[moderated] Brainstorm: Aggressive play rule

[Andrew]

G101 Overly Aggressive Play Overly aggressive play is defined as ungracious and unfair play designed to damage or disable an opponent's robot outside the scope of the rules.

1. Deliberate Tipping
2. Excessive Pinning (see pinning)
3. Grabbing and Holding (see entanglement)
4. Deliberate Entanglement (see entanglement)
5. Late Hits

G101a Deliberate Tipping
Deliberate tipping occurs when a robot extends a surface below an "upright" robot and raises that surface until the second robot assumes a "non-upright" position. "Upright" is defined as the condition in which the primary drive mechanism is in contact with the playing field surface such that controlled robot mobility is enabled. "Non-upright" is the negation of "Upright."

A 50 point penalty will be assessed against the tipping robot for each occurrence.

G101b Late Hits
A late hit occurs when a robot makes contact with another robot which has been immobilized or disabled. Examples of immobilization include being caught on the playing field border, being pinned by another robot, having a drive system or software malfunction which prevents mobility, being disabled by the referees for another offence.

The first late hit in a match will be penalized by a 20 point penalty. The second late hit will result in disabling of the offending robot.

G101c Last Resort due to Excessive Damage
A team which feels that it has been damaged due to overly aggressive play in a match may issue a written complaint immediately after the match. [Note: a specific form and very specific guidelines for complaints would be established.] The complaintant robot will be inspected for damage immediately. The team against whom the complaint is registered will be interviewed to determine their intent. The head referee in consultation with the other field referees will make a judgement to uphold or deny the complaint.

The team which registers the complaint will have a pink dot attached to its on field badges (regardless of the determination of the complaint).

If the complaint is upheld, the offending team will have a penalty dot attached to its on field badges. The first offense will have a yellow dot, the second offense a red dot, and the final offense a black dot. A "black-dotted" team will not be allowed to compete further in the competition.

Analysis
Most of the problems with "overly aggressive play" are cumulative and perceptional. If a team feels that they have been "wronged," they need a formal mechanism to resolve this. If a team is serious enough about a complaint to write it down, then some form of resolution needs to be undertaken. In some cases, they just need their complaint to be heard. In others, a real correction to the offending team needs to be applied. It is worth the stoppage in play to resolve the dispute to the satisfaction of all parties, rather than to continue to have bad feelings build up.

The pink dot is designed to keep teams from "excessively complaining." If you have five pink dots on your badges, you are not going to be taken seriously.

The yellow, red, black dots follow the "carding" system already proposed. Mechanistically, it provides a visual badge to the world that this team has had complaints against it upheld. The referees, alliance partners, and opponents will know what they're dealing with before they get into the match.

The reason for a written complaint system is that FIRST is not going to want to disqualify someone from competing in a tournament that they paid for without consistent written documentation. Since the referrees are generally volunteers and generally drawn from teams, a legal argument could be made by a disqualified team that "team bias" had been involved in defrauding a team of its entry fees and tarnishing its reputation. By providing consistent written documentation, if a team is going to be disqualified and thrown out of the tournament, the legal action that that team might undertake would be curtailed.