[FTC]: 2nd AZ Qualifier of the Res-q season OVERVIEW. Chandler AZ, November 21st

[MattRain]

Background: I am a Tournament Director here in Arizona, that works very closely with the AZ Affiliate Partners, and I make it a point to volunteer at every qualifier and competition we have in the state of Arizona. Our Second Qualifier of the season was held at my teams' school.

Below are a few questions that Were from my last post about the first qualifier of the season 2 weekends ago. Some of the stuff below has been repeated, as we saw it at this qualifier as well. Found here: http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=139051

PLEASE ask any questions that you may have.

Questions:

How did the sports start and sports stop go? Any issues?

Again, the first matches of the day were a learning curve for the teams and referees. Teams would either start a few seconds early, or forget to stop moving their robots at the end of the game.

We made it very clear before any of the matches, that teams had to place their controllers, and phones, on the stands during Autonomous. We also made them aware that they were not allowed to touch the driver station stands once they hit the start button on their Driver Station Phones. Once it became time for Tele-op, the students were able to pick up their phones.


How did the new electronics hold up? Were all teams able to start and finish matches with working robots, or were robots dying during matches? Did any teams have their modules completely die and then be unable to finish the tournament?

As I stated in the above question, teams had difficulties in the beginning, learning the start and stops of their robot. As for the electronics they held up pretty well.

PLEASE remember to purchase extra fuses for your PDMs.

One our first match, all 4 teams ended up having problems, that were later figured out to be programming errors made by every team. Weird coincidence.

For the most part, most of the teams kept their phones charged in the 80%-100% range the whole day.

The lesson here: PROTECT YOUR USBs, EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM.
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1108784 (Valley X, Trojan Robotics)
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1106087 (Valley X, Trojan Robotics)
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1099628 (Cheer4ftc)
http://www.thingiverse.com/thing:1096699 (Valley X, Trojan Robotics)
https://twitter.com/trojans8640/stat...10567272099841
(Myself, and other Affiliate Partner, mass printed some of these to give to teams at inspection.)

Did any teams have their modules completely die and then be unable to finish the tournament?

We had two PDMs release thier magic smoke Saturday Morning. Both boards were from the same team. Reversed Polarity. Here is the kicker though, it wasn't their fault. Tetrix sent them a battery that had been wired wrong inside of the battery. Before they event tested the PDM and batteries, they had changed it over to the Anderson Power Poles, Black to Black Wire, Red to Red wire on both the board and battery, and when plugging in the battery and board, Red to Red, Black to Black. Poof the magic smoke appeared. Burning $180 dollars of PDM board in a matter of seconds.

Our Affiliate Partners purchased 3 extra PDMs for any teams that had issues with their boards. (No one ever completely died in a match due to PDM.)

How did this year's game look? Were there any surprising rule interpretations? How did penalties go? Were there many >5 debris penalties issued?

While I was not at the field most of the day, as I was running around helping teams and making sure everything was running smoothly, the following is what I heard from my Students, who were Refs.

1. <GS7> Still played a big role in this game.

Plowing (bumping, moving, touching, etc.) Debris located on the Playing Field floor is allowed and does not count towards the five Debris Possession/Control constraint if the movement of the Debris is not purposeful
(i.e plowing them into the Floor goal)

2. A few teams were scoring in the Low and Mid Mountain goals.

Any surprising designs or strategies?

The team that won the event, was the same team that won the Flagstaff Qualifier. Again, only focused on hanging (i.e. 1 objective). This team is known for going to the first qualifier of the season in our state, and doing this. They have won an advancement every year to the Regional with this strategy.

As for strategies in-game. Again, this qualifier is so early, most of the teams only scored in the floor goal (A few in the Low and rare, medium goal. Its still to early to see alot of strategies.

At least for Arizona, in the beginning of the season, having an autonomous, being able to score very well in one area, can get you pretty far in the beginning. Once the season goes on, it definitely becomes a lot harder to win in our state. (Unlike some states, there are not alot of "power-house" teams in our state)

How were the robots?
Did any teams successfully push the rescue beacon button?
Only one.... with a paint roller brush, driving past it.
Dump the climbers in autonomous?
A few.
Score in the high goal?
Too early, Floor goal and hanging were the major contenders
Climb the cliff zone?
2 robots out of all of the teams had climbing abilities at the event. Only 1 robot could do it successfully 50% of the time.
Release the zip-line climbers?
The bottom zip-liner. A few teams could do this one. One team could do all three while heading up to hang.
Did the zip line release work well or did it have problems?
They worked alright. Every once and a while the 2nd zipliner would release when triggering the bottom zip-linner... Only the team triggered zip-linners were counted.
Were there any robots doing backwards somersaults down the mountain?
A few. The team with role bars was at our qualifier again. Reminded me of Arizona, FRC team 1011 CRUSH, in the "Breakaway" season.
What was the high score and what were the top alliances able to accomplish?
The highest score I saw was in the 260s range with no penalties. Hanging included.

PLEASE ask any questions that you may have.