2014 was definitely play offense and defense kind of game, probably the best of any year. We focused on slam dunk shots which proved to be effective even with defense, and had a blocker that even blocked the best team that year.
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Why do people want defense to be strong?
I thought that while it was not the worst for blocking style defense to be a relevant strategy for one year (2019), I find the whole idea of removing all the mechanisms on your bot in order to ram into robots on the other team to be profoundly uninspiring. Itās uninspiring for the team doing it (āwe built this cool mechanism but if we want to win the best thing to do is to disassemble itā). Itās uninspiring for the teams playing against it (while rules have limited the most frustrating type of defense, it can be frustrating if a overzealous defensive bot causes damage or draws penalties). Itās uninspiring for the teams who are passed over in alliance selection in lieu of defensive bots (āour robot can score well, but the no. 1 seed alliance chose a drivetrain only bot insteadā).
Of course, thatās all my opinion, and I understand that others feel differently (I also am certainly not denigrating teams who choose to play defense for whatever reason). There are good arguments for why defense is good for FRC. But I donāt agree. Itās nice that defense is a fallback option when a teams robot is not functioning as intended, but Iām glad that the optimal strategy to be a second pick isnāt to build only a drivetrain, and I hope GDC continues to design games where that is true.
Another aspect not often discussed is that swerve improves your defensive capabilities more than it improves your offensive capabilities in most games. So, pro-defense games favor swerve even more.
These ideas apply less to defense which requires something more than a drivetrain (e.g. shot-blocking robots), or game design which encourages bots to sometimes play defense but doesnāt encourage ādefense botsā. In fact, I think weāll see effective defense of both the above types (shot blocking and opportunistic defense) this year.
Best of all would be if FRC could add a defense mechanic that required teams to actually have an active mechanism. For example, adding game pieces the other team has to clear away, or alternatively some sort of ādescoring opponentās piecesā mechanic.
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Did you forget 2006 with specific offensive and defensive periods? I thought you were around for that one.
Agree 2014 was the last game where defense worked well.
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I think FIRST intentionally designs games where it will always be the first priority to build a robot to score as effectively as possible, rather than play to keep the opponents from scoring. I personally enjoy games like Aerial Assist where it was important to be able to switch between offense and defense effectively, but over the past 3 years, that doesnāt seem to be the type of game FIRST seems to want.
OP - Iāve heard a lot of voices from others here, but Iām curious to hear yours. In what ways to you believe it has become weak? And, if so, why would you consider that to be problematic?
Not to point at a single instance as solid evidence, but Embiid put up 70 points last week and only scored 1 three pointer.
The mid range jumper is no longer dominant, but itās definitely a viable strategy.
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2016 Defense worked out pretty well too, for team 1405.
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Except that one match where it didnātā¦
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yes and no. Still bothered by that, all these years later.
Thanks for helping me remember. I was around.
What I dont remember is if teams were loading during that non-scoring periods. All I recall is it was very strategic when you loaded vs. when you attempted to make shots.
End game being balanced and encorporating a human component will make defense more relevant. In some games a huge endgame disparity could overshadow defense.
That was the idea. You wanted to win Auto, so you could reload before you went on offense.
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Donāt forget, there was some great D played during auto mode as well.
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Alex,
now that you mentioned it, I cant think of another game where playing D on auto was really strategic. Those were good times.
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You were only allowed 2 defensive robots, and the 3rd could load to get ready for your offensive period. The interesting part was loosing auto was a huge setback because you had probably shot all your preloaded balls and had to reload before you could score while the team that won auto could reload while defending.
The real kicker was that the endgame value was so high if you pulled off your chess game of setup for defense in auto to prevent your opponent from scoring a lot you could keep the score low and win with the bonus for 3 robots on the ramp at the end. A lot of teams were also unable to climb the ramp to get the bonus so that was a huge strategy in picking alliances.
Oh and pinning on the ramp was legal, it was a loophole that could be exploited if you knew how to do it.
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Not even from the perspective of defense, but in general, FRC could use the injection of some new gameplay approaches.
I think this year was a missed opportunity to have more interaction between bots, or at minimum coordination between them. ie something where you had to score in sequence (playing notes in a song being the obvious theme equivalent) vs. the same target each time or simultaneous action bonus for performing two different actions at the same time (keeping in timeā¦). The amp was an attempt at that but itās less a technical challenge than a coordination one.
As a whole the FRC space has figured out the pick something up and propel it model pretty well, itās a hard model to get away from but I think they could evolve the idea to drive more innovation/new styles of gameplay.
This year was the combo of two 2021 team submissions, which I really appreciate. I havenāt gone through and looked at all the gameplay mechanics the winning submissions had but I suspect there is some unique stuff in there.
It is a balancing act between an audience suitable game and interesting gameplay. Slow rollouts are ok imo, so hopefully there is some interesting stuff in the future.
Agree on the missed opportunity for a sequence based on the theme.
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Oh I remember this. Fun to watch back then.
2006 Aim High perhaps? 2016 STRONGHOLD had both the BATTERs and the DEFENSE ramps, but no defensive vs offensive period.
Heās referring to 1405ās defensive play in 2016. Came within a second or so of winning the Championship.