Overdrive <G22> poll: yea or nay?

[whytheheckme]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

Please do not continue the debate here. I'd appreciate it if this thread could be kept as just the poll.

But Alan, then the thread would never get bumped

To follow up my vote, "The Rule is bad but could be fixed", I think that the intent of the rule is to
a) prevent re-scoring on the same line
b) prevent traffic flow in the opposite direction

As a driver, Positions 1 and 3 are bad ENOUGH (very terrible in fact; It literally can make or break your match), and then to get wrong-way penalties for trying to maneuver through pileups and traffic..... The intent of the rule isn't being considered. It's not like I'm driving in reverse around the track; I simply am trying to move through traffic, and if I happen to be over one of the cursed white lines, I'm screwed.

In my opinion, the rule should be written so that you cannot cross two consecutive lines in reverse order. This allows some freedom for the driver to maneuver through traffic, but doesn't allow him to go in reverse around the track to chase a ball. The disadvantage of course: it would be almost impossible to ref this.

Jacob

[Bongle]

So far, it looks like it is just a noisy minority that doesn't really like it, which makes sense. You don't post a thread to say "I am satisfied with rule G22!!"

[Al Skierkiewicz]

I think the rule is good but needs some modification. I look at the rules as being imposed constraints to allow team members to plan, design, and play under additional simulated physical constraints that real world problems will present in the future. However, there are great many areas of the field that for one reason or another, the drivers cannot see that they are in violation. How can a driver 30 feet away, looking through a two lexan panels with reflections and a multitude of vertical poles, tell that their bumper which is several inches off the floor and in bad light, has just crossed backwards over the lane marker by 1/4". (The parallax in this situation is tremendous) There is just no way that can occur. Make the rule that the whole (or the majority of) robot must cross backwards over a line to incur the penalty and then I think you have something. Even refs must be hard pressed to see that small a change accurately.

[Richard Wallace]

What Al said.

[Daniel_LaFleur]

Originally Posted by Al Skierkiewicz

<SNIP>
However, there are great many areas of the field that for one reason or another, the drivers cannot see that they are in violation. How can a driver 30 feet away, looking through a two lexan panels with reflections and a multitude of vertical poles, tell that their bumper which is several inches off the floor and in bad light, has just crossed backwards over the lane marker by 1/4". (The parallax in this situation is tremendous) There is just no way that can occur.
<SNIP>

Here I must disagree with you.

The rule has been in place since kickoff. The designs for the field, a week later. Teams that did not look at the field setup and where the blind spots would be are now complaining because they cannot see their robot.

It is not the GDCs fault that some teams did not take into account field design and driver viewing angle (I learned all abot that in Stack Attack) when they worked on their strategy and now, because of this failing, they want the rules to change.

All I can say is I am very happy that the GDC decided to not change the rules.

P.S. As far as viewing the robot ... have you ever considered putting your robocoach on the other side of the field and give hand signals?


JM(NS)HO

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by Daniel_LaFleur

As far as viewing the robot ... have you ever considered putting your robocoach on the other side of the field and give hand signals?

It would be neat to see the position of the robocoach mined further for the value that it offers in this game as part of the drive team/alliance.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by Daniel_LaFleur

P.S. As far as viewing the robot ... have you ever considered putting your robocoach on the other side of the field and give hand signals?


JM(NS)HO

Originally Posted by JaneYoung

It would be neat to see the position of the robocoach mined further for the value that it offers in this game as part of the drive team/alliance.

Remember that you have to be in the RoboCoach Zone on your side of the field. Side, not end. If you are Red, you can be in a RoboCoach Zone next to either color Alliance (drive) Zone, but you must be on the Red side of the field (same side as the Red Finish Line).

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

Remember that you have to be in the RoboCoach Zone on your side of the field. Side, not end. If you are Red, you can be in a RoboCoach Zone next to either color Alliance (drive) Zone, but you must be on the Red side of the field (same side as the Red Finish Line).

Gary,
Apologies for being unclear.
I meant that I would like to see the robocoach position continue to be looked at for its value. That was what I meant.

[johnr]

I haven't seen a field or comp in person yet so could someone tell me if all driver stations have a clear view of their down field robocoach? I was hopping that the robocoach could give hand signal to driver to take inside or outside turn.

[Craig Roys]

Originally Posted by johnr

I haven't seen a field or comp in person yet so could someone tell me if all driver stations have a clear view of their down field robocoach? I was hopping that the robocoach could give hand signal to driver to take inside or outside turn.

I have not been to a comp either, but based on the pictures I saw earlier in another <G22> thread there is a good chance that you cannot see them clearly if you are in the far left station - you would have to look through the center barrier. However, as Paul Copioli also pointed out, the coach can make use of the fact that he/she can move throughout your entire alliance zone to try to get a view of things.

[Lil' Lavery]

Through a misunderstanding about a signaling device, 116 thought of an interesting use of robocoaches for purposes such as directing your drive team. Initially a 116 member didn't realize that 1731's signaling device (4 massive colored flashlights) was being read by a CMU cam on the robot, and thought it was being used to signal the drive crew. We then realized that signaling devices such as that actually could be extraordinarily effective (more so than hand signals, which are visible, but hard to see) for signaling to your drive crew as well as your robot.
Additionally remember that you may still use your robocoach for actually signaling the robot during the tele-operated phase of the game as well. Depending on your programming, it may or may not make sense to have your robocoach help navigate the opposite corners of the field to avoid programming (or at least act as an anti-penalty check if you give him/her some sort of power to stop the robot).

[Phyrxes]

Having seen the pictures on here our Drive team checked out the field at VCU as soon as they were able and pronounced it "not as bad as the pictures." As the field lighting varies by arena this wasn't a big surprise.

[kborer22]

I agree with the comments that "intent" should be determined. At the AZ regional there was a match with 120 or 130 penalty points (can’t remember which) and 90-100 of them were in Hybrid mode, the team was just spinning in circles around the lines, not intentionally I would imagine. I think when a situation like this arises, completely taking an alliance out of a match before it really begins warrants change. I can understand rules for robots destroying the field, or leaving the field of play, which deserves an E-stop/disable from the refs, but this seems a little excessive. Also; there seems to be about 20-30 penalty point average in most matches from what I have seen (NJ/Az regional).

[JesseK]

Originally Posted by kborer22

I agree with the comments that "intent" should be determined. At the AZ regional there was a match with 120 or 130 penalty points (can’t remember which) and 90-100 of them were in Hybrid mode, the team was just spinning in circles around the lines, not intentionally I would imagine. I think when a situation like this arises, completely taking an alliance out of a match before it really begins warrants change. I can understand rules for robots destroying the field, or leaving the field of play, which deserves an E-stop/disable from the refs, but this seems a little excessive. Also; there seems to be about 20-30 penalty point average in most matches from what I have seen (NJ/Az regional).

Advocates of for G22 would tell you to hit the Estop to prevent the bot from racking up so many penalties. But then again it probably wasn't your bot that incurred all of the penalties. This seems to be that "luck" factor that's required to take you to the finals.

I like the cross-field signalling idea. Currently our robocoach sits on our side after Hybrid and cheers when we do something great, and that's about it. I never noticed if 1731 used their signaling device in teleoperated mode.

[Bongle]

Sorry about my earlier post, I had just come from reading this thread, which contains some fairly bitter anti-G22 posts, so seeing a result like 60% in favour (even if that support is qualified) surprised me. I wasn't trivializing the opposition, I was just surprised to see it so low after reading a thread that was 50-50ish in terms of favouring/decrying G22.

No?

http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...094#post674094

Perhaps I should've said "it is uncommon to post unprovoked in support of a rule". If we assume that teams are mostly happy with the game this year, than we would expect a post like yours for every rule in the rulebook.