[FTC]: New Game Animation

[Joe G.]

The platforms look...interesting.

I can see the gamepieces running out fairly quickly, if teams develop an effective way to capture them as they fall from the loaders. Descoring may be key.

Still don't see why we need the Tetrix kit for this game.

Can the autoloaders tip backwards? That would make a "drain your opponents of gamepieces" strategy quite easy.

Can't say I'm convinced that all these changes to FTC are for the better...

[gdo]

One can rotate the racks, but they can't go backwards, They have to lowered down (like the animation shows, there is a stopper on the back to prevent it from rotating backwards), but nothing is there to prevent it from continuing to rotate until it is backwards. To get the opponents rings out of play, you would have to hold them in the rack until they are outside, or have a plate the slants them out of play.

I hope that helps

[Kevin Thorp]

Originally Posted by rocketperson44

Can the autoloaders tip backwards? That would make a "drain your opponents of gamepieces" strategy quite easy.

Nope. There are a bolts in the caps to prevent them from rotating away from the field.

[thatguy]

You can just as easily grab all your opponent's pucks into a bucket built into your bot.

The strategy: don't score, but take away your opponent's ability to score.

[ATannahill]

that would not be GP, and against the rules

[EricH]

Originally Posted by rtfgnow

that would not be GP, and against the rules

Prove the latter point. The former is not provable either way.

It would, in fact, be legal according to the rules as written. Whether or not it would be GP is up to interpretation.

[gblake]

Originally Posted by rtfgnow

that would not be GP, and against the rules

Many would agree that GP or not-GP has nothing to do with the strategy described.

Also, which rule forbids the strategy described? I took a quick scan through the rules and didn't spot one that forbids it or makes it impossible. Did I overlook something?

[gdo]

No, I don't think there is anything in the rules that prevent you from doing it. Though I wouldn't recommend doing it .

FYI, I was just commenting on IF you could do it.

[Joe G.]

Every year that we have alliance specific game pieces, this comes up. I personally wouldn't do it, but according to the rules, it is fine. It just feels to me like losing due to a electrical failure, rather than losing against a good robot. I was not endorsing the strategy with my previous post, just questioning the possibility of it.

I have to say though, even with the racks only rotating forward, this game makes it much easier than past games. Every year prior, I had thought, "okay, teams will do that. How can our strategy beat that?" And to do so, they would have to build a fairly ingenious robot, to pick objects up off the floor, and hold large amounts of them. However, now it seems like a simple arm and bin can, very quickly, remove all gamepieces of a color from play.

I just wouldn't see it as inspirational if a team built a very effective scoring robot, but in all their matches, were unable to even attempt to use it.

It is not un-GP, but certainly not the embodiment of GP either.

[Lowfategg]

Ha, well I guess a lot of you would not like our robots from last year.

I like the game, and I think it will be quite a challenge,

Love the unloaders, the ground traps should be interesting, and the robot drop platform is cool.

But I have a few small gripes so far,

Pucks and rings are too similar, and the field looks some what difficult to build.

Besides these I think its going to be a great game.

[Joe G.]

Originally Posted by Lowfategg

Ha, well I guess a lot of you would not like our robots from last year.

Not quite, for two reasons.

1. It probably could have crushed anyone even if it didn't capture opposing rings.

2. It was an innovative, incredible work of engineering. It was a challenging design to do. We discusses something similar, and threw it away as "too hard." You proved us wrong. The engineering required to pull this off this year is far less challenging, and arguably much easier than actually scoring.

[Lowfategg]

Originally Posted by rocketperson44

Not quite, for two reasons.

1. It probably could have crushed anyone even if it didn't capture opposing rings.

2. It was an innovative, incredible work of engineering. It was a challenging design to do. We discusses something similar, and threw it away as "too hard." You proved us wrong. The engineering required to pull this off this year is far less challenging, and arguably much easier than actually scoring.

Ha! Thanks.

I think we all might be surprised by what teams come up with this year. Descoring does look easier, I guess time will tell how many teams go down that road.

Good luck to all teams this year!

[gdo]

FYI, I don't know if anyone would find this useful, but I always doing a 2D view of the top the field at high-res for printing. My team has used these things for strategy making with alliance members, autonomous coordination, etc.

This one is 14" by 14" (about) at 300dpi. Hope people find it useful for the coming months.

It can be found here

[gblake]

Originally Posted by gblake

Many would agree that GP or not-GP has nothing to do with the strategy described.

Also, which rule forbids the strategy described? I took a quick scan through the rules and didn't spot one that forbids it or makes it impossible. Did I overlook something?

OK - So it's not against the rules and some of us can agree to disagree about whether GP has anything to do with it.

My bottom line advice is this:

If you are going to spend your time hording your opponents' pucks, you had better be able to horde them faster than those opponents can horde yours; and you had better be able to score with the remaining pucks (the ones they miss) faster (or better) than they score with the ones that you miss.

I'll tip my hat (and not wag my finger) at any team that can pull that off consistently enough to win a tournament.

Read the rules. Read an introductory text or magazine article on the branch of math called Game Theory (it's not hard to get a common sense understanding of it quickly). Devise a strategy that maximizes your score when you contend against all the opposing strategies you can envision. Play the game. Have fun.

Blake

[Billfred]

Originally Posted by gblake

I'll tip my hat (and not wag my finger) at any team that can pull that off consistently enough to win a tournament.

FVC 1148 executed this exact strategy on the way to a win at the 2006 FVC Championship, along with Simbotics and Singapore SMART. Wait, we're still playing Half-Pipe Hustle, right?

After watching the animation, I can dig it. The team that does well on the field this year is not going to be all-arm, and they're not going to be all-drivetrain. It should be interesting to see.