2006 Official Game Hint Discussion

[Zach Purser]

Originally Posted by Andrew Blair

Hey, I think ArkoRobotics is onto something:

So, look at the shovel: What's it pointing at(shovel's show)? ORO - What type of pasta sounds like ORO? ORZO! And by the way, orzo is a long, rice shaped object. Almost like a football. It also means barley in Italian, which is even more football shaped!

Or ORO could turn into Oreo. What pasta lools like an Oreo? Wagon wheels! And a wagon wheel would want to see Montana's green heights. So the game pieces will be wheels!

[sdexp]

There will be one robot controlling other robots from two different alliancees of two robots; and there will be "Oreo" game scoring objects which move up and down.

How's that for a rational idea?

[Joe J.]

I don't like the idea of teams getting to choose their alliances for the Qualifying Matches, Mainly for the same reasons of a free for all match you will either get several "strong" teams ganging up against the "weaker" teams, or several "weaker" teams ganging up against a "strong". Neither of which goes along with the ideals of FIRST. At least the way the system has been set up for the past several years all teams are on a level playing field when it come to alliances, during the Qualifying Matches anyway.

Just my opinion.

[edthegeek]

Joining kinda late.
I really don't think that the game will have to do with shoveling sand or snow. The FIRST people are not idiots and want an easy cleanup and reset.

[Zach Purser]

Originally Posted by edthegeek

Joining kinda late.
I really don't think that the game will have to do with shoveling sand or snow. The FIRST people are not idiots and want an easy cleanup and reset.

I don't think anyone seriously expects that we will be shoveling sand, or snow, or anything messy like that. Even resetting a field with something the size of golf balls or tennis balls would be difficult. I think the most feasible game pieces mentioned so far, in no particular order, are:

1)Footballs - the clue has several hints that could be taken as football references, the strongest of which is the Joe Montana reference. There is also a general expectation (although I'm not sure where it comes from) that FIRST will return to balls this year. The danger is this expectation could lead people to find ball references where they are not intended.

2)Pool noodles - which would be a clear reference to pasta, although their durability is questionable making it a somewhat less likey choice.

3)PVC pipe - similar in shape to pool noodles but more durable

4)PVC elbows - I find this one intriguing. The elbows are of course the reference to pasta and the durability of these would be higher than pool noodles.

All of these options could be reset on the field in a reasonable amount of time and could be easily cleaned up at the end of the day. Additionally, they are all reasonably priced so that the teams can set up practice fields with as many game pieces as needed.

[Bill Moore]

Okay, I'm probably the last person in this thread to take Dave's animation picture, blow it up with IrfanView, and examine it in detail.

The object does look as if it is a banana; I cannot imagine anything else being skewed enough to end up with that shape. With that in mind, there are three possible conclusions:

1) As already mentioned, there will be a difficulty posed by slippery conditions this year (slippery field or slippery game objects), or
2) Since the robot appears to be carrying the banana, the game objects this year are banana or sickle shaped, or
3) Dave is indicating the special musical guest during the kickoff broadcast will be Tally Hall

[Henry_Mareck]

What if Montana's green hights are green, football shaped goals that are set up in different positions before the match, like the vision tetras.

[KillerCows456]

Im sorry if im a little slow but can someone link Dave's animation i want to take a look at it.
Thank you in advance.

[Nuttyman54]

Originally Posted by KillerCows456

Im sorry if im a little slow but can someone link Dave's animation i want to take a look at it.
Thank you in advance.

all we have right now is a picture of what would APPEAR to be Dave's animation...here

[663.keith]

I woud agree that we shouldn't look too much into the 2007 "hint", I belive that dave's picture is just trying to fool and confuze us (even more ) before kickoff, thereby creating the havoc and chaos he loves to see these few weeks we have left

On the pool noodles -- I like the idea of them being implemented in the game, it could be possible that FIRST could do something to make them more sturdy, they could possibly wrap them in duct tape. They would be practically indestructable

[EddieMcD]

Originally Posted by dez250

bot Pronunciation Key (bt)
n. A software program that imitates the behavior of a human, as by querying search engines or participating in chatroom or IRC discussions.

Is it sad that I completely forgot about autonomous? I'm pretty sure they wouldn't leave it out this year though, so I'll go with your definition.

Originally Posted by Andrew Blair

So, look at the shovel: What's it pointing at(shovel's show)? ORO - What type of past sounds like ORO? ORZO! And by the way, orzo is a long, rice shaped object. Almost like a football. It also means barley in Italian, which is even more football shaped!

So five prime (5+1=six) robots autonomously going though a bunch of footballs all over the field? Perhaps that's also where the shovelling comes in, though I'll still go with my passing theory.

For the record, I still have my circular hill with possible field goal. But one thing I find interesting is that we don't know how much of the game this may or may not be telling us. For all we know, this clue is just about the game piece and number of robots. Or it tells us the entire game. Or, they're just messing with our heads and the "clue" has absolutely nothing to do with the game... I guess time will tell.

[Karthik]

Originally Posted by Game Hint

five 'bots tangling with pasta

There's been some talk about how "prime" is a common way to denote a derivative. Well, if we go back to our introductory calculus course, we remember that the derivative of a constant function is precisely equal to zero. 5 is a constant.

Hence,

5' = 0

Therefore,

five' bots tangling with pasta
= zero bots tangling with pasta

... Just something to think about

[Arkorobotics]

Originally Posted by Karthik

There's been some talk about how "prime" is a common way to denote a derivative. Well, if we go back to our introductory calculus course, we remember that the derivative of a constant function is precisely equal to zero. 5 is a constant.

Hence,

5' = 0

Therefore,

five' bots tangling with pasta
= zero bots tangling with pasta

... Just something to think about

There you go! I was waiting for that idea to come up.

[Adam Richards]

Originally Posted by Karthik

There's been some talk about how "prime" is a common way to denote a derivative. Well, if we go back to our introductory calculus course, we remember that the derivative of a constant function is precisely equal to zero. 5 is a constant.

Hence,

5' = 0

Therefore,

five' bots tangling with pasta
= zero bots tangling with pasta

... Just something to think about

Or perhaps we can be a little creative using information other people have given:

5' = 5 + 1
5' = 0
5 + 1 = 0
5 = -1

negative one bots tangling with pasta

[Tom Bottiglieri]

Originally Posted by Adam Richards

negative one bots tangling with pasta

Silly Adam!

You can't have negative robots!



...Or can you...