A novel strategy: Always score for your opponents

[Laaba 80]

Originally Posted by Bill_B

So that is what you tell your sponsors, Molten. How you got to the semifinals will not seem important to your sponsors. The amount of time their name was in front of the audience will be a major concern to them.

Try explaining to them that the majority of the time their name was in front of the audience it was scoring for the other team, and letting them win. This strategy will make matches much less entertaining to watch, turning away many newcomers, and those who enjoy watching hard fought FRC matches.

[WJF2011]

my vote: change the qualifying so it is hard fought. Also, I agree with your scouting plans, in Peachtree the bottom three teams were picked for alliances due to scouting. However some people do not scout and those teams will leave skilled robots out of competition because those robots could not get in the top 8.

[dtengineering]

Originally Posted by Grim Tuesday

I would just like to note the fact that this was used AND WORKED at Fingerlakes regional today (no less, from a rookie team). They got into it with their alliance and the amazing thing was, the MC understood what they were doing. However, few teams followed their lead, due to gracious professionalism. In fact, however, their score on yourself thinking got them into number 3 seed, and well into the semifinals...

Pardon my "bolding", but since when did being unable to comprehend the rules equate to "gracious professionalism"?

A better phrase might be "few teams followed their lead due to a desire to win the match rather than advance their ranking".

Just because the rules of this tournament are different from other tournaments doesn't make them any less the rules... and make no mistake, the rules are the rules whether we think they make sense or not.

Jason

[WJF2011]

Yes, at peachtree regional scoring for your opponents ended up working. In one seeding match 1771 and 1466 were allied together and were up 10-0, 1771 then started launching balls towards the opposing goal so their opponent could shovel them in. Final score 10-4, and 1466 got the highest seed and the coopertition award. Everyone on an alliance should talk to the other alliance and talk about not playing defense, letting the game get up to something around 10-10 then play for real.

[Travis Hoffman]

Originally Posted by WJF2011

Everyone on an alliance should talk to the other alliance and talk about not playing defense, letting the game get up to something around 10-10 then play for real.

So you are then saying that not playing defense, colluding, and/or artificially inflating scores is "playing for fake"?

I think I've found a new description for this process.

[Integral]

This is essentially the 6v0 strategy.

Did you spend 6 weeks building this robot to play the game or game the system?

To anyone engaging in this strategy I say SHAME ON YOU.

If this is proposed to your team just say no, it is simply not in the spirit of FIRST and is a betrayal to team mates, friends and family.

Please play the game, don't game the system.

[jspatz1]

As I said in a similar thread:
I think it is fair to say that the GDC probably did not foresee all the possible ramifications of this seeding system. I understand and agree with the concept of coopertition, but when a win is a loss and a loss is a win, when poor robots rise to the top of the seeding, and when it becomes smart to forfeit matches and not play the game, then something is clearly very wrong. I talked to both students and mentors this weekend that were discouraged that building a good robot meant less than knowing how to game the seeding system. If the cooperition factor is taken too far and begins to effect the participants' moral, or if FRC gains the reputation for being a league where building a good robot doesn't really matter, then that is potenitally very damaging ground for FRC.

[Integral]

In my mind purposly throwing a game is unaccepable in any sport at any time for any reason. Just play the game and let the chips fall where they may.

I am waiting for an apology from your team to ours.

[XaulZan11]

Originally Posted by Integral

In my mind purposly throwing a game is unaccepable in any sport at any time for any reason.

Teams need to understand that by not trying to maximize your seeding points you are, in fact, 'throwing the game'. By playing defense or any other thing that will hurt your seeding points, you helping no one and effectively throwing the game. Teams need to change their mindset that winning each individual match is not the goal.

[Integral]

I may be weird, but I enjoy the play of the game. Winning or losing takes second seat to a well played game.

I sincerely hope that when 1515 arrives in Atlanta they will be ostracized for pushing this misbegotten strategy. Any team that proposes this needs to be taught the fundamentals of FIRST. Once again shame on your for ever suggesting it.

1515 (Beverly Hills HS) is, believe it or not, is a very well funded team they are scheduled to attend multiple regionals and stole a slot to Atlanta at the Oregon regionals. Our team on the other hand struggles to find students and money in our economically stressed area. Our team would have been energized by playing on a winning alliance. 1515s tacky strategy could well destroy our team.

Perhaps a gain of a few seeding points was great advantage to higher ranked teams. We were low middle of the pack there is no way we gained anything for this match. So what if we moved from 35 to 33.

Throwing a game is simply unforgivable.

[Vikesrock]

Originally Posted by Integral

I may be weird, but I enjoy the play of the game.

Personally, I consider the ranking system part of the game, it is released to us at the same time as the game and governs how success in the game is measured (strictly in terms of competition related, qualifying results).

1515 (Beverly Hills HS) is, believe it or not, is a very well funded team they are scheduled to attend multiple regionals and stole a slot to Atlanta at the Oregon regionals.

They didn't steal anything, they earned their spot by playing the game that we have been given. If FIRST wanted to prevent this behavior they would have gone with a different ranking system or put something into the game to discourage it.

I do not agree with a strategy of collusion between alliances, but I feel that a single alliance should be able to do anything within the rules to maximize their seeding points.

Our team on the other hand struggles to find students and money in our economically stressed area. Our team would have been energized by playing on a winning alliance. 1515s tacky strategy could well destroy our team.

While I do understand the excitement of winning, if your students are only staying around for wins then frankly you are not doing your job as a mentor. This gets said over and over, but there is much more to this competition than robots, and certainly much more than winning with those robots. It is up to you and your fellow mentors to help the students enjoy the experience of the build season and competition season even when you aren't earning the W's you may have hoped for.

[martin417]

I think this discussion about "this is wrong" or "un-gracious" is silly. The rules are published at the beginning of the season. The goal of this, or any competition is to win. Do you think Dean Kamen will give away the rights to the Segway to be "Gracious"? If you don't plan to do all you can do, within the rules, to win, then why play? I realize that Gracious Professionalism is the heart of FIRST, but as I have said before, if we weren't supposed to compete, we wouldn't keep score. If we weren't out to win, I know I wouldn't have many kids interested in joining the team. The better the team does, the more students are interested joining. Is that not the goal of FIRST? To get get kids involved? Like most people, kids are interested in wining traditions. Look at football. Teams that win a lot have a lot of fans. In FIRST, those fans become involved in the team, and maybe in engineering and technology. The reason I am involved in FIST, and plan to stay involved, even though both my kids will have moved on to college, is to inspire more american kids to become engineers. At my place of business, less than 50% of the engineers are native born Americans. I am not knocking those talented foriegn born engineers, but the fact that we have to import talent because we don't have enough of our own tells me that there is a fundamental flaw in the way we inspire kids.

I, for one, will continue to inspire the kids that are on our team to do everything they can do (within the rules) to win. If winning gets more kids involved, and therefore interested in science and technology, then it is, by definition, within the spirit of FIRST.

[pfreivald]

Originally Posted by jspatz1

As I said in a similar thread:
I think it is fair to say that the GDC probably did not foresee all the possible ramifications of this seeding system.

More specifically, I think they expected teams to play with honor, integrity, and gracious professionalism instead of just playing to "win".

Winning is an outcome. How many times have we heard Woodie say not to let outcomes dictate your behavior?

Originally Posted by jspatz1

I talked to both students and mentors this weekend that were discouraged that building a good robot meant less than knowing how to game the seeding system.

This just is not true. At one point we were seeded 20th, even though it was clear at the time that we had the dominant bot. (It still seems weird to say that... Weird in a very, very good way! ) We were very confident that we would be one of the first (if not *the* first) robot picked, regardless of where we were seeded at the end of the day -- because we built a good robot.

Of course, that we did not even once try to game the system and still ended up 1st seed -- and the Cooperatition Award -- was just glorious. That the alliance selection followed good robots over high-seeded robots reinforces my point.

I agree with Integral -- this is a cheap tactic that prioritizes a certain low cunning coupled with gamesmanship, instead of cooperatition and gracious professionalism.

Play each game to win. Show off that robot you've worked so hard to build. You won't regret it, and neither will your parents, fans, mentors, or sponsors.

Patrick

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by jspatz1

As I said in a similar thread:
I think it is fair to say that the GDC probably did not foresee all the possible ramifications of this seeding system. I understand and agree with the concept of coopertition, but when a win is a loss and a loss is a win, when poor robots rise to the top of the seeding, and when it becomes smart to forfeit matches and not play the game, then something is clearly very wrong. I talked to both students and mentors this weekend that were discouraged that building a good robot meant less than knowing how to game the seeding system. If the cooperition factor is taken too far and begins to effect the participants' moral, or if FRC gains the reputation for being a league where building a good robot doesn't really matter, then that is potenitally very damaging ground for FRC.

FIRST knew what they were doing when they put this in.
To them it's just another element of the game like the bumps and the towers to tickle your brain to make you figure out how to navigate your way to the top of the standings.
And I would not be surprised if they knew this would happen. They're too smart not to see it coming.

[jamie_1930]

good luck getting picked. A lot of teams have already said if they catch you scoring for your opponents they will never pick you.