After watching the elimination matches for several events, I am starting to get the feeling that with the vast amounts of defense being played this year the 4 rotor match will be rare if not extinct in the upcoming weeks as the competitions become more competitive. As far as I know there have only been two, four rotor matches in elims thus far.
So this is where I ask you, the CD community, what you think about the following (answer all or none, but please reference which question you are referring to, thanks):
Defense in general: go you think that defense will intensify, get lighter, or stay the same?
The Defense bot: do you think that their is a place for a purely defense focused bot on a winning alliance or not?
3.Do you think that going forward there will be a alliance that will be able to pull of this four flung feat?
We were one gear away from the Four rotors but needed to show off our climbs at the end to get selected (only 8 quals) , this against single defense so its definitely within realm of possible . As for whether a very good defensive bot could be a viable option I would tend to say YES (even thought about it in hindsight before competition experience) , but likely that thought would be proven wrong against strong alliances. There are so many great teams with good drive bases that trying a single strategy to me at least seems very problematic (now that I’ve seen it live with great teams) So if one is facing off with several of those teams probably not a great winning strategy. The only time I truly saw great stifling defense was when a bot was dead (other alliance) and the opposing bot could blockade the main area forcing a long end around , that was effective that match. Rare indeed. Otherwise defense did not seem to me to significantly effect ultimate game outcomes.
We tried late to play defense and it was not pretty without practice, certainly not in our best interest as to what we can do best , so kudos to those that can. A good defensive bot IMO can win some even many games and certainly get selected , until they reach top competition where it likely won’t be enough . Lots of YELLOWS (and Reds) so some of those heavy defenders got tagged…even in elims.
I think that defense will definitely become tougher as the season goes on but it won’t be impossibly difficult.
I believe a robot shouldn’t focus on only defense. It should be able to grab one maybe two gears including the auto gear to relieve some pressure (haha) off the other two bots on the alliance.
I believe four rotors is completely within reach, however as stated early it will become progressively more difficult.
As scoring capability increases, defense will intensify. Defense always intensifies, even in 2015.
Yes, there will be second picks by high seed alliances selected for defensive capability – plus a climb, which may be cheesecaked. Some of these alliances will win events.
I expect that the four rotors bonus will become slightly more common or remain about the same, but remain rare enough that FIRST does not decrease the number of pre-populated gears at CMPs.
“3 and D” was the name of the game for us at most matches at the Miami Valley elims, save for one brain fart where we had delusions of grandeur. Our alliance didn’t bother with gears after getting our 3rd rotor going. Instead, we engaged the opposition in the neutral zone and slowed them down if they had yet to get 3 going and kept them as far away from their airship as late in the match as possible.
Sometimes our defenders would get too aggressive (cough hi Joe cough) and it cost us a few times, but in the end, the strategy worked well.
3 and D is especially effective if you can get some kPa and/or a gear bonus edge in auton and can leverage that late in the match. 2451 helped with that kPa thing quite a bit.
I think the St. Louis Regional elims had some really interesting game play, including great defensive strategies.
The 1259-4329-1985 alliance was really good and put up huge numbers and 4 rotors in both Quarters 2-2 and 2-3, setting the event high score.
The 1732-1706-537 alliance beat them because of defense and the 40 kPa bonus. 1706 was definitely the best fuel scoring robot there, and 537 was solid with fuel as well. Plus, all 3 partners could climb well. Because of that, even though 1732 was one of the better gear scoring bots there, having 1706 and 537 on an alliance let us win with Fuel and defense. We were able to pretty quickly score enough gears for 2 rotors while 1706 drained balls and 537 played awesome defense, at one point in Semis 1-1 going 1v3 and stopping the whole Blue alliance. Depending on how autonomous and the early parts of the match went, 537 could play pure defense or help score balls, while we could either put up enough gears for 3 rotors or play defense.
St. Louis Semis show that Fuel + 2 Rotors + Defense can beat a good 4 rotor alliance:
I think atleast for now 4 rotors is totally possible. Though I feel like you do need a really fast cycler (180 in our case) and a good cycler with floor intake to correct ur own gear mistakes and punish the opponents.
As for solo 4 rotors. I think it will be hard. In quals, if both alliance partners will hang 1 gear then it will be doable. We had quite a few matches where we were 1 gear off eventhough doing the majority of the gears outselfs. Same goes for 180.
Talking about a pure defender. I think in some regionals this will be enouth, especially still early in the season, but as the game progresses I think it needs to have some more function. At the the moment I think we are already seeing that it needs to climb 100% and in most cases score some fuel to break possible tie.
4 Rotors is only possible if the opposing alliance doesn’t play effective defense. Against any solid alliance that can score 3 Rotors reasonably quickly, there should be enough defense to prevent 12 Gears from happening. It will definitely continue to happen, but it isn’t a reliable strategy that you should plan for in the Playoffs. I certainly wouldn’t want to go into the Playoffs with an alliance that can’t score at least 5-10 kPa consistently.
Yes, I know, sounds strange coming from me. When you can actually play offense, then YES, a robot playing defense can become overaggressive and find themselves in a region of the field they’d rather not be in, especially late in matches.
Based on my experience at CVR this weekend, 4 rotors is not likely. I don’t recall any of the teams actually getting all 4, the most is 3. Maybe if there were 3 dedicated gearbots with a lack of defense from the other side, 4 rotors may be possible. It’s hard to tell, but it really depends on alliance and strength of drive team/robot when it comes to gear delivery in both auton and teleop.
We played the same strategy against 48-2451-4085 (and lost 2-1 in the QF, they were better), and it seemed like we were the only two alliances doing it at MVR. The key is that if you pull off getting the first three gears done (one in auto) within the first 10-15 seconds of teleop you can have two robots playing defense almost immediately with one at a time grabbing a gear. And probably all three for 45-60 seconds. Making it very difficult to get four rotors. As Travis said, if you can get even a few fuel points, this can be a very difficult strategy to beat. One of the keys is playing defense smart. Stay in the middle and delay the other robot coming and going, without risking loading zone fouls.
I’ll also say that the lack of a ground pickup capability on the 5 alliance definitely made your defense all the more effective. The congestion between the airship and the human loading area was so bad that 4329 just started taking the ‘long way’ around and it actually worked much better when they did that. 537’s defense was solid though, getting 1259 hung up quite a few times.
Rumor has it 4329 is working on a ground pickup for Iowa & a faster drive high gear. I doubt they’ll see the ‘gear littering’ strategy deployed against them after that.
Also remember that if you place the three preloaded gears, you only need to deliver 9 more during teleop, which should be achievable even with defense.
For 4 rotors, the 1st pick almost has to be a gear-runner. Red 3 & Blue 1 have amazing sight lines for 2 different pathways to the feeder station. One sight line will incur collisions (can’t see around the far airship…), and the other is only useful when there isn’t a lot of traffic (the diagonal). The 2nd pick, as a gear runner, has only one effective path to the feeder. The captain can usually choose the straight or the diagonal, but really that depends on how comfortable the driver is while the bot is in the blind spots.
The biggest defense against 4 rotors is 3 gear bots without a rhythmic match flow. They can easily get in each other’s way. This is particularly noticeable with two ground intake-based gear bots, as they might go for the same gear, or go for each other’s intended gears. Opponent’s defense has very little to do with this.
In several of our qual matches, where we were with random partners and the strategy was still high-level, we came close to 4 rotors. It usually happened when partners teamed up and were flexible. One the way to to feeder, the bot in front always took the far feeder, etc. On the way back, the first bot always took the middle peg. If defense got in the way, both bots pushed through it like a train.
The real risk of 4 rotors is being around the opponent airship in the last 40 seconds. Defenders will try to block you in, trying keep in contact with you while ropes are deployed. So really, the 3rd rotor needs to be finished in the first 30-40 seconds of the match so the last full gear cycle for the 4th rotor can happen before the last 30 seconds. Fast climbs also help, removing the pressure to get back quickly in the last 30, thus leading to fewer drive mistakes.
) and it cost us a few times, but in the end, the strategy worked well.
When you can actually play offense, then YES, a robot playing defense can become overaggressive and find themselves in a region of the field they’d rather not be in, especially late in matches.