Observations First Day of Matches

[Ian Curtis]

Originally Posted by Greg Peshek

Traction control makes a huge difference. I watched one match with 121 in it, and the difference it made was huge. Robots with effective traction controls will be precious commodities on alliances.

Also it seems as if it pays to have practice getting out of the scrums and the giant messes in the middle. If you can learn how to effectively back out and get away, you will have a good time scoring on the people that are still stuck in the scrum. Those are the things I saw.

-Greg

Yeah, 121 is a step above the rest. They've torn away from the pack. It seems that every single match they're good for two jam pack full hoppers of Moon Rocks. While most teams slip and slide across the field, 121 barely skids.

At BAE, 20 is scary, but they've just got one big dump. We barely got away from them once, it was awesome (from our perspective) to pull away and watch 20+ balls barely miss our hopper.

In general, you've got to keep moving. I have been mostly unimpressed with human scoring, it didn't seem to make that big of a difference.

It's hard to see. Robots are everywhere, and often get in your way. It's much easier to score when you're on your half of the field.

Practice is huge. Teams who built a second practice robot have a HUGE advantage. With finagled our way into 5 practice matches today, and there was a very noticeable difference in # of points scored in the first and # of balls scored in the last.

Overall, this game is fun to watch. Hard as heck to tell whose winning, but fun to watch. The crowd's great, there's a huge "aawww..." when some one misses an empty cell, and huge cheer when someone dumps big.

[keehun]

I can't wait until MN 10,000 Lakes regional... 7 weeks away!

[rjohnson]

I was at Buckeye today. I only watched several matches (time in the pits is much more valuable), but here are a couple general observations.

The robots move slowly if at all. There are still many teams without an autonomous function and other robots get stuck by running into other robots. There are many times when robots are stationary and human players get great advantages.

Human players are scoring most of the points. This could be unfamiliarity with robot functions and code or just the way the game will be played. Many points are scored in autonomous, and once the human players run out of balls the scoring drops off significantly.

Most of the robots that I saw in the match were dumpers of some sort or very short range shooting (like right next to the trailer). I didn't see any effective mid/long shooters, although I only watched several matches.

There are no high speed collisions, and no moon rocks are being crushed. (Sorry to all those that predicted doom and destruction to FIRST because they would run out of balls.) Since robots are not running the length of the field often, they tend not to build up any speed on this low friction surface. Less sturdy robots should hold up fairly well and not be smashed to bits. I don't know why they would be build like that in the first place, but there are always some teams that just aren't there. We were rookies once too, and it was a disaster. I feel for all those new guys.

Empty cells/super cells are not a really big part of the game (yet). Only a few teams have even been able to deliver them, and those that get them to the human players have had a difficult time scoring them. Even if the shot is made, the 15 points has not made a difference in many matches.

I think that this might change as well, but the matches are not quite as exciting as previous years. Last year the pivotal hurling of the trackball over the bar was exciting to watch (at least with good teams). This year scoring is in small increments, and it happens so often that unless it's a super cell shot with 3 seconds to go, then there's not too much to cheer for other than the general success of your alliance. Maybe if a team has a rapid fire shooter that can make dead accurate shots every time I might change my mind. Sadly so far I haven't seen anything close.

The scores of the matches today ranged from 30-70 (of either alliance) with most being anywhere from 40-50. I don't think this will change too much because as teams become more effective at scoring, robots will also get better at running away, especially in autonomous.

EDIT: By the way, I forgot that they were playing for much longer than two minutes today. These score ranges could definitely be off. Just remember that the human players are scoring most of the points, and they are doing it in the beginning of the match.

Hey, it's the first day of like 20 days of these regionals. Many things could change (although I doubt much will). It's still going to be a sweet time at these competitions with just the buzz that accompanies FIRST. There are so many innovative designs, I am so excited to be seeing all this again. I hope these comments helped those who can't watch the videos or don't compete for five more weeks. I get to have all the fun right now. I would love to answer any more questions, especially after experiencing more tommorrow.

[gorrilla]

Originally Posted by rjohnson

The robots move slowly if at all. There are still many teams without an autonomous function and other robots get stuck by running into other robots. There are many times when robots are stationary and human players get great advantages.

Most of the robots that I saw in the match were dumpers of some sort or very short range shooting (like right next to the trailer). I didn't see any effective mid/long shooters, although I only watched several matches.

based on what I saw today, i would say, if your robot is a shooter, and you cant shoot VERY-VERY quickly(near dumper speed) you better be dead accurate

[sdcantrell56]

I think based off of what I saw today If you are a shooter and can't shoot at near dumper speed, whether accurate or not, you better find a new plan. There is no way any team is going to shoot from greater than ~5ft reliably and have any impact on the game. It's too crowded and the robots move too erratically to reliably make balls from any real distance. I do still think that a very high rate turreting shooter will be quite effective

[drewsef]

Maneuverability is the key to keeping your trailer clean. Like others have said, if you get stuck in a big dogpile, the human players will just clean out their stash on your trailer. If you are quick and able to move "randomly" about the field, unless the opponent's HP is Kobe, you are pretty much golden.

Our robot is human fed, and we didnt really focus on reloading our dumper, but our crab drive kept the moon rocks out of our trailer, significantly helping out our alliance. The last 3 practice matches we had only 2 balls in our trailer while playing defense.

[BrendanB]

Today at BAE, there were several robots who did not have autonomous modes. VERY BAD MOVE!! They were half full by the end of autonomous and were reasonably full by the end of the match without much scoring by robots. Another observation is that many human players were not concerned with their practice, but became distracted by their robot on the field, and left lots of balls behind the wall out of the field. This should change by tomorrow with the competition starting for real. Another note that surprised me was that many teams spent the time handling the empty cells, rather than spending more time scoring on other robots.

OH ya, dumpers are very affective. 121 has been leading the pack in NH.

Good luck to all teams this weekend!

[eNyoron]

Our team had a half functioning robot for a single match (but we solved nearly all our issues ), but I watched a good amount of them. Some general notes:

The difference between some form of traction control, even if it's exists only code, and no traction control is the difference between having a target or having a competitor.

Half a second for scoring. A robot in a scoring position with a opponent trailer will reliably score any balls for .5 second. If your robot needs more time to dump/shoot/fling, you NEED some sort of pinning/trapping strategy.

Hit and run is the way to go. The longer you take to put balls in a trailer, the longer you are a target.

Back up! Very few times are you actually trapped, you CAN back up with the trailer.

Wheels coordinated. If your drive train is set up with each side having their own power, you should NEVER have them going in contrary directions. It's impossible to pivot with the trailer, a (relatively) tight turn can be made by moving one side and keeping the other stationary.

Herding viable! Good payload specialists will run out of balls fairly quickly. A robot that has some means of pushing or transporting balls en masse to the PS will be providing great help to the alliance. Any robot capable of moving can be useful in this regard.

That's all I can think of right now. Just a final note though, programmers CANNOT be using recycled code or code designed without a trailer in mind. The default arcade or tank code is only good to test the motors.

[alectronic]

I watched a few matches online today (even though i only got like every few frames) and from what i could tell there really wasnt much robot scoring. 99% was human players and i think i saw 2 super cells scored in 3 hours. I hope things get more exciting!

[BPetry234]

Cyber Blue is at DC this week. It is a rookie regional with 10-15 rookie teams competing for the first time. They look good for the most part. I'm really impressed after talking to most of them after hearing their hardships. I guess since I was never on a rookie team I never really appriciated how lucky our team is from an experience stand point. As far as helping teams and helping the field set up team I have never seen a more gracious group of veterans. 45, 365, and 1712. (just to name a few) were all over the place with parts, motors, and just advise. It was great to see a mess of colors helping one team that was having a lot of programming problems.

The game is very exciting. Since there are a lot of rookies, most matches had only 2 or 3 teams on the field. No big differences from the human players yet but they will only get better as the weekend goes on. Pretty much it is a dumpers paradise. With only one or two robots on the field, shooters reign supreme, but once you put three targets out there for a quick dump to get a bite at, watch out. Power dumpers, at this point, seems like it will be a must for a winning alliance. The only real question is what is better for your stratagy, a one or two shot dumper or a steady stream of moon rocks from a shooter?

[Ian Curtis]

Also, the balls roll to the edge of the field, and largely towards the driver stations... Which means, that probably 25% of the balls on the field, and 50% of the nicely clustered ones are right under the drivers' noses. Where they really can't see them.

And, the Regolith (aka Glasliner FRP) curls up like no tomorrow. Despite the frequent repairs of the fiberglass tape, it's really pulling up. It also pulls big bumps in the carpet around the edges.

[rsisk]

Here are the observations I twittered during the day watching the OH regional on UStream

Observ #7 Does Blue outpost have adv. because they can see the score and not violate <G14>? Score board is behind Red outpost #frc

Tip #6 Autonomous mode, pin your opponent against your outpost. Team scored 36 points during auto. mode OH practice match #27 #frc

Observ #5 Fueling station used to load robot hoppers, output used 4 shooting at opp. trailer. Fuel Sta. human needs 2 have good arm 2 score

Tip #4 - Looks like Bump and Dump is definitely a winning strategy this year #frc

Lots of robots seem to be disabled on the field... good for the gather and dump style of robot? #frc

Tip #2 - be the last robot to the big pile ups in the corner, otherwise you are a sitting duck

Tip1 - Autonomous mode drive to center of field before starting search mode

[PetersJ]

At the BAE regional, team 121 did stand out above the rest. Although most people were impressed by the massive amounts of moonrocks they scored, what was most impressive to me was their driving skill. They remained without a single moonrock in their trailer for at least 4 solid minutes in one of the matches. It seems any team can be an asset to an alliance with good driving, even if their robot is not a frequent scorer. The dumper robots seemed to have an early advantage because many of the shooters are still working on code issues. Once the code is perfected, I believe the difference will be less than it seemed today. It was also clear that the human player skill varied greatly between teams. Several supercells were scored, and these may make a greater difference in match outcomes than anticipated. So although some robots are not perfected yet, defensive driving and good human players may triumph over any robot failure (as long as the robot moves somewhere )

[thefro526]

Here's a few things I found out.

If you're HP loaded only you're in for one hell of a fight. There are usually 40 or more balls on the floor within the first 30 seconds of the match. Most robots will load up from the floor in less total time than a bot will load from the HP (including transit time), also when you're loading, it's worth it for a robot to drive and try to score on you, most HP's have less than five balls that they can shoot into in them. Unless you can drive to you HP and load in Autonomous mode. (see team 25)

Floor loaded Robots, There are a lot of balls on the floor. And I mean a lot. We were able to gather 15 in about 30 seconds or less. I hope you hold a lot of balls.

Dumpers and Short Range Shooters, I've discovered two very effective and valuable moves.

1) The Moving Pin. You can pin an opponent's trailer while both your robot and their robot are moving. It's a trick but trust me it works (See 25 play). As your opponent moves about the field get behind then and pin the trailer against them. It makes it incredibly hard for them to move but it also makes it so that you can control where they go. Try it, you'll like it.

2) Make walls to pin against. Strangely enough, your alliance members make excellent objects to pin against. It makes it extremely hard for your opponent to watch where both you and your partner are. Have your partner stop and pin your opponent against them, this works extremely well if they have a turrenting scoring mechanism.

General Bits of Advice:

1) HP's, Don't Waste Balls. If you control the balls you control the match, it's that simple. Play smart, not hard.

2) The field is going to be glitchy for the first few matches, don't get frustrated. Make sure before you give the ok to the Refs that you get battery voltage from the robot, if not tell them to hold off.

3) If you've practiced on "Regolith" that was on a hard floor you're in for a nice surprise, the Regolith over carpet combo is a bit grippyer.

4) DON'T EVER STOP MOVING.

[craig_yates]

It was all Brad Mello. Hours of practice. Many orange sodas.