Lack of passion in scouting

[Nawaid Ladak]

Originally Posted by cziggy343

haha, i was hoping that it wasnt that bad. if u ever see me, i wont do that to u. i promise.

no, im referring to the kid writing that down WITHOUT asking the team. btw:
thanks, and nice job at VCU, i was rooting for you guys (we teamed up at palmetto in 04 and at Florida in 05)

im still doing that spreadsheet, here is another funny one

Number of wheels: ? or left blank,

thats how it is on at least half of them.

[meatmanek]

The real advice here would be to either get rid of the sheets, make the sheets much more open-ended, or put a lot more detail into the sheets. Then you may need to educate your scouters.

Example:
"How many wheels". Well, our robot has a total of 8 wheels. 6 of them touch the ground. 4 of them drive. Which statistic do you want? Also, those 4 that drive are in pairs, right next to each other, rather than front to back. Most of the time, that's called 2-wheel. See the problem?

There are 2 ways to fix this question on a scouting sheet:

Ask an open ended question, such as "Describe the drivetrain."
Ours would be "Tank drive, 2 CIMs per side with AM Gen 2 shifters, each driving a pair of IFI traction wheels in the back. Casters in the front."

Ask specific questions.
What kind of drivetrain is it? Swerve/Mecanum/Omni/Tank/Other (describe)
How many drive wheels?
What kind of drive wheels?
What kind of transmissions?
What kind, and how many motors per drive wheel?
What kind of casters, if any?

Tank, 2 pairs of 2, IFI traction wheels, AM gen2, 2 CIMs, 2" ball casters.

Now, that sort of information provides a lot more than '6 wheels' or '9 wheels'

If you get rid of the sheets entirely and let the (presumably knowledgeable) scouts write what they think is important, they'll provide information that doesn't fit on those sheets. How many of your sheets provide a question that would handle our (imho) innovative kicker wheel?

[Dominicano0519]

my sittuation is not too much different than yours

sure some kids did the intial interviews with all the teams

but afterwards nothing, not match by match progress.

however that is where our similar situations end

in my point of view scouting in this game is not even of any importance.
i say this because of the messed up algorithm for matches that they used this year. we saw the same teams over and over again, so much that i decided that one person(me) could do all of the scouting.

i mean just by talking to the teams 30 min before the match was enough info to see where and when the robot does what and how often they do it.

and it all worked out very well i predicted what each team was going to do every match we were in, i even predicted the scores for all of the matches with an margin of error close to 5%

Our team is beginning a program for scouting this year where we only go to the pits of teams that we have seen perform well during matches. We then get a lot of detail on the top 12 or so, which are all the teams that our field crew looks at. This method saves time, effort, and ear pain of hearing teams talk about things their robot "can" do, and yet has never done on the field.

Most of the data that we use to pick teams comes straight from watching matches, where opinions mean nothing.

[Dominicano0519]

Originally Posted by 114ManualLabor

Our team is beginning a program for scouting this year where we only go to the pits of teams that we have seen perform well during matches. We then get a lot of detail on the top 12 or so, which are all the teams that our field crew looks at. This method saves time, effort, and ear pain of hearing teams talk about things their robot "can" do, and yet has never done on the field.

Most of the data that we use to pick teams comes straight from watching matches, where opinions mean nothing.

well thats all good but will that strategy work for teams that may just need a
defensive alliance partner in order to score alot of points.

i know that was the case for a couple of teams we played with and against

a team that scored only 2-3 ringers in a match would not be considered a great team(but they were blocked the whole match), with a decent defensive alliance partner they can score 7-8 in a row.

not criticising your strategy or anything im just saying watch out for those teams, there will be quite a few of them out there. I saw 3 here in NJ already

[Tri_Lam]

scouting is going to be hard for my team we only have like 3 serious members actully going and if lucky tehre will be 4 of us there. if we had atleast two more we can get a photo/camera guy taking video recordings of the game while in play becaus ei know for a fact all 3 of us will be on the field our club pres as driver v-pres other driver n me human player......... just saying u guys got it lucky i notice most teams contain atleast 7 people i went to the lv regional last year one team had a grip or members. humm i think im just jabbering now -_-

W/e GOOD LUCK ALL

Originally Posted by Dominicano0519

well thats all good but will that strategy work for teams that may just need a
defensive alliance partner in order to score alot of points.

It did work for that. We look at winning alliances that could possibly be formed, not just who has a good scoring mechanism. On the end of ramps, we look at who has a shallow enough lifter to accomodate us, and what kind of drivetrain they have (for defense).

[lenergyrlah]

Don't assign scouting to the "extra" people just to get them out of the pits. Scouts should have done enough work on their own robot to totally know what they're about.

I do all the pit scouting for my team (I made our scouting sheets myself). I decide our team's strategy every match so I know what I'm looking for in our alliance partners and opponents. I did a lot of the mechanical work for our robot (including all the ramp construction) so I only ask "inobvious" stuff like autonomous & weight (not weight class).

I was one of the busiest students at the VCU regional -- I'm on pit crew, strategist, rules expert, and ramp upkeep/repair. The point is that you can probably spare someone who knows what they're about for long enough to scout all the teams -- just make sure you have their phone # before they head off.

BTW if you see me in Atlanta on the floor peering under your robot don't worry -- I'm just counting motors or drive wheels or something.

[115inventorsam]

Don't you worry, I'm super excited to be a scout in only my rookie year on such a big team like 115, and I've really done some things to prepare.

Though this thread does bring up a good point, scouting should be something that can be fun, not just about gathering info, but you can meet other people on other teams, make friends, etc.

I can't wait anymore, I can't even go through a single class without thinking about robotics.

[1596guy]

Originally Posted by Ben Piecuch

Particularly ones like:
"Does your robot have an arm?"
"How many wheels does your robot have?"
"How high do your ramps lift?" [we have no ramps...]

BEN

Today, we were working on our ramp, which we might just chop off, and a scout comes up and starts asking us questions. The second question out of his mouth was "Do you have a ramp?"

I think the only solution is, like many have already said, is to have only those who have passion, scout. Our scout captain is very clear that if you don't want to scout, you will not scout.

[SamC]

Well, on our team their are two types of scouting. Pit scouting (The type you mentioned in your original post, and making note of team's attitude toward you asking questions.) and match scouting (Watching EVERY match, keeping track of certain criteria, and making note of outstanding teams).

Generally, pit scouting is not so horrible as far as people not wanting to do it. I think this is true mostly because you can get it done in about 1-3 hours per regional. You also get to interact with the other teams and their members which is also pretty cool.

Match scouting is where it is really difficult to fins a willing scout. I have one reason for this, match scouting is BORING! I am sure some may disagree and say its better that standing around in a pit wishing you had something to do. Here are a few reasons to defend my statement...

1. All you do is sit there for a long period of time and watch robots
2. You don't really get to watch each match as you are watching an individual robot
3. You do not get to interact with other teams, students, or hang out with friends.

I'm sure some will disagree with me, but I have little hope that match scouting will ever get "fun" its still watching a robot rather than a match...

[Rick-906]

boring as it is, match scouting is one of the most important aspects.

not to beat round the bush but: talk is cheap.
if your robot is amazing, it will demonstrate said amazingness during qualifications [barring technical problems cause i know that happens now and again]

basicaly what im saying is that [especailly if youre ranked high in the standings] people tend to tell you what the robot can do and not what it actualy does.

[cziggy343]

Originally Posted by FreedomForce

no, im referring to the kid writing that down WITHOUT asking the team. btw:
thanks, and nice job at VCU, i was rooting for you guys (we teamed up at palmetto in 04 and at Florida in 05)

im still doing that spreadsheet, here is another funny one

Number of wheels: ? or left blank,

thats how it is on at least half of them.

ah, yeah, i dont do that either.
and thanks, we like people rooting for us.
and i remember us with yall at palmetto and florida. yall were great.

[AdamHeard]

There was a scout at La who asked how many gears our drivetrain had.

I replied "Well, we have 3 gears in each side... Are you sure you don't mean speed because it is a single speed drivetrain"

To which he replies "Nope, it says gears". He then proceeds to write 3 down.

Later on a member of that team came and asked my how and why we had a 3 speed shifting transmission rather than a 2 or 4.

[Rich Ross]

Just to give heart to the scouts out there. You scouts WILL be the difference on your team. When you scout matches and that data is successfully complied, it helps you pick well, or if you arent ranked it helps you see what the better teams are doing.

My Scouts did a really nice job and i hope yours will too. Don't look at scouting as a chore, because its not. I scouted a bunch, and i enjoyed every minute of it.