Week 2 Regionals: Veterans Still Have No Advantage

[Kellen Hill]

I dont know if anybody watched but the lower four alliances at wisconsin were led by rookies and a combined total of 10 rookies made eliminations. The winning alliance was also led by a rookie.

[JamesBrown]

Alright I finally got around to investigating a hunch I have. The results we are seeing, the fact that team number has little to do with record has nothing to do with the game or how good the new teams are.

In each match with the exception of the last one or two in each round (ie when all except 6-12 teams have played the same number of matches) the sum of the team numbers on the red alliance is very close to the sum of the team numbers on the blue side. I am writing a program now to gather data from all of the regionals but from the three I have looked at it seems that in order for one alliance to win they must give losses to three teams with simmilar numbers. This Prevents any group of numbers from getting significantly more wins than any other. It seems that any data you have collected relating win percent (or seeding) to how well these groups are doing is invalid.

There really isn't any merit to any of the claims in this thread.

[Jim Schaddelee]

Originally Posted by meatmanek

I don't think this game is 'dumbed down', as you say, and especially not because we're only allowed to handle one tube. This year's game provides quite a few different choices in effective arm and grabber design. You can use an articulated arm, a 4-bar linkage, a sliding elevator, a telescoping arm, and anything else your team can come up with. Grabber designs include pinch-type grabbers, curved pincers, two spatulas, wheel type, and grabbers that deal with the inside of the tube. Optimization and automation can be done with sensors and programming. In terms of ramps, I have seen many clever designs, including lifter types where the lifting robot does the work, cable driven ramp extensions, ramps where a robot driving up will extend the ramp, and so many others.

The focus this year is on tube handling and lifter design, rather than storing game pieces.

I agree ,You have given great example of how to do the task.(lift a tube),what I am trying to say is that
why limit someone creativity. How cool would it be if a team score a entire row in autonomous or the rules allowed for more than placing a tube, drop a ramp or climb a ramp. Just a quick example. I think it was 2002 the game had 3 large goals on casters .These goal were multipliers .Team 71 designed a robot that dropped down ,grabbed the three goals in seconds then walked them into the scoring position.
That was truly INSPIRING .First is about inspiration. If a team uses a 4link or sliding elevator is that inspiring?

Your Friend
Jim

[IndySam]

Originally Posted by hill

I dont know if anybody watched but the lower four alliances at wisconsin were led by rookies and a combined total of 10 rookies made eliminations. The winning alliance was also led by a rookie.

Great job by those rookies but after looking at the entry list almost half of the teams were rookies.

[meatmanek]

Originally Posted by Jim Schaddelee

why limit someone creativity. How cool would it be if a team score a entire row in autonomous or the rules allowed for more than placing a tube, drop a ramp or climb a ramp.

The same thing could be argued for any rule. Isn't a weight limit stifling creativity? I could build a really awesome robot if I didn't have to worry as much about weight.
Rules don't limit creativity, they channel it in different directions. In this game, the rules reward a creatively and effectively designed mechanism, rather than a creative way around the way most people play.
Only holding one ringer is part of the game, like not using your hands in soccer, and not traveling in basketball.

Originally Posted by Jim Schaddelee

First is about inspiration. If a team uses a 4link or sliding elevator is that inspiring?

I would be inspired if a team can manage to score all of their team's ringers in one match.
This year, awe-inspiring moments like that will most likely come from the drivers and coaches. That's not to say robots can't be inspiring. I'm impressed by the lifter robots that can manage to lift 2 robots, and also by the really effective scoring robots.

[Nawaid Ladak]

when i said they didn't get selected for alliance parings i ment

"team so and so, who would u like to invite to join your alliance"

in outher words, no rookies in the elimination matches at GLR or UCF

[Cody Carey]

I don't like it very much...

At Pittsburgh, we ended up with a rookie team as first seed... They were an awesome team, and a VERY awesome alliance captain and we couldn't have asked for more. That being said... The were a drivable base that hadn't run in some of their matches. They were undefeated in qualifying.

When you get this happening, the First alliance is automatically handicapped against. The first seed rookie chooses whatever bot is in their best interest for the first alliance selection (at Pittsburgh, that team was us), but when you get around to choosing again, quite a few of the top scoring or ramp bots are gone. This left us with two exceptional defense bots and one exceptional hybrid. This is different than having a team earn their way up by being an exceptional scorer.

Any rookie team (no matter how AWESOME they are) that doesn't earn their way to the very top of the regional is not being given a gift. They are being handicapped against. This leaves the first alliance in a very tight predicament when the other alliances have two or three scorers each, and they have one.

I am not complaining, And I couldn't have asked for the Pittsburgh regional to go any better for us than it did, I am just relaying an unfortunate situation that happened to a rookie that got stuck in the new algorithms.


In my opinion, FIRST should not give precedence to rookie teams. It shouldn't be about team number, it should be about the ability of the robot.

[T3_1565]

Originally Posted by meatmanek

I don't think this game is 'dumbed down', as you say, and especially not because we're only allowed to handle one tube. This year's game provides quite a few different choices in effective arm and grabber design. You can use an articulated arm, a 4-bar linkage, a sliding elevator, a telescoping arm, and anything else your team can come up with. Grabber designs include pinch-type grabbers, curved pincers, two spatulas, wheel type, and grabbers that deal with the inside of the tube. Optimization and automation can be done with sensors and programming. In terms of ramps, I have seen many clever designs, including lifter types where the lifting robot does the work, cable driven ramp extensions, ramps where a robot driving up will extend the ramp, and so many others.

The focus this year is on tube handling and lifter design, rather than storing game pieces.

True enough. I was just using the word used before me instead of making up my own I suppose. I am completely fine with the game as it is right now, and I like the fact you can focus on very very specific parts of your design now because you don't need a complicatied robot to be able to do everything. I am still impressed with what they can come up with

[Jim Schaddelee]

Originally Posted by meatmanek

I would be inspired if a team can manage to score all of their team's ringers in one match.

I will be inspired with you ,IF or when this happen. Thanks for the intelligent debate. You seem like a very thoughtful young person. That is what is inspiring .Good luck to you and your team.

jim

[MariaChristineK]

I agree with you Cody. I think that the way the matches were set up at Pittsburgh was definitely a disadvantage for many of the veterans. When a team like 1038 isn't even in the top 8 it really shows that some of the better teams are having some tough luck with the match pairing. I think they may need to work on that match pairing algorithm for next year...too bad I won't be there

[Jack Jones]

Originally Posted by dtengineering

...
The match scheduling system was also discussed, as it pretty much ensured last week that for every match a veteran team won, a veteran team also lost a match.

So, presuming that the match scheduling system bias would be fixed this week, I promised to take look at this week's data.
...

Jason

That presumption just ain't so: http://www.grovesrobotics.org/GLR2007matchlist.xls

[waialua359]

Good teams go with the flow with whatever FIRST throws at them and find a way to win. ex. team 25, 254, etc. Excuses are not made.
In NJ we played either team 341 or 375 in EVERY match because of our team no. 359. Both were good teams!
Strategy to me is what was important in looking at the strengths and weaknesses of your fellow alliance and the opposing alliances in every match, especially the playoffs. That was our focus and I truly believe this is why as a #7 seed in the tough NJ regional, we were able to successfully win against the #2 and #3 seeded teams to get to the finals.
Although the finals didnt go as planned, our strategy still had a chance had we done what we were close to doing, in one of those matches. For team 25, the winning alliance member, to come out and tell us this, made us feel competitive and validation for what we were attempting to do. And most importantly, our discussions with EVERYONE involved all had gracious professionalism in our approaches in how we deal with these challenges.
Adversity should be seen as a challenge and not as an obstacle.

[dtengineering]

Originally Posted by JamesBrown

In each match with the exception of the last one or two in each round (ie when all except 6-12 teams have played the same number of matches) the sum of the team numbers on the red alliance is very close to the sum of the team numbers on the blue side. I am writing a program now to gather data from all of the regionals but from the three I have looked at it seems that in order for one alliance to win they must give losses to three teams with simmilar numbers. This Prevents any group of numbers from getting significantly more wins than any other. It seems that any data you have collected relating win percent (or seeding) to how well these groups are doing is invalid.

There really isn't any merit to any of the claims in this thread.

While I agree with you that having a seeding algorithm that averages team numbers across each alliance prevents any one group of numbers from getting significantly more wins than another, I disagree with your conclusion that this makes the data invalid. In fact, that is the whole point of the data!

Allow me to demonstrate by making two assumptions:

1) A team's performance (robot quality, strategy, resources, etc.) should be at least roughly reflected in their performance in qualifying matches. Note that I'm not saying that this is happening this year, but rather that, in general, your top seeded teams should be relatively better than lower seeded teams.

2) That veteran teams should have some advantages over rookie teams. Not, perhaps, an insurmountable advantage, but one would hope that as teams develop resources and learn more about robotics that they should become better each year. This is pretty much implied, if not explicitly stated by FIRST and is the logic behind the "rookie only" awards at each regional.

Now if one were to take those two assumptions, one could hypothesize that veteran teams should rank higher in qualifying matches than less experienced teams. The fact that this is not happening (at least as far as I can tell) is really rather important.

It suggests that at least one of the two assumptions is flawed. So either teams don't improve with time, or else the qualifying rankings do not adequately reflect the quality of a team and their robot. If we don't get better... why bother? And if the better teams aren't on top (in general...) then why do we give awards like "top rookie seed" and allow only the top eight alliances to pick their partners?

To be clear, I did not mean to suggest that veterans had absolutely no advantages... merely that they demonstrated no statistical advantage in qualifying matches, data that poses a very signficant and valid challenge to the two assumptions listed above.

If FIRST were to implement a scheduling algorithm that ignored team number then we could run a test to see which -- if either -- of the assumptions are invalid. (And probably end up with a much better representation of relative robot quality following the qualifying matches.)

Jason

Just a quick P.S.... If the scheduling algorithm is going to be biased for team number -- or anything other than operational measures such as equal numbers of matches and reasonable breaks between matches -- then that should be stated in the rules at the beginning of the season.

[AdamHeard]

Well... I can certainly tell you that the LA regional winners were veterans.

254 and 330 for sure. I know Last year was 4's first season, but they had a large experience base that came with them; I can't them as a veteran team.

But, some high numbered teams had awesome robots.

1717 was the best vertical lifter I have seen. two platforms about 4'x4' that lift in 2 seconds.

1622 was also a very impressive scorer.

[dtengineering]

Taking a look at last year's second week regionals, I calculate that there is a .16 correlation between team number and seeding. This is a noticable difference from this year, where the correlation was -.026.

I did not do any tests to prove whether this is significant or not, however, it is much greater than this year's correlation, and looking at an x-y chart of team number and seed, you can sort of force yourself to start to see a trend. (nothing but the finest statiscal analysis from this guy!)

I suggest this adds weight to the "common sense" hypothesis that veteran teams DO have some advantages... certainly not overwhelming ones... but that experience DOES help, and that something in this year's game (perhaps the scheduling system) is preventing veteran teams from achieving their traditional success in qualifying rounds.

Jason