Midfield Collisions

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by phrontist

The real challenge comes when you starting blocking the blockers...

Wow! You mean that simple little boxes on wheels, that can't do anything else in the autonomous period except drive around (which they can do just by building the kitbot), might actually be able to play a very important role by protecting their vision-tetra-capping-capable alliance partners from opposing onslaughts?!!? Just drive really fast from the starting position to one of the two "channels" between the middle goals, and patrol there, block the opponents efforts to disrupt the alliance, and enable your alliance to score points during autonomous! And maybe if the simple little box on wheel teams wasn't "quite there" with their autonomous software, a vision-tetra-capping-capable alliance partner that wanted them to fulfill that role might even be able to just give them the simple autonomous routine that they needed while they were at the competition! That seems like a pretty cool idea! Who'da thunk o' dat?!

[Max Lobovsky]

Originally Posted by dlavery

Wow! You mean that simple little boxes on wheels, that can't do anything else in the autonomous period except drive around (which they can do just by building the kitbot), might actually be able to play a very important role by protecting their vision-tetra-capping-capable alliance partners from opposing onslaughts?!!? Just drive really fast from the starting position to one of the two "channels" between the middle goals, and patrol there, block the opponents efforts to disrupt the alliance, and enable your alliance to score points during autonomous! And maybe if the simple little box on wheel teams wasn't "quite there" with their autonomous software, a vision-tetra-capping-capable alliance partner that wanted them to fulfill that role might even be able to just give them the simple autonomous routine that they needed while they were at the competition! That seems like a pretty cool idea! Who'da thunk o' dat?!

I think that is really wishful thinking. Last year, my team was almost always the most friendly and willing to interact out of all the teams we played with. There were numerous oppurtunities where we could have benefitted (and vice versa) from people from other teams helping with software, yet very little happened. One programmer from another team did help out a bit, but the code he gave us was mostly useless because we decided it was too risky to try it without testing it.

Sure teams can lend each other spare parts and give each other advice, but I think its pretty unlikely that you will see many teams reporgramming other teams bots in the 1/2 hour or so that they have to prepare for matches.

[phrontist]

Originally Posted by Max Lobovsky

I think that is really wishful thinking. Last year, my team was almost always the most friendly and willing to interact out of all the teams we played with. There were numerous oppurtunities where we could have benefitted (and vice versa) from people from other teams helping with software, yet very little happened. One programmer from another team did help out a bit, but the code he gave us was mostly useless because we decided it was too risky to try it without testing it.

Sure teams can lend each other spare parts and give each other advice, but I think its pretty unlikely that you will see many teams reporgramming other teams bots in the 1/2 hour or so that they have to prepare for matches.

I think it's possible, but very hard indeed. The problem comes with having time to test it.

[dlavery]

Yea, I guess so. I must have been daydreaming. I realize that giving them

{CMD_DRIVE, 8500, 0, 0},
{CMD_TURN, (-1500), 50, 0},
{CMD_WAIT, 1000, 0, 0},
{CMD_DRIVE, 0500, 0, 0},
{CMD_WAIT, 1000, 0, 0},
{CMD_DRIVE, -1000, 0, 0},
{CMD_WAIT, 1000, 0, 0},
{CMD_DRIVE, 1000, 0, 0},
{CMD_WAIT, 1000, 0, 0},
{CMD_JUMP, 4, 0, 0},
{NULL, 0, 0, 0}

in a little text file would be too hard.

-dave

[Max Lobovsky]

Mr. Lavery, if you have the guts to take that from some stranger's hands (regardless of the strangers intentions or background), drop it into the robot you have worked for 6 long, hard weeks on right before one of the maybe 25 actual matches your robot will play, you are a braver man than me.

[dlavery]

That is what practice fields are for.

[russell]

I have two plans for teams not having much luck with their cameras, both involving use of gyros and encoders. Your first option is to have your autonomous dedicated to blocking opposing blocking bots (Obviously I "borrowed" this idea). This is a good plan because the very good teams will likely have camera autonomous and will find you to be a valuable partner. The other plan is to have an arm with an aluminum tetra shape on the end, and two three way switches, one to select your starting location, and the other to select a goal which your robot will then drive to and put its aluminum tetra on top of for the duration of autonomous (It would be a part of the arm, not something it sets there then leaves obviously). Not only is this a more GP way of blocking than simply careening about with the intent of destroying, but it should also be moree effective. If you were really good you could even have a giant folding arm that covers all three goals .

[Anchi]

We are buildign to take the hits, and dishout more than our fair share in auto. we had thought abotu mounting the controler on a foam pad or somethign along those lines to prevent bad jaring.

[russell]

Yeah. I know it has been noted that they actually give you a higher weight limit this year to accomplish way less. I think this is partly because they realised there were too many tasks last year, but also as they repeatedly emphasized at kickoff the game this year is going to result in a lot of colisions. Beef up your bot. (wow thats a catchy phrase)

[OZ_341]

Originally Posted by Max Lobovsky

Mr. Lavery, if you have the guts to take that from some stranger's hands (regardless of the strangers intentions or background), drop it into the robot you have worked for 6 long, hard weeks on right before one of the maybe 25 actual matches your robot will play, you are a braver man than me.

One of our many strategies in 2003 was to approach our partners, well in advance, to help them with their Auton code and any mechanical issues.

Maybe we just got lucky, but we found many teams that appreciated the programming help. They ended up with permanent code they could use and we had a better partner.

We feel that was a major factor in our success at the 2003 Championship. Also our team went home knowing that we had helped many teams over the course of the year. Overall a great feeling.

[Paul Copioli]

A fact:

You do not have to shoot the gaps to block the center goal (or any goal, for that matter) in autonomous.

A question:

What is faster: Finding a vision tetra, picking it up, finding the goal, moving to the goal, capping; or driving straight about 17' and placing an arm above the goal?

-Paul

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by Paul Copioli

A fact:

You do not have to shoot the gaps to block the center goal (or any goal, for that matter) in autonomous.

A question:

What is faster: Finding a vision tetra, picking it up, finding the goal, moving to the goal, capping; or driving straight about 17' and placing an arm above the goal?

-Paul

Great point! And think about the alliance with one really good vision-tetra-capping-capable robot and two boxes on wheels, going up against the alliance with one really good uber-long-goal-blocking-arm robot and two boxes on wheels. I can just imagine the intra-team debates that will be happening:

RedTeam1: We can cap the vision tetra on the center goal, so let's set our robot to go there while you two block them and keep them out of our way.

RedTeam2: Yeah, but Blue knows that you can do that, so they are going to set their BigBlueArm to block the center goal. You need to go to the left side goal.

RedTeam3: But Blue knows that we know they have the BigBlueArm. And they are probably figuring that we are figuring that they will go to the center goal, and are going left instead. I bet they are already setting the BigBlueArm to go left. So we need to go to the right side middle goal.

RedTeam1: But we know that they know that we know they have the BigBlueArm. And we know that they know that we know they can block the middle goal, and will probably go to the side goals. But they don't know that we know that they know that we know that they can block the middle goal, and will probably go to the side goals. But since we do, we should go to the middle goal.

RedTeam3: But they do know that! We partnered with BigBlueArm three matches ago against you, and noticed then that when you know that they know that you know that they know you are going to the center goal, you always go the left goal instead, and we told them that. So this match they are going to expect you to go to the middle goal. But they know that you know they expect you to go to the middle goal, and will go to the left goal instead.

RedTeam2: But hopefully they don't know that you know that they know that you know they expect you to go to the middle goal, and will go to the left goal instead. So you should go to the right goal.

RedTeam2: But don't you think that they are smart enough to know that you guys were one their alliance before, and know what they know? They must know that we know that they know that you know that they know that you know they expect you to go to the middle goal, and will be planning go to the left goal instead. So they know that we will probably go to the right goal. So we need to go to the center goal.

RedTeam1: Ah, but I think that you are about to fall victim to one of the classic blunders. The most famous is "Never get involved in a land war in Asia." But only slightly less well known is this: "Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line." And my late Sicilian Uncle Vizzini always taught me that if you know the other guy is smart enough to know that your partner was once their partner, they must know that you know some of what they know. And since we know they must know that we know that they know that you know that they know that you know they expect you to go to the middle goal, and will be planning go to the left goal, but are planning to go to the center goal since they know that we would normally go to the right goal, we have to do something completely different. So we have to figure out what we know that they don't know...

Meanwhile, on the Blue side of the field:

BlueTeam1: Do you think that we should say something to them?

BlueTeam2: I dunno. Probably.

BlueTeam3: Yeah, we should. I mean, the match was over two minutes ago. We scored 67 points while they sat there plotting and planning. Of course, we would have scored a lot more if BigBlueArm hadn't fallen over during autonomous because it was running all over trying to block all three goals against red robots that weren't even there...

BlueTeam2: So I wonder what they are still talking about?

[Mr. Van]

Originally Posted by dlavery

Great point! ... I can just imagine the intra-team debates that will be happening:

RedTeam1: We can cap the vision tetra ...

So we have to figure out what we know that they don't know...

Meanwhile, on the Blue side of the field:

BlueTeam1: Do you think ...

So I wonder what they are still talking about?

Dave- You have too much time on your hands. (Yes, I got a kick out of it - thanks!)

Regarding blocking blockers: Of course, you gotta figure that the other team just might quite possibly do the same thing as you and send out some blocking 'bots, which would have to get there quickly... say in a few seconds... using the supplied drive train in the kit... (2 * 10 ft/s = SMASH!) and we are back where we started.

Have I got this wrong? Perhaps all of the "tic-tac-toe/othello" analogies a bit off. Perhaps the game we should be looking at (with heavy blockers and more fragile scorers) is... football?

-Mr. Van

[Paul Copioli]

Believe it or not, Dave latched onto exactly what I was getting at.

You gotta love the "Princess Bride" reference. By the way, didn't the Sicilian get poisened anyway?

-Paul

[dhitchco]

I got a big kick out of Dave's latest response to this thread. The mention of Sicilian tactics is really great. So, as long as we're at it, how about some of the sayings of the great Chinese warrior Sun Tsu. A lot of what goes on in this FIRST Robotics competition is NOT what the robots do on the field.

So...HERE IS the complete text with these great "sound bites":

• All warfare is based on deception.
  Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near.
  Hold out baits to entice the enemy. Feign disorder, and crush him.
  If he is secure at all points, be prepared for him, If he is in superior strength, evade him.
  If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be weak, that he may grow arrogant.
  If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. If his forces are united, separate them.
  Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected.
  These military devices, leading to victory, must not be divulged beforehand