2007 VCU Regional

[Nuttyman54]

Originally Posted by SURVIVORfan44

That's one of the realizations one must come to in FIRST. There are some teams that build their robots strictly for defense.

There are also plenty of teams whose robots either don't work quite how they intended, or who find that they're much more valuable as defense (eg. 1281 at Waterloo last year).

[Cuog]

414 from what I can remember was built to be a scoring robot but because of weight they cut out these systems and so they were left with the strong defensive bot that they had at VCU.

[blakwyte]

Originally Posted by Cuog

414 from what I can remember was built to be a scoring robot but because of weight they cut out these systems and so they were left with the strong defensive bot that they had at VCU.

900 did the same thing. they were playing with ramps and a scoring mechanism thursday but they ended up having to pull everything off to fit in under weight. this is much more understandable than building a purely defensive/potentially damaging robot. i don't understand how that is educational, rewarding or even enjoyable. you don't build anything that complicated, you don't score points and you don't really even have a chance to succeed. maybe they have fun ripping apart other people's hard work?

[burkey_turkey]

Originally Posted by nukemknight

414 also received a yellow flag. They were the short 6 wheel drive bot with a wide wheelbase that played nothing but hard defense.

Originally Posted by blakwyte

yeah i remember them ... i don't see why they built that thing if all they were going to do was hit people with it. not exactly the spirit of FIRST imho

team 422 noticed that they were a defensive bot, as we were paired against them EVERY SINGLE MATCH. we were the target of their defense every single match as well, and since we were never paired with another strong offensive robot our alliances never got any rigners placed. i dont think 414 went too far though, they wre just playing the game. they were next to us in the pit, loaning us stuff and we them. they apologized for constantly smashing our robot, and we admited we would do the same thing in their position. after they got their yellow flag, we scored a few ringers the next match but had no ramps to climb up so we lost, and from them on we got smashed by different teams in our 7th and 8th matches.

[September]

Originally Posted by blakwyte

900 did the same thing. they were playing with ramps and a scoring mechanism thursday but they ended up having to pull everything off to fit in under weight. this is much more understandable than building a purely defensive/potentially damaging robot.

Like someone said before, 414 was originally built as a scoring robot. In fact, I believe they even brought the arm with them to the regionals. And every robot is potentially damaging. You ram a wooden boxbot against any robot many times in the correct place, it will damage it.

i don't understand how that is educational, rewarding or even enjoyable. you don't build anything that complicated, you don't score points and you don't really even have a chance to succeed.

Seeing as how you're not on their team, nor do I believe you understand the structure of their team, I wouldn't expect you to understand why anyone would find it a rewarding experience.

Many, if not most, who join 414's team are rookies in their junior year. If the rookies weren't familiar with FIRST robotics before, and was never presented with a chance to participate in a team, then being there during the building process is a very rewarding experience. So someone new to FIRST actually participating in the creation of a functional robot... how is that not educational, rewarding, or enjoyable?

And why should everyone build something complicated? Isn't the infamous motto of FIRST "Keep it simple [stupid]"?

Success isn't about winning.

maybe they have fun ripping apart other people's hard work?

Or maybe that some teams think it's better to execute a defensive strategy than an offensive strategy?

Disclaimer: The statement above expresses my opinion, and my opinion only. It does not, in any way, shape, or form, reflect the views or opinions of team 510 or 414.

[blakwyte]

owned?

i was only expressing my frustration at the fact that they were beating the crap out of something that i'd spent several grueling days working on, even though it's perfectly legal and i'm just grumpy they make bumpers for a reason, it's easy to put them on and it makes a robot much less likely to take a chunk off someone elses hard work. if winning isn't everything, then deliberately trying to disable someone's robot isn't the way to go.

and i definitely wasn't saying that this was 414's strategy at all. i was over in their pit many times, and i saw that they had definitely planned on scoring ringers ... as you say i have no idea what they were planning on doing before the competition or how much they got out of it. i was just saying that if someone had a strategy like that (purely defensive, potentially damaging robot. ive heard stories.) i consider that to be at the very least inconsiderate of other teams.

again, just my opinion ...

[VanMan]

Originally Posted by Nuttyman54

There are also plenty of teams whose robots either don't work quite how they intended, or who find that they're much more valuable as defense (eg. 1281 at Waterloo last year).

That is exactly why we tried to pick something simple for our rookie year. We wanted defense and ramps that any team could get on.

[LordTalps]

Originally Posted by VanMan

That is exactly why we tried to pick something simple for our rookie year. We wanted defense and ramps that any team could get on.

The only thing I DON'T like about that, is it's not ambitious. An ambitious rookie team (as far as what I know and have heard says) can make an excellent impression on judges. Our team worked a high-goal shooter last year that was quite complex. It was a turret with vertical and horizontal motion, such that the camera could determine where it needed to be from any given spot on the field (if we could make the shot). Suffice to say the entire robot was slow and didn't work extremely well, but we did two things:

1- Learned a LOT. We learned the mad pace, among so much technologically, that you're going to need next year to keep your track record of success. I was ready for a horrible last week, and spent 74 amazing hours working at Robotics in the last 7 days. We had learned all sorts of ways to use and manipulate the camera, which we applied this year to autonomous (even though we never turned it on at competition), and expanded upon with other sensors. Learning a lot is important, cause you're not able to get the rookie awards anymore. You're now in the full running with the rest of us -- and oh boy will you have catching up to do.

2- Impressed the judges. Now of course, I can't speak for the judges all by myself, but we did win the Rookie All-Star award at the World Championships....

[blakwyte]

Originally Posted by LordTalps

We learned the mad pace, among so much technologically, that you're going to need next year to keep your track record of success. I was ready for a horrible last week, and spent 74 amazing hours working at Robotics in the last 7 days.

the huge amount of experience that my team had in the first year was really helpful to me when i joined up with the program this year. they were also a really ambitious rookie team and learned everything about programming the camera's, building an effective drive-train ... using a band saw i was really glad that i we didn't have to start with a completely blank slate, and we did manage to equal the school record this year making the semi-finals, thanks largely to the things the team learned and was able to build upon.

in other news i hear that we might be riding the same bus down to atlanta with you guys from 1885 ... all i can say is be prepared

[LordTalps]

Originally Posted by blakwyte

the huge amount of experience that my team had in the first year was really helpful to me when i joined up with the program this year. they were also a really ambitious rookie team and learned everything about programming the camera's, building an effective drive-train ... using a band saw i was really glad that i we didn't have to start with a completely blank slate, and we did manage to equal the school record this year making the semi-finals, thanks largely to the things the team learned and was able to build upon.

in other news i hear that we might be riding the same bus down to atlanta with you guys from 1885 ... all i can say is be prepared

Whoa whoa whao dude YOU'VE GOT FREAKING PMs

[mrmummert]

If anyone took a very close look at our robot you might have noticed the 30X30 extruded aluminium frame...in the corners there had been posts which we cut off. these were to be for our ramps...which due to time and weight we
did'nt do this year...but almost did.

Our first year (2005 triple play)we tried to use and do everything...
not only were we the top rookies, but also rookie allstars...which got us
to Atlanta.

During the alliance selections...we had been approched by 116, but when we were selected by 928 we went with them. And the rest is now FIRST VCU
history...In a way we were kinda glad we did'nt go to Atlanta..(not that, thats a bad thing)...its just that..ok we had been twice in two years and have never been able to have more time to build the team...so hopefully not going will make us a stronger team next year. Lord knows we came close though.

[Metalhugginman]

VCU was fun and Metalinmotion - Team 343 - was very honored to recieve the GM Quality Award. Unfortunately, we lost a laptop computer during the competition. If anyone found a laptop computer in a case and is unsure who it belongs to, we sure would like to hear from you. My boss is not happy....... Anyway, any leads would be appreciated. Use the contact information on our webpage at www.metalinmotion.com.

[cziggy343]

Originally Posted by Gil Huggins

VCU was fun and Metalinmotion - Team 343 - was very honored to recieve the GM Quality Award. Unfortunately, we lost a laptop computer during the competition. If anyone found a laptop computer in a case and is unsure who it belongs to, we sure would like to hear from you. My boss is not happy....... Anyway, any leads would be appreciated. Use the contact information on our webpage at www.metalinmotion.com.

yeah gil, i heard a couple of people wern't happy about that.

[wdw_mkr87]

does anyone know how many people were able to actually throw ringers on during the matches? our team is trying to work strategy for Las Vegas and Atlanta and we would really like to know if it is even possible to get a technique down like we had for scoring with the balls from last year competition.

[StephLee]

That's one thing I didn't keep accurate count of when I took stats for VCU (it was kind of hard to tell by the webcam), but I think the number was around 6 or 7 if I had to guess. It's a whole lot of luck, but if you've got an excellent thrower I suppose you could make it worth your while.