What did FIRST get right this year?
-This game was fun and exciting.
I was pleasantly surprised how nice the GRB was
Going district in Ontario.
More game play opportunities for younger teams and intense competition at district level (higher than champs divisions) without the long distance travel time and costs.
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Although it wasn’t always great to loose points because of it, having an on field human player was a really interesting change of pace
Agreed. The layout was really nice for subdivisional matches. Soundbleed between fields was minimal. Even eliminations pits were really nice. I love that my pit crew got to see their robot’s last few matches. Seating was great as well. It was great to have the entire Houston CMP campus in one building. It was less of a logistical headache to let students go to the Innovation Faire, Scholarship row, conferences, and FLL/FTC.
From a spectator perspective - the production value during St Louis Einstein matches was outstanding. The boom camera really showed the scale of the field even on stream.
- FIRST Champs Live is awesome. Simply awesome. Even my wife enjoyed watching it.
- The production of the St. Louis Finale and Einstein was fantastic, the best that I have experienced in my time in FIRST. We ended on time! Complaints from Houston were for the most part addressed! Show Ready Events is so good at this, and I hope they will continue to be involved once we leave St. Louis.
- The game was fun to watch, had strategic depth, and was sort of balanced…late in the season. The District and World Championships had exciting matches that saw a diversity of alliances and strategies (some of them quite subtle) succeed at various levels. Unfortunately, this was a minority of the total number of matches played across FRC this year.
- Putting humans on the field was a unique change of pace.
- The rope climbing challenge was exciting (at least the first few times you see it).
- No trouble purchasing official game pieces for once.
- I liked the format of the manual this year with the “plain old english” rule summaries.
- I like not requiring tag checks at Champs, though I think after several years of doing this that the cat’s out of the bag (heh) and this should just be made the rule.
- More areas going to districts. Every district robot I saw at Champs was capable of playing the game with some level of proficiency. The same cannot be said of some of the regional (or waitlist) teams.
- Watching the field crew build a tarp out of a roll of plastic and some ethernet cables was one of the most fascinating things I’ve seen at a Championship.
Chairman’s and two runners up… Score!
Los Angeles Regional new location at the Walter Pyramid at UC Long Beach… Score (except for the 5Ghz wifi in the arena)
Having a Championship in Houston without tornadoes, rain storms, hail, etc was good planning.
Camera work on Einsten:Stl very pleasing to watch.
Great game designed that was able to grow with the teams capabilities thru the season
I enjoyed the strategic diversity of alliance selections and playoff strategies as well as the shifting meta throughout the season. Depending on the kinds of robots at a particular event/division, the same picking strategy was not always optimal. For example, I liked the fact that top seeds (who often were the top fuel scorers) couldn’t blindly pick the next best fuel scorer and expect to win if there was a risk of them getting out-geared.
Unfortunately, I think this strategic diversity partially a function of the poor score weighting and difficulty of the shooting task.
A wide range of difficulty levels for different tasks, each with significant but not overbearing (ok except climbing) impact on the game.
I liked how this year, every team, no matter how weak or strong, had meaningful and significant things to improve upon between competitions. Whether it was tuning a center peg autonomous or increasing a 45 kPa auto to 55 kPa, this seemed to allow a greater number of teams to improve between competitions. I will contrast this to a game like Recycle Rush where the difficulty in manipulating game pieces led to many teams with completely non-functioning robots and many designs that could not realistically be improved between competitions.
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The game pieces and fundamental concept was great. Scoring lots and lots of wiffle balls into a shooting goal, while also picking up and placing hard plastic disks, that was cool. Climbing a rope was cool. Fundamentally a good concept for a game.
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The automatic wildcard was helpful in making sure excellent robots made it to the Championship.
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Einstein in St. Louis was fantastic this year. The pacing of matches, the presentation and everything. A few details here and there (keep the standings on the screen for more than, like, half a second) but otherwise it was bang on.
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The Championship is quite simply a better and less overwhelming event with 400 teams than it was with 600. That was simply too many teams!
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The Manual was more straightforward with helpful clarification and better organization.
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For the most part, referee judgement calls placed in the rules were somewhat limited compared to prior years, which made things easier.
Honestly the game this year was fantastically balanced in my opinion.
Nonlinear gear scoring because it actually made decision making skills necessary and increased pressure around critical gears.
Teams could make significant improvements to their robots within the holding allowance.
The game evolved as the weeks went on.
Rankings were pretty representative of robot quality in the later weeks.
Seriously, +++ STL Einstein production value. After getting soured by the poor experience at Minute Maid Park, watching STL Einstein was beautiful. I hope the FoC is produced similarly.
Climbing was a fun challenge
The fuel and gear durability was impressive. I would not mind getting these game pieces again. I bet the gear could be used in a shooting game and still hold up.
The referees not having to score most of the points, thus having more time to focus on fouls and judgement calls and getting those right, is a HUGE plus.
Also, having some of the fouls start at a verbal warning–no points or cards necessary–is one of the best things about this game (and I told Frank that directly at Houston). If all you
Two different game elements is something that hasn’t been seen in a while, good move there (though the scoring balance could use some work).
The positive lessons from 2016 seem to have been carried through on, also a major plus.
This, and more chances for students to be on the drive team with up to 5 this year. Since most drive teams are static, often for multiple years, that’s a big deal in terms of number of students who get an in match experience.
St. Louis Einstein. Smoothest that Einstein has ever run.
The partnership with Twitch for streaming, showing “featured” events each week and FIRST Champs Live. I know response to the kickoff stream was mixed but I loved it the rest of the season.
The expansion of Chairman’s at Champs.
One of the smoother years for real time scoring, issues with the scoring sensors tended to be pretty uncommon. Thank you for taking responsibility for scoring on judgement calls away from the refs (I say this as a ref).
This game really allowed teams with a limited history of success to be competitive. Alliance selection wasn’t the usual suspects across the board at the events I attended and a number of rookies did very well.
Cool game pieces and scoring challenges, even if one was very unbalanced.
Interesting strategic game at high levels of play, and entertaining to watch.
Larger drive team gave more students the chance to get the experience of being at the centre of action, pressure and stress, joy of a win and tears of a loss.
In my opinion this game was well balanced, fuel let the top teams gain a little edge with a lot of effort while everyone else was on a much more equal playing field. Good gear system and consistent climber were not simple tasks to achieve as demonstrated by top teams in the finals still struggling with gear placements and climbs. You didn’t need to be one of a handful of top teams to be competitive this year.
The George Brown Convention Center was an excellent facility to hold the FIRST Championship.
Security at this facility seemed accommodating and managed to get folks in a quick and efficient manner. No metal detectors slowing the flow. I heard many comments about how easy it was to navigate from one area to another to see multiple competitions including the FLL and FTC on the 3rd floor. Especially important to those who had students, kids, in FRC and FLL/FTC.
A good opportunity to show VIPs all the aspects of FIRST/FTC/FLL/FRC with less walking and it took less time. Perfect it was all under one roof.
In GBCC the least seat saving issues there have ever been at Championship. Less up and down to the seats and many seats with good views of each field.
It seemed like team members were able to have a better chance of seeing Dean, Woodie, Don, and Dave as they were more accessible in the GBCC. We can’t underestimate what a special experience that is for them. Even if they just see them from a short distance in the pits it is memorable and meaningful. In the big domes, sometimes on stage is the only time these team members see them. I appreciate the efforts each of these men make to meet the teams and the time they take to sign an autograph or take a picture.
Much easier for those with handicaps to access the building and get to the field they needed to see their team/children. Easier for those unfamiliar with FIRST to find the team they were looking for. I assisted handicap family members and they were excited to see their children/siblings in action. In particular, I remember a man who had survived a brain tumor/chemo treatment, who obviously was having great difficulty, but none the less made it to see his son play in a FTC quarterfinal. His smile watching his son was one of my favorite moments this year. I will always remember this as a highlight of my FIRST volunteer experience.
Easily accessible elevators for those who needed them. The ability to pull up in front of the center and let handicap guests out in front. I would like there to be available wheelchairs by the entrance for those who need them. (Who show up with canes unaware how large the center is.) I would like to see student ambassadors or alumni have an opportunity to assist with this effort if they are willing. I liked seeing the student ambassadors in action with their large hand held signs.
I liked that the FIRST Alumni had more emphasis on accommodating their group with special events, planning meetings and functions for them specifically. I like seeing the patches on the arms of the alumni volunteers. Thanks to Michelle for all her efforts regarding the alumni. I think a special assigned/reserved place at Finals for them to sit next year at Championship would be a nice touch. I realize that many of them are still volunteering or with the teams they mentor during Einstein but I came across many who were looking for other alumni to sit with. This is important since they need to make new connections once they are no longer involved with a team and because some in FTC and FRC never meet until they have this opportunity volunteering.
The Discovery Green in front of the GBCC was enjoyed greatly and a wonderful place for teams to gather. It reminded me of the area in Atlanta in Centennial Park which was always a favorite for teams.
I heard some teams liked the food trucks but I never saw them. Maybe these would have been nice around Minute Maid Park so teams could have eaten while standing in line to get in. Maybe someone else can elaborate on food trucks and what they liked about them.
FTC and FRC both being in Einstein Finals together. A chance for FTC to get the recognition it deserves and the teams/parents who were involved with both getting to witness the top teams in action.
Spectacular fireworks to timed FIRST music in the Minute Maid Stadium at the end. Wish all teams could have seen them. I appreciated the Minute Maid staff inside the venue who helped direct handicap participants so we could assist them and helped with crowd control upstairs.
The FLL kids who were on stage at Minute Maid Park. So adorable. I would like to see more of them.
The Minute Maid Jumbotron. Fun to watch stadium danceathons, interviews, bad lip reading and team videos. For those who could see it well, great to watch all the close up shots of matches.
The many activities in the Houston area including the Space Center which is a great tie in for science and engineering. We loved the location of Houston Hobby Airport for flying in and the close proximity to the Space Center, Kemah Boardwalk and Galveston Beach. The warm sunny weather was nice.
I heard the art car museum was great. I will have to look it up next year.
I liked there were several areas to buy FIRST merchandise and there was a variety of items to buy in many price ranges. I could buy small thank you gifts. I did spend more money there than I usually do, but money well spent. I would suggest a FIRST Alumni logo for shirts for those who want them. I just saw keychains with such logo.
I have been in St. Louis every year except for this one. It was a wonderful venue with the exception of putting FTC way over at Union Station which was not practical for going back and forth to both venues for most. St. Louis got better each year as the kinks were worked out. I expect Houston will be the same.
Denise B.
Volunteer since 2004
- The game was designed to be played with the highest level in mind. This made St. Louis Einstein matches the most exciting Einstein tournament I have ever watched.
- I really liked the round robin format on Einstein. The two best alliances were able to advance to the finals, making it that much more exciting.
- Auto mode was important and varied. The high value of kPa and/or 2 rotors provided interesting strategic depth even in the Einstein matches.
- Every important event in the game could be understood by looking at the field. Rotors turned, kPa lights in the steam tank, and touchpad lights made a very complex game much easier for the audience to understand.
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The technical challenges were great - three tasks which (at least at the obvious level) required quite different mechanisms. Only the top tier of teams were able to do all three well, and you were definitely better off picking two and doing well than trying to fake all three.
If the GDC intended that a robot to play the game well be very different from one that would make a great demo robot, they hit it out of the park.
Edit/amplification: not intended as a negative - this makes for a good summer project.
Oh boy:
-St. Louis closing ceremonies/Einstein were some of the most efficient and least time-wasting ever. I might be wrong, but I think we were out before 7:00 which was absolutely fantastic. Other than a couple of audio problems with 2614’s video when they were walking up, the presentation of awards was also fantastic.
-I loved that FIRST had FTC next to Einstein at Houston. I know that that isn’t necessarily a popular opinion, but I liked it because it was much more relevant than chicken dances or BMX performances. Hopefully if they’re keeping this going forward it will also encourage them to up the production qualities of the FTC program.
-The game was utterly fantastic on Einstein. Seriously, one (two) of my favorite Einstein series that I’ve ever watched. There was a three point difference in both of the final matches! That’s great and exciting and I loved it.
-The theme was more “window dressing” than last year, which I think is a generally good direction to go in. Other than watching the kickoff broadcast, it was pretty much just the decals and the animations at the end of matches, which was great, and pretty easy to overlook.
-Honestly, though I still dislike 2-champs, I dislike it a little less now that it seems both events are relatively similar quality. St. Louis didn’t actually feel terribly different to me other than not being able to see all of my friends with robots at once, which was still sad. Still hoping we’ll get a single championship after the contracts are up, but the intervening years shouldn’t be too unbearable.