opponents' robots. This was the year of the white Clippards, so we burst a few of those. We started keeping a tally in sharpie on the side of our robot of the number of robots we broke, turned off, or otherwise disabled throughout the season. IIRC that number got into the double digits.
I nominate this for the most gangster thing I have seen in FRC.
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Unread 25-01-2017, 01:36
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Re: Vetting defensive picks

When looking for a defensive robot, talking to the team itself isn't my first go-to.

Match scouting is gonna tell you most of what you need to know.

Look at their drive style- are they slower to respond or are they proactive in their driving? Some teams are good at just getting in the way of others in the midst of their offense, this can speak to their skill.

Is it apparent that they know the defensive rules?- For example, sometimes you can see their coach or co-driver watching the ref for a countdown. Fouls in elims can often be the difference between win or loss. It is generally apparent if the driver is timid in his movements or intentional with them.

Overall pit/match- Is the robot robust? All you need for a defensive bot is a good driver and a robot that isn't going to fall apart on impact. (Or maybe their bumpers keep falling off and there's an easy way to fix it)

Find the gem- Sometimes a robot won't be great offensively and will slip through the cracks of scouting. They may only play defense in one match for various reasons. In this case, again take a look at their drive style and refer to the other points I mentioned.

When talking to the team- It's usually easy to tell in a conversation with the drive team their knowledge. You can ask if they are willing to play defense, but I try to listen to tone on this one. Some will be a wishy-washy yes, others will be excited to tell you about it. This more refers to the Driver's knowledge on rules again and whether the driver knows how to drive defensively (I guess I keep coming back to drive style and rules knowledge). I saw one robot defend against two robots quite effectively last year.

Last point, yes, it might be good to ask about cheesecaking. Whether adding a net or something else. Actually, some teams may have one made and just not bring it out until elims.
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Unread 25-01-2017, 05:06
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Re: Vetting defensive picks

One thing I have to add here on the subject of cheesecaking: I don't think it'll be too useful this year. The best defensive robots will probably have the wider config, which is also only 2 ft tall. This doesn't really give you much room to put in a blocker, and even the 3 ft config won't be tall enough to block any shots, especially with the angle teams will be shooting at. Defense is likely to be based more on trying to hit targets at key points in their cycle and getting in their way when their driver's can't see their robot.
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Unread 25-01-2017, 08:44
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Re: Vetting defensive picks

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Originally Posted by pmattin5459 View Post
One thing I have to add here on the subject of cheesecaking: I don't think it'll be too useful this year. The best defensive robots will probably have the wider config, which is also only 2 ft tall. This doesn't really give you much room to put in a blocker, and even the 3 ft config won't be tall enough to block any shots, especially with the angle teams will be shooting at. Defense is likely to be based more on trying to hit targets at key points in their cycle and getting in their way when their driver's can't see their robot.
As I said earlier in this thread, pretty much any tank drive robot with a decent driver can play effective defense. They may not be the absolute best at it, but it will still be effective. If that means only picking a tall volume robot for defense with the intent of cheesecaking on a blocker, so be it.
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Unread 25-01-2017, 09:01
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Re: Vetting defensive picks

During the season we were on both sides of having defense on our alliance (that is being a captain and picking a defender and being picked to be a defender). We asked questions like:
What type of drive train do you have?
What type of wheels do you have?
How many and what type of drive motors do you have?
How much does your robot weigh?
How many years has your drive team been on the drive team?

And before every match that we had a defender we would make sure that they knew all relevant rules on defending (Pinning, ramming, etc.)

We asked these questions during pit scouting and took it into account during our selection process the night before the day of alliance selections. We didn't actually ask about cheesecaking a blocker and it did not prove to be necessary because we won the event.(MAR Mt. Olive 2016)

At MAR District Championship we were chosen to be a defender. They asked us if we'd be willing to put a wall on our robot and the answer was "definitely". We were a very light robot, pushing wasn't really its specialty. But that's okay! Good defense last year proved to be less about pushing robots and more about strategic playing. We would park our wall in front of a robot and just wait for them to shoot. Yadda yadda I'm getting away from myself here.

The moral of the story is that while all of that previously mentioned robot things are important, you need to make sure that whatever team you pick as a defender knows how to hit the important elements of defending for whatever game you're having them defend for. (Defense strategy discussion can be somewhere else. I've digressed enough )
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