[BB] 2010 Game Hint #1

[jamie_1930]

Originally Posted by Pikat

Hmmm... One of our member's parents found this:

We keep talking about having a track to put the balls in but what ifyou don't want the balls to go in the track, or gutter. Anybody up for bowling, Robots vs. Humans

[johnr]

Originally Posted by AcesJames

A challenge would be making the field visible to spectators, but invisible to drivers and human players

It's called blindfolds

[Tetraman]

Every year, some kid gets the idea to have a robot designed, that it drives over to the opponent's station, and raise up one big massive sheet that would block the vision of the opponent's, rendering them incapable of playing. They claim there is no rule against this - I always point to GP for this rule.

It would be awesome if there was a game that worked on the idea of "visibility" and forcing teams to have limited vision, making robots like this a possibility, under some kind of specific rule that defined how you could block vision.

[Katie_UPS]

If the game is focused on rails, I vote the name be FIRST Derailed

And show a picture of the first logo going craaaaaaazy and off the tracks.

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by Tetraman

Every year, some kid gets the idea to have a robot designed, that it drives over to the opponent's station, and raise up one big massive sheet that would block the vision of the opponent's, rendering them incapable of playing. They claim there is no rule against this - I always point to GP for this rule.

There has been a rule specifically prohibiting doing things like this for many years. If they said this last year, you might have referred them to Rule <R02-A> of the 2009 FRC manual. If they were not picking up on this - just the second rule in the "Robot" section of the manual - then they probably were not reading the manual at all.

-dave



.-

[Karibou]

Originally Posted by dlavery

There has been a rule specifically prohibiting doing things like this for many years. If they said this last year, you might have referred them to Rule <R02-A> of the 2009 FRC manual. If they were not picking up on this - just the second rule in the "Robot" section of the manual - then they probably were not reading the manual at all.

-dave



.-

And even if that rule didn't exist, then wouldn't raising some massive sheet up be a huge safety hazard? (assuming it's some kind of cloth)

[Tetraman]

Originally Posted by dlavery

There has been a rule specifically prohibiting doing things like this for many years. If they said this last year, you might have referred them to Rule <R02-A> of the 2009 FRC manual. If they were not picking up on this - just the second rule in the "Robot" section of the manual - then they probably were not reading the manual at all.

-dave

Usually, on the first day of designing, everyone spent much more time looking at the game rules, rather then every robot rule.

Also, all this talk about tracks, made me think about playing Spirit Tracks again. And then thinking of that, made me think about a train FIRST game, which made me think of having stationary robots rolling around on a track, completeing tasks as they pass them. Sort of like a assembly line, only the robots will move around, rather then the "product"

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by Tetraman

Usually, on the first day of designing, everyone spent much more time looking at the game rules, rather then every robot rule.

Perhaps a change in process might be something for you to consider. If you are doing ANY design work at all before you read the Manual (ALL of the relevant sections, including the Robot Rules), you are just asking for trouble later on.

As has been said elsewhere, the Manual is your "requirements document." Virtually every successful and experienced team will make sure that they understand what they are designing before they begin the design process. They do that for a reason. It is for the same reason that every good real-world engineering team makes sure they fully understand the project requirements before they begin designing. You have to understand the requirements of the problem before you can ever understand the solution.

-dave



-.

[jamie_1930]

Originally Posted by dlavery

Perhaps a change in process might be something for you to consider. If you are doing ANY design work at all before you read the Manual (ALL of the relevant sections, including the Robot Rules), you are just asking for trouble later on.

As has been said elsewhere, the Manual is your "requirements document." Virtually every successful and experienced team will make sure that they understand what they are designing before they begin the design process. They do that for a reason. It is for the same reason that every good real-world engineering team makes sure they fully understand the project requirements before they begin designing. You have to understand the requirements of the problem before you can ever understand the solution.

-dave



-.

I have to disagree with you here, following kick off we have a huge brainstorming session and as should be with all brainstorming sessions there are no bad ideas. If you come up with something that's against the rules you can always tweak it to fit the rules and that illegal design may lead you to numerous legal ones that would be any better. By the time you agree on the final design yes it should be checked for all of the rules, but saying that it'll only cause trouble isn't entirely correct. Although, yes you should understand what you need to design before you do so, but isn't that the whole purpose of the game animation?

[pandamonium]

Dave finally comes out of hiding and comments on this game hint thread and we waste his time with something stupid. Come on guys lets get back on "TRACK" if that's what it is. Which it isn't Because people had been talking about tracks and trains because of some beverage comercial long before this hint came out. Assuming it was Dave who is the architect of this hint he deliberatey gave us a hint that we would think is a track but isn't.

[JaneYoung]

Originally Posted by pandamonium

Assuming it was Dave who is the architect of this hint he deliberatey gave us a hint that we would think is a track but isn't.

I would never assume anything about any one of the members of the GDC at this time of year.

[Chris is me]

Originally Posted by pandamonium

Dave finally comes out of hiding and comments on this game hint thread and we waste his time with something stupid. Come on guys lets get back on "TRACK" if that's what it is. Which it isn't Because people had been talking about tracks and trains because of some beverage comercial long before this hint came out. Assuming it was Dave who is the architect of this hint he deliberatey gave us a hint that we would think is a track but isn't.

While I agree, being on track won't make Dave comment on the hint.

I don't see why everyone's glued to the track idea. The lexan seems almost useless in such a setup.

[pandamonium]

rings were brought up but not payed any attention to

[jamie_1930]

Originally Posted by Chris is me

While I agree, being on track won't make Dave comment on the hint.

I don't see why everyone's glued to the track idea. The lexan seems almost useless in such a setup.

What if the track doesn't come in contact with the robots but only the game pieces. Do you think any robot from last year could hit that thing with a moon rock and break it?

[Gary.C]

Originally Posted by Pikat

Hmmm... One of our member's parents found this:

Man I am digging this idea. Nice find. Also we should have spoiler tags when using images, so it doesn't stretch the page when having high res images.