Human players and FIRST games

[Koko Ed]

BEST YEAR TO BE A HUMAN PLAYER - 2009.You were heavily involved in the game and influenced the outcome of the match more often than not. Avoiding hot shooting human player became and actual strategy point.

WORST YEAR TO BE A HUMAN PLAYER - 2008. More often than not they had nothing to do unless you had a decent autonomous mode and then they just stood there for the rest of the match.. Anyone could push a remote.

MOST DANGEROUS YEAR TO BE A HUMAN PLAYER - 2005. They had to run out to the side of the field with tall robots and there was the occasional robot that toppled into the lane. There were dire predictions on CD that a human player would get taken out by a robot and calls for mandatory helmets for them.

MOST COMPLEX TASK FOR A HUMAN PLAYER - 2006. You had to pay attention when to shoot and when not to shoot balls so your team could best operate during their period. Wasting shots when it wasn't your alliance's scoring period was one of the most inexplicable acts ever by a human player.

[Tetraman]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

BEST YEAR TO BE A HUMAN PLAYER - 2009.You were heavily involved in the game and influenced the outcome of the match more often than not. Avoiding hot shooting human player became and actual strategy point.

Don't forget 2004.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by Tetraman

Don't forget 2004.

I was thinking of 2004 with it's "cuddly little landmines" but since the target was stationary instead of the challenge of hitting a moving target and getting to make a big difference with the Supercell, 2009 wins out.

[AllenGregoryIV]

I love the human aspect of most games. When I was in high school, I was human player for both 04 and 06. I was also the head programmer so it was really good to be on drive team and see up close were code changes need to be made. I remember several matches were we had our robot either tip over, 04, or break its shooter, 06; being able to human score gave my team the ability to contribute to the alliance. I thought 06 had a good balance between human and robot, teams with the best robots obviously won but the humans still needed to be good at their jobs to allow the robot to perform well.

[pfreivald]

We pulled a basketball player into FIRST in Lunacy, just to be our human player. Ironically, he DIDN'T end up being our human player during the competition (and the kid who did was the best HP at FLR), but he DID end up going to RIT for engineering instead of FLCC for sports management...

Any way you cut it, that was a giant win!

[mathking]

Originally Posted by pfreivald

We pulled a basketball player into FIRST in Lunacy, just to be our human player. Ironically, he DIDN'T end up being our human player during the competition (and the kid who did was the best HP at FLR), but he DID end up going to RIT for engineering instead of FLCC for sports management...

Any way you cut it, that was a giant win!

Excellent!

Our HP was a CC/Track kid (I also coach both of those sports) who is an engineering major at Ohio State now.

In my experience even in years like 2009 it was not so much athletic talent that made good human players as it was the ability to stay focused and think clearly. A lot, I mean a lot, of human players in 2009 just kept shooting whenever they got a ball to shoot. The good ones watched and tried to shoot when robot were near and/or moving toward them rather than far away and/or moving away. I think that such focus will be particularly important this year, as will good communication.

[GaryVoshol]

Originally Posted by Koko Ed

MOST DANGEROUS YEAR TO BE A HUMAN PLAYER - 2005. They had to run out to the side of the field with tall robots and there was the occasional robot that toppled into the lane. There were dire predictions on CD that a human player would get taken out by a robot and calls for mandatory helmets for them.

It happened. Our HP got conked on the head by a robot arm - I don't think it was our robot. They didn't stop the match. Worst part was, she had to crawl back to her pad, or our robot couldn't keep running.

That said, I did like that interaction. While the HP was in motion, the robot was immobilized. That put in an element of strategy to HP use.

I prefer games where the HP can assist the robot to score, but cannot score directly. This year it comes close to that, since scoring is so difficult.

[Koko Ed]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

It happened. Our HP got conked on the head by a robot arm - I don't think it was our robot. They didn't stop the match. Worst part was, she had to crawl back to her pad, or our robot couldn't keep running.

That said, I did like that interaction. While the HP was in motion, the robot was immobilized. That put in an element of strategy to HP use.

I prefer games where the HP can assist the robot to score, but cannot score directly. This year it comes close to that, since scoring is so difficult.

I doubt we'll ever see a human player role like 2005.
The potential for disaster was just too great.

[Tetraman]

Originally Posted by GaryVoshol

It happened. Our HP got conked on the head by a robot arm - I don't think it was our robot. They didn't stop the match. Worst part was, she had to crawl back to her pad, or our robot couldn't keep running.

That said, I did like that interaction. While the HP was in motion, the robot was immobilized. That put in an element of strategy to HP use.

I prefer games where the HP can assist the robot to score, but cannot score directly. This year it comes close to that, since scoring is so difficult.

As a HP of 2005, I remember having plenty of close calls with robots. But the worst part was less about the robots, and more about the other human player. If either of us weren't paying close enough attention, we would have collided.

[Joe Ross]

Several human players were injured, including a broken ankle, in the 2003 game. http://www.chiefdelphi.com/forums/sh...ad.php?t=19329

[gblake]

In addition to the arguments others have advanced, if you are willing to think of FRC as a slightly misnamed STEM program, then the human player's contributions to the "strategy space" that must be properly analyzed and navigated is a big contribution to the M part of a STEM program.