If YOU were the GDC...

[Joe Johnson]

TL;DR: Now that all but the World Championships are behind us what would you change about the game if you had been on the GDC could have known what you know now before Stronghold was unveiled?

All,
There are a bunch of Monday Morning Quarter Backs in the FIRST community generally, but on CD especially.

After every kickoff, there is a lot of chatter about how the GDC screwed up this or screwed up that or messed up this other thing. In fact, I can't deny that I've been one of the voices singing in that chorus some years (and I wasn't always been as gracious as I might have been -- I need to work on that).

That said, as I watched the NEF-DCMP Elims, I was pretty happy. I didn't really have a dog in the fight as the team I advise, Overclocked, didn't get drafted*. But I really enjoyed watching the matches. It was exciting. It was unpredictable. It was... fun.

I have to say that from my point of view, the GDC deserves a lot of credit.

To my eyes, the Auto Period is important but not TOO important so that the match is over before Teleop even begins (I'm looking at you Recycle Rush). The same can be said for the so called end game: Scaling is important but not the whole ball of wax. And in between, Teleop is a frenzy of activity with robots zip-zapping all around the field but even my mom could kinda tell what's going on and which alliance was getting the better of the other.

Having designed robot games myself in the past, I have to say that there is a lot that the FIRST GDC got right.

Can I complain? You bet I can! ...but I probably shouldn't.

So... ...here is my question for the Monday Morning QBs out there:

Knowing what you know now, what would you change about Stronghold to make it better as a sport (better for the participants to play and/or better for the fans to watch)?

I look forward to hearing what others have to say.

Cheers,
Dr. Joe J.

P.S. It is up to you to frame your answer but if you basically define a new game from scratch, nobody is going to listen to you. Try to keep it to a few simple tweaks to the game that you think would make STRONGHOLD better not wholesale changes to turn Stronghold into, say, Soccerhold or something.

P.P.S. I'm asking you to keep this a light thread. I know, haters gonna hate, but there will be plenty of opportunities to dump on this or that aspect of FIRST after St. Louis. I just thought this would be a fun group thought experiment for us all while we make our plans for either going to St. Louis or for getting to the Championships next year if you aren't lucky enough to be able to attend this year.


*like the other 39 teams that didn't get drafted at NEF-DCMP, we felt the drafters we crazy not to notice the diamond in the rough that our team represented ;-)