week 1: Three Things I've Learned

[Mark Pierce]

#1.

Originally Posted by IndySam

The first couple weeks qualifications are always less exciting, even boring, because the game play and robots are new and feeling their way. The finals in St. Louis today were amazing to watch. I don't think I ever have seen a more exciting finals in a first week regional before.

I think the game is much more exciting for an audience than I expected at kickoff. I have to agree with Indy Sam here, except I would add the exciting semifinals. I certainly would not have predicted those matches to all be so exciting and close. At least this year we did not experience the field failures and match delays common in previous week 1 play. That's worth a little longer learning curve for teams in my book.

#2. I still feel some penalty calls were inconsistent or plain wrong, but less so than before I went back and read the rules. This is a part of the game and will improve.

#3. In this year's game, as in others, alliance coordination and balance is very important. In our quarterfinal matches it seemed to me that our opponents won partly by working together more smoothly. Judging a team by reputation or past history is iffy at best. However, these things can affect things like robustness, response to competition pressure, and and pit crew ability. These things can only be accurately judged by scouting the pits and careful observation, but are a consideration.

An aside on the pit crew importance: Even with less intense defense, several teams suffered damage and break downs this weekend and all of us were tweaking the robots. In some cases this included some amazing pit work. Many teams made it back onto the field fully functional when lesser crews would have had to skip matches or operate in a crippled mode.