I was wrong about stacking. The UTC scrimmage shed some light on the major problems with it…
Grabbing an individual box out of the huge mass is near impossible. Throw in a couple robots trying to move through it all and it’s downright impossible.
Many stackers made the assumption they would be able to find boxes in one particular orientation, or require lining up very precisely to grab them. That just doesn’t work.
I still, however, stand by defending the top as a near-impossible task as well. We aren’t the most powerful team out there, but we were able to muscle up through much stronger teams thanks to the lowered traction on the platform and the angle of attack the ramp gives you. Teams frequently swapped positions back and forth fighting over the top.
Simply, the challenge this year is the challenge itself, not your opponents. FIRST has given us a couple of options to approach the game, and neither is anywhere close to easy.
no one’s doubting your ability to pick up boxes. The problem is that there is not nearly enough time to do it, and - if you do pursue the boxes for stacking purposes - you would have to momentarily ignore the rest of the action in the match. This is suicide.
Take it from us. We have an excellent stacker that can quickly pick boxes up in any orientation. At the UTC scrimmage, we didn’t use it at all in the Finals, and with a little help from RAGE (ok, a lot), we won the whole thing without losing a single round.
the winners this year aren’t necessarily the ones who control the ramp (although that is helpful), but the ones who are adept at shoving around the bins. And remember…
So, for those of you who attended the scrimmage, could you estimate the average stack height per match and maybe the tallest stack you saw? Or was stacking literally impossible?
Also, did the stackers at least provide a decent diversion so that one of the opponent’s bots was completely occupied during the match?
during one of the qualifying amatches, one bot put a stack of two on top of a human player stack of three. another bot made a stack of two, and another one put 1 on top of a human player stack of three. that is all i remember.
i was at the UTC scrimmage as well, and it seems that the human player period is going to be more important than i thought. the stacks of four that are put up during the human player period are, for the most part, the only stacks that will get that high. it’s always been my opinion that the only bots that will really be able to stack well are the ones that stack internally and drop whole stacks when they’re done. since most teams (for what i’ve seen) havent dont that, i think that we will be seeing suprisingly little stacking throughout the game. most of it will be worrying about QP’s and getting on the ramp at the end. for example, at one point in the scrimmage, my team actually had to ram our alliance partner to stop them from taking boxes from our opponents, a move which would have caused us to lose a large amount of QP’s. it needs to be known that QP’s are based on the other alliance’s score too, and for that reason, sometimes leaving the opponent’s stacks up is important. so, dont just go shooting out to knock down other stacks. all teams need to discuss that part of the strategy.
*Originally posted by matt111 *
**we solved that problem and we can pick up any box, in any orientation!
Micheal picked a good design, now that its finished **
We can also pick up a box in any orientation, and stack. In fact, our grabbers rotate so the boxes are either lid up or lid down depending on how we pick up the box. We don’t have to be perfectly aligned with the box to pick it up. The problem arose, as Jason said, when there are large amounts of boxes in our zone, for it is impossible to get to an individual box without scattering all the other boxes. Scattering all the boxes just to grab one could work against a stacker, for some of the scattered boxes will settle in a no score zone and be valueless. Stacking may work if done another way, however, but that is for me to know and others to discover…
I think the point of this post is for the the people who were at the UTC scrimage to relay what they saw and experienced. Every year people get their idea of what will happen and what is important. Now that there have been some rounds played what actually is important and what rounds are like is known. There are some very competitive UTC teams. So for some people to say they can do something is pointless unless they’ve played the game with 3 other bots. I thank the people who share experiences about the UTC scrimage and others around the country because now teams can modify there bot to pick up crates and think of new strategys.
hmmmmmmmmmmm… i really don’t know
I know that we had an average of 35 or so by the end, and we were ranked 11th. this is considerable when you realize that we couldn’t actually move for most of the qualification matches - a problem we didn’t solve till finals.
the biggest difference this year is that when you win, you win, and when you lose, you LOSE. big time. the difference between the winning and losing qp’s tends to be around 70 or so in a good match.
I just got back from the Chatsworth scrimmage. We saw the same thing. We do have a solution to flip sideways boxes right-side-up. Not a single team stacked successfully.
Overall, stacking would require sheer teamwork and a fast stacker. I don’t know how we can do (4 secs per box, up to 12 in 48 secs.) Our stacker was not working because it was not all the way programmed.
I now see more of a reason to gamble and try for a stack of 8 in human player mode, or at least a stack of six.
*Originally posted by mikeL 177 * i was at the UTC scrimmage as well, and it seems that the human player period is going to be more important than i thought.
I also noticed that very few teams were actually able to get their human players off the field in under 10 seconds at UTC. The scoring system wasn’t set up to disable autonomous for those teams, but many teams who sucessfully used autonomous mode(including Rage) wouldn’t have been enabled had the arena controller been functioning correctly.
*Originally posted by ahecht *
**I also noticed that very few teams were actually able to get their human players off the field in under 10 seconds at UTC. The scoring system wasn’t set up to disable autonomous for those teams, but many teams who sucessfully used autonomous mode(including Rage) wouldn’t have been enabled had the arena controller been functioning correctly. **
actually, one of the latest team updates changed the human player period to 15 seconds. most of the human players got off of the field in time.
*Originally posted by ahecht *
**I also noticed that very few teams were actually able to get their human players off the field in under 10 seconds at UTC. The scoring system wasn’t set up to disable autonomous for those teams, but many teams who sucessfully used autonomous mode(including Rage) wouldn’t have been enabled had the arena controller been functioning correctly. **
I made a post stating this about 10 days ago and I was scoffed at by everyone. I mentioned that human players would need to practically dive for the mats in order to make it back in time and that it might cause an injury concern. Everyone told me that getting back in time would be EASY and that we must be doing something wrong. Interesting …
Anyway, I wouldn’t be surprised to see the 10 seconds get bumped up to 15 seconds. I hope it does.
*Originally posted by Solace *
**actually, one of the latest team updates changed the human player period to 15 seconds. most of the human players got off of the field in time. **
Team Update 10 lists 15 seconds of human player time during the PRACTICE ROUNDS ONLY. In the fine print is says that the H.P.'s should get used to the 10 seconds during this 15 sec time.
I am my team’s human player and didn’t have that much trouble getting off in under ten seconds. As long as you stack the boxes right near the wall it isn’t hard, but I can’t say I would mind having the extra five seconds.
*Originally posted by MBurr-Mecum *
**I am my team’s human player and didn’t have that much trouble getting off in under ten seconds. As long as you stack the boxes right near the wall it isn’t hard, but I can’t say I would mind having the extra five seconds. **
And an experienced human player she is, too!:rolleyes:
Micheal picked a good design, now that its finished
Micheal picked a good design, now that its finished **