Einstein?

[FierceRabbit]

Hmm interesting...


It was brought up to me that the "Head" mentor of 494 Had a 20 minute talk with the "head" mentor of 997 after everything was over...



The story goes...

Throughout duration of the competition 494 thought highly of 997. When it came time for alliance selections 494 was ranked number 1. They chose the poofs. The 3rd round came back to 494. The "setup" they wanted was two scoring robots, and a "pushing" robot. According to the poofs, 997 was on the "do not pick list" because they could not fit on their ramps and did not lift the poofs to a full 12 inches. The rep from 494 "didn't see it" and chose 997 without thinking twice.

When Quarterfinal match came round' 254, 494, and 997 were about to enter the field. I was on the floor taking pictures when I hear 997 is to be substituted. The excuse was that the ramps didnt work right. My initial reaction was....(several obscenities)

As you all know the ruling was to keep 997 in the picture and go on with the matches.

(during one of the quarterfinal matches) I looked at EJ (mentor from 254) straight in the eyes and asked him what the deal was. He told me that it was 494's decision to substitute 997 and that they really never gave an excuse for it, taking the poofs out of the picture. interesting....

The matches continued on to the semi's and eventually this alliance was eliminated. Not due to the fact that both 254 and 494 were not lifted to a height of 12 inches + but....to the fact that the poofs could not stay on their feet...2 rounds in a row. Both 997 and 494 did their best to hold off both alliances. blah blah blah you all watched the rounds.

When 997 was packing up the robot a The "head" mentor from 997 wanted to get the truth on this whole saga and went over to 494. The mentor from 484 proceeded to tell situation of how the 254 did not want 997 in the first place because they could not lift to a full 12 inches, and they convinced/concurred 494 to sub them out at the beginning of the round.

An extremely successful team like 254 has a lot of "Power" so to speak when it comes to running a finals alliance team. They are/were respected for it.

What that tells me is that EJ straight up lied to me about 254 not being involved in the substitution process. Ugh? am i confused....did i hear wrong...? i hope so. It just brings me down that a highly respected member of 254 would look at me in the eyes and lie to me?



bah....im done talking about this.



F.R.

[pakratt1991]

our Member with the media pass was also told by the alliance captain of 254 that it was 494 decision to substitute us and that they had nothing to do with it. The conclusion you stated above is the same one that we came to out on the field, and after our Head Mentor talked to you. I find that this was not gracious of professional, I personally don't like being lied to, I am not trying to accuse anyone here but the simple fact it that someone did say an untruth. If it was an accident or a mistake that is one thing, but I have heard the same thing from a couple people.

[FierceRabbit]

I guess winning is everything now-a-days.

[Travis Covington]

You sure EJ didn't say it was up to 494 (as the alliance captain) to make the decision?? (as in, the Refs didn't care what 254's opinion was. 494, as the alliance captain, was responsible for conveying the alliances opinion to the ref) I was there too, and there was a lot of confusion and a lot of hurt feelings... the bottom line was this... when we tested the ramps/platforms, at full lift, when 254's bot was on the platform, the top of the platform measured 11.75". When we attempted to lift the platform in an effort to remove any possible delfection, the height remained the same. Furthermore, 494 was not even able to climb up the platform at all! Their casters behind their rear set of wheels made it impossible to climb over the platforms 1" lip.

[FierceRabbit]

Originally Posted by Travis Covington

You sure EJ didn't say it was up to 494 (as the alliance captain) to make the decision?? (as in, the Refs didn't care what 254's opinion was. 494, as the alliance captain, was responsible for conveying the alliances opinion to the ref) I was there too, and there was a lot of confusion and a lot of hurt feelings... the bottom line was this... when we tested the ramps/platforms, at full lift, when 254's bot was on the platform, the top of the platform measured 11.75". When we attempted to lift the platform in an effort to remove any possible deflection, the height remained the same. Furthermore, 494 was not even able to climb up the platform at all! Their casters behind their rear set of wheels made it impossible to climb over the platforms 1" lip.

Im positive he told me that. I'm also aware that the lift was not all the way. They waited 5 mins to be sure there was enough pressure. but they only did it once. apparently the 5 min of waiting was enough justification that the ramp didn't work. 494 did make it on 997's ramp. 997 just had to be in the lifting zone backwards for it to work.

[Nuttyman54]

Can we please get this thread back on topic? The discussion is about whether or not it is a valid strategy to use, not whether a particular mentor provided wrongful information. Since 494 was the captain, they must have talked to a ref. Can we get clarification of what exactly the ref said about not being allowed to substitute, and if there is a common ruling on what qualifies as "inoperable"?

[eugenebrooks]

Inoperable is a completely broken state, aka dead on the field,
or if next years game is in water as some have rumored, dead
in the water. Inoperable also means dead in the sense that it
can't be made operable in an allowed timeout. If you had a
wheel knocked off you might consider yourself inoperable, but
then again you might bolt on a caster and continue to play as
1280 did as a finalist in SVR last year.

A robot with an arm ripped off is not inoperable, it can still play
defense. A robot with a lift that comes up 1/4 inch short of
12 inches can still lift a pair of robots 4 inches and score 30 points
doing it. This is far from inoperable. If your robot could not roll
around on the carpet, I would call it inoperable.

You pick your alliance, and you play your elimination matches.
If a robot is inoperable, it is quite obvious to everyone.

Eugene

[FierceRabbit]

Originally Posted by eugenebrooks

Inoperable is a completely broken state, aka dead on the field,
or if next years game is in water as some have rumored, dead
in the water. Inoperable also means dead in the sense that it
can't be made operable in an allowed timeout. If you had a
wheel knocked off you might consider yourself inoperable, but
then again you might bolt on a caster and continue to play as
1280 did as a finalist in SVR last year.

A robot with an arm ripped off is not inoperable, it can still play
defense. A robot with a lift that comes up 1/4 inch short of
12 inches can still lift a pair of robots 4 inches and score 30 points
doing it. This is far from inoperable. If your robot could not roll
around on the carpet, I would call it inoperable.

You pick your alliance, and you play your elimination matches.
If a robot is inoperable, it is quite obvious to everyone.

Eugene

Agreed.

[Karthik]

Originally Posted by eugenebrooks

A robot with an arm ripped off is not inoperable, it can still play
defense.

...

If your robot could not roll around on the carpet, I would call it inoperable.

You pick your alliance, and you play your elimination matches. If a robot is inoperable, it is quite obvious to everyone.

Eugene,

Are you saying that an alliance should not be allowed to replace a robot with a broken arm? That for an alliance to be allowed to make a replacement the robot must be 100% immobile? Isn't this a bit excessive. Since the backup rule was put into place in 2005, I've seen many teams be replaced for reasons far less than complete immobility.

Now, I can definitely agree that 494's attempt to replace 997 falls into a gray area, but I think forcing teams to play with a robot until it's completely "dead" is going too far.

Then again, the rule does say "inoperable". As you described, that wording is pretty clear.

[eugenebrooks]

Originally Posted by Karthik

Then again, the rule does say "inoperable". As you described, that wording is pretty clear.

Reading the dictionary, the meaning of the word inoperable is
pretty clear. The GDC could have used the word broken if they
did not mean inoperable in the stronger sense that it conveys.
I think that one might reasonably reach a conclusion that a robot
is inoperable while it still can roll around on the field, depending on
the situation, but in this years game there are too many different
ways to contribute to a win for just a broken arm, or a ramp that
is just below 12 inches, to get a robot classified as inoperable.

Eugene

[Bill Gold]

First of all, I find it very cowardly and offensive for someone to troll these forums anonymously. Your being on the floor taking pictures and self-admitted obscenities pretty much gives you away as either a member of 997 itself or of another friendly team from their area. If you’re going to say something like this you should at least make a fair representation of yourself like the rest of us.

It bothers me that I feel that I should have to even toss in my $0.02 here, but I think this is a bit ridiculous. It appears to me that the alliance captain and another member of the alliance weighed the opportunity cost between 997 and whoever the backup robot was in this situation only after coming to the realization that 997’s ramps could never count for the 12” lift period, even after extensive fixes. This is definitely a grey area for robot replacement (which means there are good reasons both for and against robot replacement), but there’s no harm in pursuing it. The only reason I can see that 997 would be upset about this would be because they would rather play and lose than to do what’s arguably in the best interest of the alliance and agree with the switch. The competition is a competition, and an alliance is like a hockey team. You want to win, and you want to do whatever you can and whatever’s in the alliance’s best interest to help it win. Not to mention the fact that if the alliance won with you subbing out there’s that 4th place on the alliance in the official records, so it’s not like you’re kicked to the curb with no recognition. Anyways, my point is that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with the alliance captain stating a case for a possible replacement.

With great respect Eugene it was pretty clear to pretty much everyone at the 2006 SVR that your team was one of the two main scoring threats on your alliance. It wouldn’t have made sense to take the backup robot at that point because it would have significantly decreased your alliance’s ability to win the regional not having your robot in play. It was very courageous and something that was very inspiring seeing a team doing all that it could to try to give its alliance the best shot at winning; that’s not to be forgotten, but to have such a harsh stance on robot replacements is also a bit... harsh for lack of a better word. Especially having seen a few robots who can drive in varying degrees be switched out.

Whatever happened happened. It’s over now.

By the way, I had absolutely no contact with 254 at all this season other than saying hi briefly to a couple people on the team at SVR. So don't think I'm taking their side because I'm a part of the team. I'm just speaking my mind.

-Bill Gold
(I take responsibility for my opinions)

[Daniel Brim]

To shift this thread in a different direction (since it's so off-track already)

Why is it the highest unpicked team for non-Einstein replacements? I would think that it should logically be another pick by the same alliance. Thoughts?

[Corey Balint]

Just to let everyone know, since they keep saying different things about the intent of this thread...the intent was just to find out who would be playing who on Einstein, and was not expected to have any more posts after about 4 o'clock Saturday.

[ScoutingNerd175]

Originally Posted by eugenebrooks

A robot with an arm ripped off is not inoperable, it can still play
defense. A robot with a lift that comes up 1/4 inch short of
12 inches can still lift a pair of robots 4 inches and score 30 points
doing it. This is far from inoperable. If your robot could not roll
around on the carpet, I would call it inoperable.

I am not commenting on whether or not I feel that this strategy is okay. However, at least as far as robots with ripped of arms go, we have seen robots with broken arms and that sort of thing be replaced many times in the past few years. At BAE in 2005, we were the alliance captain and our arm was broken, we decided to ask for a replacement, which was allowed even though our robot could still drive. (This is only one example, but there are many) So I don't believe that any rules about the robot being completely inoperable have ever been enforced. I don't know about robots which are still in the condition that they were in when they were drafted.

[eugenebrooks]

I think that the interpretation of the replacement rule should be strict (not harsh), so that it can't be used as an element of strategy. Ultimately, it is the role of the head ref to decide whether a given request meets the definition of the rule and an appropriate decision was made in this case. I could cite several hypothetical examples to demonstrate why I think that a strict interpretation of the rule is best, but at this point the issue is clearly left as it is.

Eugene