[Official 2005 Game Design] Game Elements and Subtasks

[Ryan Foley]

Originally Posted by Billfred

Personally, I'd be partial to just giving teams the four team numbers on the pairings. Then when the teams are queued, they draw colors. Kinda Survivor-y, I know, but it'd require teams to be fast with the strategy.

They did this in 2001. I liked it a lot better, made you think quickly.

I'm working on various game ideas for the main thread, and trying to organize all my thoughts before I post.

[Mike Ciance]

for the scoring objects, i would suggest using cylinders.

i also have a unique idea for scoring. instead of assigning each scoring object (hopefully cylinder) a certain point value, why not make the score the square of the number? 1 cylider would get 1 point, 2 would get 4, 3 would get 9, 9 would get 81, etc. this would make the games a whole lot more exciting and hectic

for the way objects are scored, i think the best way is to have a scoring zone on the field which is slightly lowered from the rest of the field

[Gabe Salas Jr.]

Well the past two years there was a variant of a "King of the Hill" style play. I know in 2002 there was something similar to a "Gold Rush" scenario with the three movable goals in the middle of the playing field. And I was just thinking, why not a "Capture the Flag" type of scenario; where there is something that your team needs within enemy territory, and vice versa for the opposite team.

I also like the idea mentioned of an interactive playing field, where something happens on the playing field when an event occurs; like something on the playing field moves. Something like this year with the ten-point balls but more drastic, but not too mission critical like "Stack Attack." But I would like this to happen during human operator mode.

I was thinking of more teamwork critical objectives. We can use the floor panels used for the human players in "Stack Attack," and have robots use these to activate the event on the field. Like in order for a person to take an object from the other team, the other team must activate the switch, which will make the objective (the flag) available. Like it will lower the cage around the "flag." So one robot is on offense, the other is on defense, and vice versa for the other team. But since it is necessary for two robots to get the objective there will be a lot of pushing, and shoving, along with speed and timing being critical. Just an idea, nothing concrete.

I love how with this year's game, there are so many things available to do, but nearly impossible to do within the time limit.

Another evil thing that will definitely make scouting and preparing for a match a lot more difficult, is if for some "odd" reason, the team colors on the LED's switch in the middle of a match. This is would be a unique twist to the game, but will probably get shot down. I am pretty sure somebody else mentioned about this (but I am uncertain).

[Greg Young]

I've been waiting for a week to find the time to write this up properly. It doesn't look like that is going to happen, so this will have to do. I'm assuming a two against two game, but it can be easily modified for other scenarios. This is just one element of a game, there would have to be other scoring methods added.

GeneF talked about some similar ideas a couple of pages back in this thread.

Near the center of the field are a set of pedestals 30 inches square and 72 inches tall. Half of the pedestals are blue, the others are red. The top surface of each pedestal has a one inch wide white border. The pedestals have a net of 3 inch square mesh 18 inches down from the top and extending out 12 inches from the vertical walls.

Each team builds two robots. One is the usual 130 pound behemoth. The second robot is built from the parts in the Robovation (I think that's what they call it these days) kit and must fit in an eight inch cube. The maxumum weight of this dozer is three pounds. The dozer is strictly autonomous, no operator control allowed. The Robovation kit would need added sensors for this to work. An alternative is to develop a narrow list of additional electronics that can go into the dozer.

At the start of the match the behemoth is carrying the dozer. At any time during the match the behemoth can place the dozer on one of the pedestals. The dozer is activated when released by the behemoth.

The scoring pieces for this element of the game are hockey pucks or air hockey pucks. The pucks on top of a blue pedestal are worth points to the blue alliance, red pedestal pucks give points to red alliance. One of the tasks for the behemoth is to collect pucks and put them on top of the pedestals. The task for the dozer is to push pucks off or keep them on. Keeping pucks on the pedestal may involve pushing another dozer off. The net will let pucks fall to the floor while keeping dozers off the floor where they might get crushed.

The behemoth can't hold on to the dozer and use it to sweep the top of the pedestal. A behemoth holding a dozer while knocking an opposing dozer off the pedestal would draw a stiff penalty. The only time a behemoth can contact the top of a pedestal is while placing or picking up its dozer.

Using air hockey pucks would reduce the chance of a dozer being damaged by a puck dropped on the pedestal. It would also increase the challenge of picking a puck off the floor.

Yes, it sounds a lot like robot sumo.

The idea is to increase the emphasis on electronics and autonomous programming. Making more of the main game autonomous has a certain appeal, but I don't want to go that route. One of the most interesting aspects of the competition is watching the field team adapt their strategy to changing situations on the field. Taking away driver time will necessarily reduce this aspect of the game.

[Scooter]

I would really like to see the robot giving some feedback to the drivers that is essential to the game. The current control setup limits this a bit, as you can only transfer 1 or 2 bytes of data back. I would like to see a dedicated wireless RS-232 stream. This would also help in that teams could use it for debugging their code wirelessly.

What if there were several zones on the field and at the end of the match, one field was randomly selected and started beaconing (ir). The robots would have to autonomously move into that zone for bonus points. This would move the auto portion to the end of the game, add an element of randomness and uncertainty to the game, and provide a great challenge to the veteran and rookie teams alike.

-Bill

[Evilfrog87]

its a little late for this post but whay not?

i feel the game this year should have several different games or objectives to do. for instance, you could have capture the flag, 'shoot hoops', bowling. and end it all with a hang on the bar. team could choose to do one, or all of these tasks. the harder the task, the more points its worth. all of these tasks should be simple things that everyone understands, (flip a switch, shoot hoops, bowl, etc.) not something hard to understand (like: grab 2point balls and put them in one of 2 goals and put a 2x ball on top). i should be able to explain it to a 5 year old and he should be able to visualize the game. this would also make PR with little kids easier.

I'd like to see a walking challenge!

[LBK Rules]

Alright, I know alot of people are going to extremely dislike me for this, but I have a few suggestions.

I agree with Mr. Lavery that FIRST should have more improvising. When Mr. Lavery came by our robot at VCU, he enjoyed seeing our robot made of shelving, lamps, plastic bins, bungee chords, a lawn mower wheel, and a bicycle. First should encourage more scrounging, improvising, and dumpster-diving. (We found a large sheet of steel in a dumpster behind a Wal-Mart once
) I hope there can be more of that in the future.

There should be an optional autonomous mode, in addition to the regular autonomous mode. Teams that opt for the XAuto, will have their points doubled, or added onto, depending on the type of game. All teams will have to comply with some form of ID system, so all robots can know who's where. There should also be some form of Rookie/2nd-Year team points for completing, or almost completing, the XAuto. Autonomous programing is tough. Believe me, I know.

FLL has been tougher than FRC for me. You can't custom-fit a LEGO. Everything is autonomous. It's smaller scale. you have to work with a less-powerful programming system, and fit everything into 5 slots. And that doesn't even include the presentation, which is harder to work on than the Chairman's Award, at least now that it's been restricted to paper. FLL is much less strict then FRC regarding the build time, which is not as good as you might think! I almost wish I could be on a FLL team this year.

I would also like to see something with water. I saw that somebody mentioned ice, and that's also unique, but I think water would present an ultimate challenge! (I'm serious here.)

Thank you for taking the time to finish reading my post! If you have any comments or flames, you can just PM me.

[Billfred]

Alright, dead topic, I know.

But I had an idea, and it might just be one of those diabolically evil things that FIRST could do.

Imagine along the edges of the field (like where the ball tees were this year) a sort of cage made of PVC pipe with a kickball inside. Points or a multiplier or whatever would be awarded based on the location of the ball within said cage.

Now would fiddling with that ball take some precision or what? (And it has the added benefit of PVC pipe being cheap as free.)