Ideas to move in the direction of making FIRST competitions 'fair'

[artdutra04]

Originally Posted by To Kill a Mockingbird

'Atticus, are we going to win it?'

'No, honey.'

'Then why-'

'Simply because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try to win.'

As much as I would like to see the playing field leveled, I believe that as with anything in life, a slight to moderate imbalance is necessary to keep the program moving forward. When everyone is exactly even, who do you look up to for ideas and inspiration? If you're a team with limited resources, what inspiration is there to try wild, innovative, and new ideas to try to beat the "better" teams, when all you have to do is go with some stable, boring idea to beat the average run-of-the-mill bot?

With the ever increasing amount of off-the-shelf resources, such as the IFI and AndyMark transmissions and wheels, IFI Kitbot frame, and the EasyC programming environment, it's becoming easier and easier for rookie teams to build better robots. Rather than seeing strict rules put in place to stifle the "better" teams, I would rather see more resources being developed to help rookie teams build competitive robots.

Instead of lowering a team's expectations, let's raise the amount of competitive resources available to them.