Do you like the seeding system?

[Sunbun]

Has anyone analyzed the rankings and seen where teams would place if it were run on a W-L-T/Ranking Point system like last year?

(sorry if it's been done earlier in the thread, it's late)

[Kims Robot]

Originally Posted by Matt Howard

I've never seen a season where teams have actively considered going onto the field and doing their worst, because scoring 0 wouldn't allow the other alliance to travel as far in the rankings.

This is what I don't think teams are seeing... if you score in a situation where you can't win, not only are you "helping your opponent in the rankings" but you are also potentially starving them of balls that they could be using the boost YOUR rank score. In the matches where we played 3v0 or 6v0 it wasnt to HURT the other alliance, it was to HELP ours. We let them have all 12 balls so that they could maximize the field score, rather than playing defense or fighting over balls.

[johnr]

I really don't like this system and things i am reading. Rookie teams pay attention-If some team asks you to just sit there and block the goal,don't. They may tell you that you will be helping yourself gain points but all you are doing is helping them. That team already thinks that you are not good enough to win and will never be on their pick list. You busted your butt for six weeks,now go kick that ball in the $@#$@#$@#$@# goal.

[Andrew Y.]

NO. I agree with matt. In the 7 years iv participated as both student and mentor, i do not like the current direction of FIRST.

in 2006 i really thought the games were going in the right direction. 2008 had me SHOCKED and this year has me down right concerned. I think how FIRST handles next years game is going to be pivotal.

Im all down for GP and coopatition, but if FIRST keeps pulling the competitive side out, we might as well show up, get our awards and leave. I believe GP shown in a non competitive environment is called being a good person. We should teach how to show GP in a HIGHLY COMPETITIVE environment. Now thats something to be proud of...

My thoughts after week 1.
- robots all look the same...
- I think the bumper color change idea is horrible...
- scoring system is confusing and crazy...
- The laptop things? i wanna kick it...
- These penalties and rules are silly too
rant done

[Bruceb]

Sure wish the GDC and Dean would read this and comment.

[Mageofdancingdr]

I'm gonna take a shot at this and propose what I think may be a better system. Borrowed nearly directly from the swiss rounds of a Magic: the Gathering tournament:
Rank is based on match points. you get 3 points for winning, 1 point for tying, and 0 points for losing.
The first tiebreaker is your opponent's match points. this summed amongst all opponents in alliances against you (counting teams once for each time they faced against you).
The second tiebreaker is your allies' match points (low being better than high. once again, counting teams once for each time you allied with them).
Third tiebreakers would be whatever endgame score is appropriate for the game, and fourth is random.

By tie-breaking off of record instead of points teams no longer have any reason to score for others, but still rewards teams for fighting against harder opponents.

I believe the scoring system is not the place to discourage defense, however I would consider a tiebreaker based on a highest average points scored, but throwing out the top and bottom scores as outliers.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Johnny

I remember those days...but unfortunetely things change and we just gotta change with them. There's always going to be things we like/dislike about each years game, but we just have to play the game and adjust. It's still very fun though

[rant]
So, maybe in 1776 the colonists should have just adjusted? It was so very fun being a colonist.

Yes a bit extreme but honestly if we ever get complacent and stop caring about the things we feel are wrong I would hope FIRST would just close its doors and shut down. If you feel passionate about something you should ALWAYS try to improve everything you touch.
[\rant]

Originally Posted by johnr

I really don't like this system and things i am reading. Rookie teams pay attention-If some team asks you to just sit there and block the goal,don't. They may tell you that you will be helping yourself gain points but all you are doing is helping them. That team already thinks that you are not good enough to win and will never be on their pick list. You busted your butt for six weeks,now go kick that ball in the $@#$@#$@#$@# goal.

On one hand I agree with you, before seeing our ranking drop when we won I was of the persuasion to go out there and score balls until my robot can move no more. Now I am questioning that. I am not a competitive person normally but I do take extreme pride in my work. When I have a robot that, by going out there and doing its best is essentially penalized for it I begin to think that doing my best isn't what FIRST wants from me. In short, I am hurt and appalled at what FIRST is seemingly forcing me to do. In 7 years I have gone out to WIN every match. I have lost matches 128-0 I have won matches by the same margin. I have been on teams who can barely field a drive team and teams that can't find enough for students to do. I've seen a ton, but NEVER have I seen something as utterly disrespectful as a team not playing their best against another team.

Do you hear me FIRST? You are encouraging me to disrespect my peers, my friends! Nay, you are essentially FORCING me to. I should never have to choose between doing my best and ranking high, the second should follow the first.

Yes, I will be writing a quick program to help me figure out what the best way to play a match will be. I will never ask a team to not do their best, even if the program tells me that would be the best option. I will ONLY suggest it as an option if it benefits EVERY single team on the field.

I apologize to the teams I offend by not playing my best against you. I will play FIRST's game this year because I owe it to my students to make sure they go as far as the robot they built can take them. I will not like it and I will be hoping that they change back to a system that rewards respecting your opponent in the future.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Matt Howard

I've been involved with FIRST for 6 years now, and in those 6 seasons I've seen a lot of changes. I remember the pre-bumper days, plastic tetras, the IFI feud, and the static blasted CRIO's of last season.

However, I've never seen something comparable to what I have seen this season.

I've never seen a season where teams have actively considered going onto the field and doing their worst, because scoring 0 wouldn't allow the other alliance to travel as far in the rankings.

I've never seen a season where a legitimate strategy for gaining position in the rankings, was to score for the other team.

I've never seen a season where nearly every match was decided by how many penalties were accumulated by the competing alliances. (although 2008 was arguably this way as well)

I've never seen a season where nearly every team brought to the event, a functionally identical machine.

Call me old fashioned, crude, or whatever you like. I am not a fan of this game, these rules, the ranking system, and the overall direction FIRST seems to be heading.

Just my .2

I invite you to check out 2003 when team openly brokered deals so thier stacks would survivie the whole match (they took a long time to create and were easily knocked down in seconds) so both teams could seed better. The for it/against it is very similair to this year and the debate was very passionate.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

I invite you to check out 2003 when team openly brokered deals so thier stacks would survivie the whole match (they took a long time to create and were easily knocked down in seconds) so both teams could seed better. The for it/against it is very similair to this year and the debate was very passionate.

Oh, and if you guys want to see more on the subject back then just type in a search on the term collusion to see the fireworks.

[JesseK]

Noting the pattern of changes the GDC has made midseason in previous years, the only suggestion I've heard anywhere that has a remote chance of making it into this year's rulebook is the one about the losing alliance using their own score rather than the winner's score. I think the only substantiable fact that remains regarding the system is that it will not otherwise change this season.

Thus, once we've said our piece on here the only thing left to do is to simply get over it.

[Enigma's puzzle]

Has anyone considered that FIRST is trying to put a real life lesson into this years game? Maybe the prisoner's dilemma that they created is there to simulate the real world, where everything is not only not fair, but possibly counterintuitive?

Example: A promotion in the workplace is often not decided by who works the hardest, who does the best work, who is the best leader, or who has the best ideas, but instead SENIORITY often trumps all these qualities which would make more sense as to why they should be leading. Lets say you figured out that your Firm does promotions based on seniority, so do you not work as hard? Or do you continue to do your best work?

So knowing this did anyone not work as hard to build the best robot they were capable of? So a few robots got a free pass into the ELIMS.
But in case you haven't figured out, the FIRST system is biased towards offensive robots, as is this new ranking system. (Although this new system is even more biased.) The top tier offensive robots are going to end up selecting on Saturday (or at least until they get picked). So in order to keep you options open you have to build a scoring robot, that will have the option of declining to select your own alliance. FIRST is rewarding scoring, because scoring is harder than defending, so thus FIRST is rewarding the people that have built the more capable robots (Theoretically)? (Tell me if the logic is wrong). Sure a few slip through the cracks, but I personally believe that FIRST is trying to reward the teams that complete the most difficult tasks well.


So lets pretend you could't/weren't able to/don't have the resources to build one of the most capable robots. So how would you go about making sure you got selected in the eliminations? By showcasing your robot. By showing your tremendous defensive abilities. By showing how easily you can hang at any opportunity you can. The way that this post is sounding, is that everyone believes that the GDC put a random ranking variable into the equation or that only teams that cheat, lie, and swindle ranking points can get the chance to select there alliance. And if so, isn't the Qualifications essentially like a tryout to see who can impress the randomly selected teams enough to get selected? Kind of like a tryout for a sports team you may not have to have your best day but if you can do something to make you memorable you have that much better of a chance to get selected.


And i personally believe if any team is confident enough in themselves that they will score for the opponent to boost their score (In a match in which they hold the win already), kudos 217 and others, this system is designed to make sure you guys, the offensive juggernauts will be deciding alliances.


My personal view is that when it comes to scoring collusion that all going for one goal is less effective because of the number of robots crawling in one zone just inhibits itself, whereas there is just so much more you could gain by playing minimal defense and concentrating on maximizing your scoring.

[Kimmeh]

Originally Posted by Sunbun

Has anyone analyzed the rankings and seen where teams would place if it were run on a W-L-T/Ranking Point system like last year?

(sorry if it's been done earlier in the thread, it's late)

I did for Kettering, however it is only based on points from a win or a tie (because I don't remember how they differentiated after that). Any time a score was the same, teams were ranking in order they were on the spread sheet, unless a team had more wins. The first column on the left is the current ranking and raw data. The column on the left has teams ranked in order based W-L-T points.

It's pretty interesting.

Team Ranking.xls

[engunneer]

Originally Posted by thefro526

I think you're onto something here.

It rewards teams who score well whether they win or not. I like it, because it emphasizes doing your best and playing your heart out which is what I firmly believe this is what it's all about. If FIRST wants to de-emphasize winning, but still keep matches exciting and make sure teams are doing their best then maybe they should look into this.

I would even suggest the following seeding scoring algorithm

The winner of the match gets the winner's penalized score, and the losers unpenalized score times 2 (same as today)

The loser gets the loser's penalized score, plus half the winner's unpenalized score.

Ties are handled as today.

The reason I am still involving the winner's score in the loser's seeding points is to equalize biased schedules. 1318 2009 on Galileo had an extremely favorable schedule. We managed to eke out being undefeated, but had a much lower OPR than 111 (undefeated) or 67 (undefeated until the very end). I feel this proposed system would have ranked us lower, but would have reflected OPR/DPR more closely as a measure of robot performance.

This system still rewards the winner for winning by the smallest margin possible, and the incentive of seeding points will get both teams to be scoring, and usually for different sides. If they are scoring on the same side, it won't be for long.

No changes are made for the penalties, since teams should strive not to have them (I know they happen anyway, but First people are smart and can learn to avoid them.)

Let's look at a hypothetical match where the current score is R8-B6. If the game ended now, R would earn 20, and B would earn 10. If the match hasn't ended yet, what does each alliance want to do? Blue earns 1 seeding point for every 'normal' goal, but only 1/2 a point for an opposing goal. Therefore, Blue scores 'normally'. Red has the incentive to score an opposing goal, since it is worth 2 points, but the game is close, so it may not be worth the risk. That is up to the leading alliance to decide, and would make for some quick changes to match strategy. On the defensive side, the trailing alliance wants to defend against the leading alliances goals, to improve their chances of catching up, and the leading alliance again gets to decide if it is worth the risk to leaving the opponents goal undefended, and risk an upset at the end.


Another case discussed here often is the tie case. Let's say 5-5 (10 seeding points if it ended right now). For both alliances, a 'normal' goal would count as 6 seeding points (6-5 gives 16 and 8 seeding points), while an opposing goal would LOSE 2 points. So in this tie situation, both teams want to score, and also defend the opposing goal 'properly'.

The last case often discussed is the x-0 score. Let's say R0-B5. Again, Blue want's seeding points, so scores for Red. Red also wants seeding points, and scores for Red. The match score quickly becomes the first situation above, and we have an exciting competition.

[ebarker]

How about the FIRST Robotics Cognitive Dissonance Competition - FRCDC ?

[rick.oliver]

Let me see if I've got this.

Loosing a close high-scoring match is rewarded more than winning a close low-scoring match.

Loosing a lopsided match is rewarded close to the same as winning a lopsided match.

The loser of a low scoring match that was made close by the winner committing many penalties is rewarded more than the winner.

The winner of a close, penalty-free match is rewarded almost three times as much as the loser.

I like this system; makes me want to play my best with the best to score as much as possible while going for the win.