Yellow card / Red card usage at 2004 IRI

[Lil' Lavery]

Cards shouldnt carry over to other competitions. Otherwise one foul play at a regional can cost you your chance at a win at another event, by having a team not pick them because of the yellow card carrying over. In many cases drivers/coaches may differ from event to event due to schedule complications and such. Such an occurance happened to our team, where the only constant between our 2 regionals was our HP, and coach, both our drivers were different. If one driver is more aggresive than another, and gains a yellow card, why punish the other? But, that makes it basically an idv. penalty, not a team, and if we pursue that mentality, a) it add another lvl of complexity, and b) teams will rotate drivers to avoid being DQed.
Since intention cant be determine in 4 ot of 5 cases, I say we give them the benefit of the doubt, and not have cards carry over.
But within a competition, it needs to follow into the elims. That is when the penalties and results will matter the most. The yellow card may keep them from the finals, but if it doesnt follow them, their actions may eliminate 3 other team, instead of just holding them out. And I think in 9/10 occaisions, if a team hasnt been DQed, but has 1 yellow card, the team will select them anyway, due to the capabilities of their robot.