Defense, It's still here.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by M. Krass

Beyond this nothing else springs to mind, though I've just woken up. Again, I can't imagine that any contact by any opposing robot unto me can (or should) be considered overt, blatant or aggressive. The caveat is that any robot in possession of a trackball and in its home stretch can be considered to be "hurdling," and contact with them or their ball as such is a very bad thing.

In circumstances, however, where we're defending from behind their finish line and, as I suspect many teams will, they've released the ball to complete the hurdle -- that team no longer satisfies the conditions of HURDLING -- and, moreso, we are really doing nothing more than HERDING at a height of 7 feet. I can't imagine how a wall, sitting innocently on one side of the overpass and bouncing balls away, is doing anything wrong.

You did just wake up. You're IMPEDING across the entire track and have possibly exceeded the 80" cylinder. You have six seconds from the first "let me through" tap before the ref flags start coming out. (There is also the possibility of high contact penalties.)

Assuming you sat there all match, that's 120/6-1=19 possible for impeding, plus 1*#high contact, plus 1 for the 80", maybe including a disable and/or DQ. 20 penalties minimum at 10 points apiece=200 penalty points minimum, not counting high contact.

The purpose of the above math is to help ensure that no one tries this at home or at regionals.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by EricH

You did just wake up. You're IMPEDING across the entire track and have possibly exceeded the 80" cylinder. You have six seconds from the first "let me through" tap before the ref flags start coming out. (There is also the possibility of high contact penalties.)

Assuming you sat there all match, that's 120/6-1=19 possible for impeding, plus 1*#high contact, plus 1 for the 80", maybe including a disable and/or DQ. 20 penalties minimum at 10 points apiece=200 penalty points minimum, not counting high contact.

The purpose of the above math is to help ensure that no one tries this at home or at regionals.

I'm not suggesting that you block the entire track -- only a portion of it and only above the overpass. My suggestion of a crab drive as an ideal drive train for this is precisely because you'd want to be able to strafe back and forth alongside the overpass since you cannot, obviously, block it all at once.

You are not impeding anyone so long as there's room for them to get by. Our robot's take up only 3' of the available 13', so unless there's a serious mess down below the overpass, it's exceptionally unlikely that you'll genuinely be impeding anyone from getting by. If you bump into me and the field around me is wide open, don't expect me to move anywhere.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by M. Krass

I'm not suggesting that you block the entire track -- only a portion of it and only above the overpass. My suggestion of a crab drive as an ideal drive train for this is precisely because you'd want to be able to strafe back and forth alongside the overpass since you cannot, obviously, block it all at once.

You are not impeding anyone so long as there's room for them to get by. Our robot's take up only 3' of the available 13', so unless there's a serious mess down below the overpass, it's exceptionally unlikely that you'll genuinely be impeding anyone from getting by. If you bump into me and the field around me is wide open, don't expect me to move anywhere.

You still get an impeding penalty because you are slower than they are and moving to block them. And you may still get high contact penalties.

[Jethr0]

but, unfortunately you can only bump a robot if it is blocking the path of yours sooooo, bumping a hurdling robot only works if they are blocking you.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by EricH

You still get an impeding penalty because you are slower than they are and moving to block them. And you may still get high contact penalties.

<G40> IMPEDING Traffic – ROBOTS shall not intentionally IMPEDE the flow of traffic around the
TRACK. A ROBOT will be considered to be IMPEDING traffic if it is preventing an opposing
ROBOT from proceeding around the TRACK. A ROBOT can be found to be IMPEDING
traffic if:
• the ROBOT is traveling slowly relative to the approaching ROBOT, and moving to
prevent the approaching ROBOT from passing, or
• the ROBOT is stopped on the TRACK and there is no clear lane of passage for the
opposing ROBOT, or
• the ROBOT pins an opposing ROBOT against an arena element, border, or another
ROBOT

It's clear that if you remain stopped as you block their hurdle -- and there is a path around you -- you do not satisfy the second condition of <G40> and are not impeding anything. Moving sideways may constitute an impeding violation if you're very generous about what it means to "prevent the approaching robot from passing." Until they've bumped me, I cannot receive an impeding penalty and if they're attempting to hurdle, they will not bump me.

Again, this makes very little difference to me. There remain a number of rules which, in my opinion, are too reliant on the subjective judgement of a referee.

I can't be impeding a robot intentionally unless I know that it's trying to get by me, and I can't know that until it makes an attempt at such or "bumps to pass". A robot 20' behind me may have every intention of passing me as it catches up to me and I might be weaving back and forth in an unrelated action and there exists every opportunity for a referee to interpret that as impedence. That is unsettling.

[johnr]

as soon as that ball touches your bot ,i think that is a complete hurdle.

[Madison]

Originally Posted by johnr

as soon as that ball touches your bot ,i think that is a complete hurdle.

Only if the ball has completely passed through the plane of the finish line. If you deflect it backward before then, it hasn't CROSSED the finish line and thus, does not meet the definition of a HURDLE.

[Daniel_LaFleur]

Originally Posted by M. Krass

Only if the ball has completely passed through the plane of the finish line. If you deflect it backward before then, it hasn't CROSSED the finish line and thus, does not meet the definition of a HURDLE.

My guess is that you'll not be able to build it strong enough to withstand a strong blow from the ball (remember, some teams will shoot the trackball and it has a decent amount of mass) and if you do build it strong enough then you will be very top heavy and will likely end up on your side, blocking traffic and incurring penalties for the remainder of the match.

[flamefixed]

There isn't anything directly stating that herding your opponents trackball into the "corner" and simply sitting there, having your bot between the ball and everything else, is illegal. Right? Please correct if im wrong. There is still ample room to pass, so no impeding, and the bump rule only is in effect if you are impeding and there is no other lane to pass.

Also a simple bump of the opponents trackball backwards across a line, completely legal as long as they weren't in the process of hurdling? This should be easy due to the balls bounce-ability (yeah, we do that haha) Legal still?

Defense is subtle, but still a very good strategy if your scoring device/strategey is weaker than your TWO alliance teammates, and they are controlling the TWO balls assigned to your alliance.

Anything against the rules here? Or are we still finding decent loopholes

[EricH]

Originally Posted by flamefixed

There isn't anything directly stating that herding your opponents trackball into the "corner" and simply sitting there, having your bot between the ball and everything else, is illegal. Right? Please correct if im wrong. There is still ample room to pass, so no impeding, and the bump rule only is in effect if you are impeding and there is no other lane to pass.

Also a simple bump of the opponents trackball backwards across a line, completely legal as long as they weren't in the process of hurdling? This should be easy due to the balls bounce-ability (yeah, we do that haha) Legal still?

Defense is subtle, but still a very good strategy if your scoring device/strategey is weaker than your TWO alliance teammates, and they are controlling the TWO balls assigned to your alliance.

Anything against the rules here? Or are we still finding decent loopholes

Nothing illegal that I see (though the GDC might make it so, but I can't see them doing that).

[Zyik]

Originally Posted by Daniel_LaFleur

blocking traffic and incurring penalties for the remainder of the match.

<G37> ROBOT to ROBOT Interaction
f. Contact with a tilted ROBOT outside the BUMPER ZONE (particularly if resulting from contact within the BUMPER ZONE) will generally be considered incidental contact.

What I'm getting from this is that if M. Krass's proposed robot did tip for whatever reason, we could gently nudge it out of the way as much as we could, I don't know if you'd be able to help it up again, but gently pushing it to the side appears to be allowed without penalty.

I'm not saying that this rule allows you to continue racing, getting off scott-free if you tore through the toppled robot, but it looks like FIRST knows that a toppled robot is a major hazard to a game like Overdrive.

[Drwurm]

I don't doubt there will be a bit of strategic defense this year. But I dont think it will be anywhere near as satisfying as pushing another team sideways into a wall.

Also, I'd advise against bets with Adam Heard. He tends to pick his battles well.

[AdamHeard]

Originally Posted by Drwurm

I don't doubt there will be a bit of strategic defense this year. But I dont think it will be anywhere near as satisfying as pushing another team sideways into a wall.

Also, I'd advise against bets with Adam Heard. He tends to pick his battles well.

Lol, thank you for the compliment.




As for the thread, there obviously won't be the hard hitting and pushing that occured last year, but there will be plenty of incidental contact with 6 robots going around the track that would favor the same kind of drivetrain that is a good defensive robot.

So, no direct defense; but plenty of interaction.

[mateus]

Originally Posted by AdamHeard

Lol, thank you for the compliment.




As for the thread, there obviously won't be the hard hitting and pushing that occured last year, but there will be plenty of incidental contact with 6 robots going around the track that would favor the same kind of drivetrain that is a good defensive robot.

So, no direct defense; but plenty of interaction.

And there will be more interactions if you think that most of time the robots have only half of the area we used to have...
I believe this year game will benefit intelligent defense, as building a robot only to push others won't be so successfull...

The game is clearing in my mind, and I believe that it will be much better than we expect... All we need to do is think smart... and there will be many different strategies to attack or defense, that you might use without break any rule...

[Branden Ghena]

I didn't get to read this whole thread, so sorry if this has been mentioned.

A simple defense in hybrid mode should be very possible for all teams. They could just place their robot the farthest to the left it can be as a starting position, and then in hybrid mode just drive forward about 5 feet. They would then be blocking the middle of the lanes in perfect placement to stop autonomously controlled robots from continuing around the course.