Winners of Two Regionals

[Masterfork]

Originally Posted by Rick TYler

It's possible that your 2 out of 12 guess is correct, but don't forget the incredible teams that only had the budget for one regional. The list of double winners would certainly be longer without budget limitations. I think the championships are going to be a lot of fun this year.

well yeah but that is not really the piont here it is nice to win 2 regionals but i fyour good and win one it is kind of a good idea it will make less people look at you and possible underestimate you so there could be an advantage there but when we play we don't care we play it as if it were our last but we don't like to kill our opponent also so we have fine lines to go by in that aspect

but i am still really suprised that swamp didn't win first in SC what was that who were the penalties on, them or their alliance teams?

but any way strategy is a very big part which has helped us alot as you can see. here is the big key know your oppenent

[Masterfork]

i t does has some luck with qualification rounds allaince teams that is why you make the best out of what you got and strategies like we have lost a few but we have also won a few that we were the only ones scoring but our alliances did what they were asked to do but it is all based on being smart and stragegy

[Swampdude]

Originally Posted by Masterfork

but i am still really suprised that swamp didn't win first in SC what was that who were the penalties on, them or their alliance teams?

Our first loss was from another strange rule interpretation that you couldn't have any part of your body cross the starting line during autonomous. Tytus pointed at a goal and about 8" of his hand was crossing that line and we drew a 10pt flag. Then we got a loading zone penalty - another 10pts. So those 2 were ours and then our alliance parters both drew (2) 10 pt penalties. So we ended that match with 40pts penalties.

we got our act cleaned up after that but our second loss both of our alliance partners were holding their tetras during autonomous - (2) 10pt penalties and lost by 2 pts

third loss our 2 alliance partners were standing on the wrong pressure pads. They decided to switch pads after autonomous started. So the ref had to either disqualify our alliance or give us (2) 30pt penalties. We got the 30pt penalties - 60pts. In this match we scored 72 pts but not enough to cover 60 pts penalty.

Needless to say we were a little upset. We came back strong after these and capped a minimum of 6 per match from then on out.

[MasonMM]

For 118 there were many factors to why i would justify our sucess at two regionals.

- A good robot. We really hit it hard this year during the build season. We set super hard to reach goals, like building our robot in 3 weeks. Alas we missed it by a few days, but we gave ourselves almost 3 full weeks to test out our bot and find problems with it, train the drivers, make modifications, and figure out it's limitations, all with good time before we had to ship it off. Being able to manipulate the tetras is huge this year, as it's almost the only way to score in the big matches. You can't push a goal around, guard a ramp, or push balls... like in other years, you've got to grab tetras and grab them well. we designed our robot around this and it has proven to be very sucessful.

-Gread Flight team. Lots of driver training, in all situations. Our drivers are well practiced with using just 1 arm, using 2, using sensors, using no sensors, and starting off with the wheels backwards. This all proved useful in the competition as we had some failures, especcially in denver, but our drivers were able to keep calm and adjust to the changing needs on the field. Even when our turret broke during the finals in colorado our drivers were able to adapt and still keep capping. Communication between the upperbody driver and lower body driver and the on field coach was curcial and all three have really gotten along well on the field. The Coach position is very important. Our drivers just focus on the task of getting tetras and placing them, only the coach worries about scores and where to put the tetras. Having each individual do their own task well has led us to be a huge contendor on the field.

-Strategy is huge this year. With one cap you can make a 30 point or more swing of the game, and with teams that can cap in less than 10 seconds, it makes for a huge change in the final seconds. The coach has to know where to put what and when, because the fate of the game can come at the last second. As the on field coach, i've worked hard to make the right calls and this has kept our team winning.

-Scouting. Knowing your opponents is a big deal. Our bot works best when we are alone, so it's curcial that we know ahead of time which robots to stay away from on the other side of the field, and who's mosy likely to charge us. At the same time, we've gotta know what our allies can do so we know whether or not to ask them to cap away, or help body guard us.

-And alliances. Such a huge factor. We've been very lucky at both competitions to have a sucessful alliance in the finals. Every team has there own idea of what they want the other two robots with them to be like, but for us, we've been able to get the type of robots on our side both times which has led us to victory.

I hope to see some exciting matches in Atlanta, and i'm sure there are other factors, but i know that these are the main ones that has lead the robonauts to sucess.

[lynca]

Swampthing minimum of 6 tetras is important,

The teams out of the 12 who have won two regionals with a high cap average will most likely be very strong.

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by Karthik

I don't believe that there has ever been a FIRST season where this many teams have won two regionals. Take a look at this list that I've compiled.

<snip>

So, why do I think we have so many repeat winners? Well here are a couple factors...

I am really surpised that no one has mentioned this yet: one of the significant factors leading to an increased number of repeat regional winners is the fact that there are (approximately) the same number of teams but there are more regional events at which to compete than last year (2004 - 26 regionals, 2005 - 30 regionals). This allowed a slightly more uniform distribution of the strong/capable teams throughout the entire set of regional competitions. This would then lead to the expectation that, with all other factors unchanged, there would be a 15% increase in the number of repeat winners between 2004 and 2005. When you then combine it with the other factors that did change (perhaps most significantly, the change from two to three teams per alliance), the increase in repeat winners is not all that surprising.

-dave

[Heretic121]

Originally Posted by Tytus Gerrish

[size=4][color=Red]IS ENTIRELY DEPENDNT ON GOOD SCOUTING
[size=2][color=Black]

tytus said it the best...

scouting is EVERYTHING this year more so than the past years... you need to know reliability, spped, pushing power, tetras capped per match, and so many more things...

its just boundless little details that makes the diffrence between a good first pick and an excelent/outstanding/great/etc. first pick which can either make or break your alliance.

[Aaron]

Originally Posted by Tytus Gerrish

it is the alliances. more importantly ....understand him.
[/color][/size] [/color][/size]

I agree completely with Tytus, its all about scouting. Friday night the whole drive team and scout team get together and make up a lit for our team, regardless of whether or not we are in the top 8. This helps us find 'sleeper teams.' We did this when we had our alliance pick 122 last year to help win Palmetto.

Their also is a bit of luck involved in being in really good alliances. Their is a big difference between being the last pick of the first round and the first pick of the second (as we found out this year at Palmetto). Some of those teams on that list have just been blessed by the gods a little more than the rest of us (but all of them are great teams). I would love to be the first pick in the secound round at nationals; but our team has a way of being picked by the lower seeds.

Nevertheless congratulations to all of the teams that have won two regionals, and good luck at the nationals.

[Master Spoon]

Good drivers and a good robot are only half of what it takes to be the winner,knowing your enemy is the key to victory. Scouts are the other half that make a good team run like a well oiled machine. With knowledge about the speed,power, and staking ability of other robots is a huge advantage in making a strategy. You should also keep an eye on the autonomis modes of a robot so that you can adjust your own to maybe block or score before the opponent dose the same.

[techtiger1]

What if u were finalist allience captian at two regionals ? We got screwed twice.

[David66]

A little recap with my own twist...

This game is indeed scouting dependant. SO much so that at the Great Lakes Regional Team 66 decided to write its own program and invest huge amounts of time in scouting and writing the actual program.. From start to finish the program took about 5 hours, and man hours into scouting equals about 72, just for a regional with 42 teams. Our program automatically ranked all 42 teams. 20 of our Top 24 were selected for the finals. 2 of the Top 8 did not even make our list-the "luck" factor of random alliance pairing

Strategy is Critical At the West Michigan Regionals in the finals our alliance (66, 93, 107) were challenged by what was viewed by many as a stronger alliance. However, with three separate strategies in three separate matches (saving the best for last of course) our alliance was able to keep them guessing, and come out on top. So yes, it is possible for the "little guy" to come out on top.

The game changes Team 66 won two regionals (side note, only 2 GM teams won 2 regionals each, and they are also all from the wining alliance at GLR 66, 67, 68-I also believe each of us has won at least one other award, 67 winning the WMR Chairman's Award). The strategy from the Great Lakes Regional was vastly different from the Srategies we used with our alliance partnersd at the West Michigan Regionals. The best teams leave their options open until they have gotten to know their opponents. WHich again leads back to the importance of scouting.

Just my $.02

[techtiger1]

Originally Posted by techtiger1

What if u were finalist allience captian at two regionals ? We got screwed twice.

I am sorry everyone this message has no pupose for bing on these boards. I sincerly have learned my lesson and will never be ungracioulsy professinal again.

[spears312]

I've taken notice that the teams that win regionals have really good robots capable of winning over and over. The teams that win at two regionals have to have the perfect balance of robot, driver, strategy, and a touch of luck. The teams also have to be extremely determined. It will be interesting to see these teams preform at nationals, hopefully we will see some good matches between them.