On side ball use agreement.

[Ekcrbe]

Originally Posted by dtengineering

So... if your team was approached by the other alliance to say, "Just so you know, we think that the goal of the game is to score lots and lots of points. We're going to put everything we have into offense, and we hope you do the same. We'll both score higher, possibly earn more ranking points, do less damage to our robots and put on a better show for the audience if we both focus on offense instead of defense."

Are they trying to undermine the game, or improve the game? Would saying, "Great idea! We'll do the same!" be G.P?

Jason

That's neither undermining nor improving the game. If they don't want to defend us, so be it. Maybe we agree that our best plan is to score and not try to defend them either, but no promises. That depends on what our three teams agree the best strategy is for that match. If we need 4 RPs to get into a good picking position, we'll probably argue to our partners to go all out offense. If it's our last qualification match and we're playing against and outgunned by Team A, who is ranked #2 and 3 RPs behind Team B for #1, and Team B wants to pick us, but Team A would rather pick Team B if they can seed #1, you'd better bet that we want to play some heavy hitting defense and make sure Team A can't get either bonus RP, even if they beat us in the match.

But those are just contrived examples. The point is, when we step on the field, we're there to win, whether that means the match or the competition. That means that we craft match strategy based on what is best for our alliance. Now, I'm not against co-opertition. If the GDC writes it into the rules, I'll gladly play along. I even like the message it sends. You could say I'm pro-co-opertition on the whole. But if it's just you telling me we should run a certain strategy for your sake, don't count on it.