22-02-2009 11:05

Ian Curtis

Re: paper: Team Paragon 2009 Scouting Sheet

On the whole, it seems like a very subjective scouting sheet. I like numbers, so we do a very quantitative sheet.

Where are the Xs and Os supposed to go? I'm confused as what goes into the boxes on the field drawings too. Team numbers? Xs and Os? Are you really interested in the number of dumps a robot makes, or the total number of orbit balls they score? Do you have any plan to amass all this data in an easy to read sheet, or do you have to flip through a huge binder each time you want information?

23-02-2009 17:40

tim_reiher

Re: paper: Team Paragon 2009 Scouting Sheet

We were trying to reach a balance between qualitative and quantitative here. I'm a fan of numbers too, but I feel there are some things statistics just can't convey about a robot or a team.

The X's and O's are meant to go onto the field, close to where the payload specialist's moon rock throws land (this was in an attempt to get a general idea of the range and accuracy of the player). This, the importance and focus to be placed on the human player, was something we debated about, and we are not really entirely sure about it yet. (I have a feeling it'll clear up a lot after BAE...)

The boxes are for team numbers, so the robot's starting position can be shown and we can reference the opponents and alliance partners (or no shows) for a match without going back to a match schedule every time.

You also bring up a good point with the number of balls scored stat. It's nowhere on here, I see, and that is something that would be good to have on there. The number of orbit balls exactly may be a difficult stat to record, but a general sense of whether a dump scores ten or two would be beneficial.

We're still interested in number of dumps the robot makes though, as this may prove to be a good indicator of the speed and reliability of a ball collection system. If a robot can get 5 full hoppers of moon rocks unloaded, it sure beats a robot only unloading one (but then, we go back to number of orbit balls scored... sigh... I'm confusing myself...)

What we've done for years past organizationally is have tabbed folders for each robot, containing robot and match info. It isn't perfect, but it's worked pretty well for us for the last couple of years. However, that may change this year, as we will be approaching scouting more collaboratively with other teams in New Hampshire and CT than in years past.

Thanks for the questions; there's always room for improvement, and I'd be lying if I told you I thought for a second this was perfect. It's always good to have an impartial eye review your work.

Look out for a possible revision of this sheet coming after NH and before CT.