Time-Outs, Give it or keep it?

[Brandon Holley]

Originally Posted by Alan Anderson

They did say that straight out.

I'm not agreeing or disagreeing with anyone

However what eric is implying is that YOU can call your timeout, if the opposing team happens to work on their bots during YOUR timeout, then good for them.


Again I am not agreeing or disagreeing with anyone here.

[bigbeezy]

I would totally agree with you. However... this year they made a rule saying that time-outs could not be called consecutively. So if the blue alliance called a time-out and needed more time they would either have to play a match 2vs 3 or call up a back-up team and the red alliance couldn't do anything about it. kind of sucks but rules are rules...

[Sunshine]

I think it would be cool for the other alliance to call a time out after the opponents time out That is, if it looked like they need the additional time. They wouldn't even have to know that you did for their sake. Now, that would be cool.

[Mike Schreiber]

I'll start by saying nothing I say here is meant offensively or to intentionally put down anyone.

I was rather disappointed in the way things turned out in the semis. Winning by penalties in the 2 vs 3 was certainly not ideal.

I was on the pit crew that fixed the drive train, and I know we would have LOVED your timeout. However, I do not think any less of any members of your alliance because you did not give it to us.

I think giving the timeout is a great display of the morals and spirit of FIRST, but it is in a way suicide for your alliance and against the idea of competition. Of course you do not want to win because of our drive train failure, just as we didn't want to win due to penalties, but rules are rules and failures are failures. If a team can not fix their robot in the time given by the timeout, then their design was not robust enough and they do not deserve the title.

In the end, we all knew 469, 217, and 440 were going to be brutal competition, so I see nothing wrong with you guys wanting to save your timeout, in case you needed it against them.

[Grant Cox]

I remember talking with you about this, and <T19> aside (which didn't apply in this situation anyways) I still feel the right decision would've been to use the time out. As soon as we heard about what was going on with 27's bot, myself and our operator went over to see if there was anything we could do to help. They had a beautiful machine and really deserved to see it functioning properly; on the other side of the field, winning by 30 points (which they kind of did) due to a 2v3 situation really is not as.. inspiring.

However, like Gary said, I don't see a fault in making either decision (for the reasons given by CountTo19).

[Nawaid Ladak]

i heard a quote during the volenteer video on wednesday

"FIRST students compete like crazy on the field and respect each other off the field"

This, is an on the field issue. so my team NEEDS to stay competitive. The other alliance has a few options to work with

+bring in a backup bot
+go with 2 bots

I agree with the point where if your robot isn't robust enough to survive then it shouldn't be in the elimination rounds

the part thats really going to disturb me is when teams EXPECT the other team to call TimeOuts for them...

[CJMyers]

A huge part of the finals is the back to back matchs. That is a real test of a robots durablity and quality. Also calling time-outs may be a sign of professionalism but it delays the event itself.

[Kims Robot]

Personally (not speaking for my team here), I would likely call the time out 1. if it was deamed legal by the refs - it seems to depend on how you read the rule, and 2. If our teams robot was in good working shape (ie if we had been having troubles with our gripper and anticipated that we might need it later, I might reckon that we keep it), and 3. If it was certain that they could fix it and couldnt or didnt call the backup robot.

My question is, that some people seem to be referring to a 2vs3 situation, did it end up too late to call in the backup robot? In FLR, one of the teams broke and they brought in a backup robot, and while I realize its sometimes hard to judge how long it might take to fix something, I would think if its getting down to time to not be able to call the backup robot, if you werent sure its much safer to call them in. But its always hard in the heat of battle.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by Kims Robot

My question is, that some people seem to be referring to a 2vs3 situation, did it end up too late to call in the backup robot?

I believe they made the gutsy decision that, despite being down 1 game, they would go without the team captain's robot rather than call up the reserves.

[Josh Murphy]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

I believe they made the gutsy decision that, despite being down 1 game, they would go without the team captain's robot rather than call up the reserves.

We did make that call. We looked at the previous match when we only lost by 6 even when it was 2v3 because 27 had transmission issues during the match. We as an alliance made the call that it was not worth bringing in the backup when they would be running in the next match if we won. We only won because of penalties but it was a gutsy choice and it really payed off. It would have been almost impossible to move on without 27.