While limiting human player in overdrive to just robo-coach, I believed that FIRST was trying to side-step away from using human players.
Instead, Human Players play a major role in Lunacy. This even includes a 15 point bonus oppurtunity.
Is the competition better with or without human player?
I think the focus on humans scoring and the overbearing rules makes this game worse. When first announced, I saw a lot of potential and creative ideas, but now I really feel like basketball skill are to much of a focal point. But, it’ll be interesting to see how everything cleans up in the end.
Look back to 2004, I think you are over underestimating how interesting watching the robots will be.
True. Many people could just be thinking it is made worse but we well never trully know until the regionals start
I personally feel that the PS will be a very important part of this game. I mean they are only way you will be able to get an empty cell for a super cell. But also I believe that they will be able to get a high amount of points by shooting. ^_^. Ok… maybe not a lot but enough to help determine the out comes of a match.
i think the human player gives the bad robots a chance. because if your robot only drives/ has a major malfunction it still gives your team a role to play in the allaince and if your thrower is good enough maybe a role in the final allaince.
Each year, human players are given a different role. And each year, human player interactions with robots, field elements and so on are different. Just as the robots we design are asked to pull off simple or difficult challenges, human players are asked to pull off simple or difficult challenges.
And its not like Human Players have to be pushed aside and let the robots take the stage…who controls the robots? Humans do.
I wish we would have had this game last year. We had a senior on our team last year who is about 6’5, and plays basketball. He is pretty sad he cant be PS. We had him shooting at the trailor and he was hitting everything.
This is different. In '04 the robots were a very important part of scoring. If the robot couldn’t return balls to the HP, you simply couldn’t score. This year, if you had a ridiculous HP, you could score every single point! Granted, launching an empty cell through the itty-bitty hole in the outpost wall and having it land in the air lock is a bit of stretch, but there are no rules against it.
That said, I’m pretty sure that this year not only will we see some really interesting robots, we’ll see some really unique robots. And that’s cool. 
I think this years game is better with human players because FIRST is trying to get more kids involved with the game. As long as the kids get some kind of interaction then kids will be more interested.
Hmmm this size of the drive team is the same how does this get more kids involved? Not trying to sound mean or anything I am just wondering what your logic is here.
I think the Role of the Human player is being over-emphasized in this years game. Yes they are responsible for introducing balls onto the field but this was the same in 2006. The thought of a human player scoring a large amount of points into a trailer seems rather far-fetched unless the trailer is stationary. It requires an immense amount of skill and luck to be able to score into a moving trailer at even 5 fps and I can guarantee many robots will be moving faster than that.
That being said I think the human player will have to be more strategic than in the last few years. Yes, last year we had the robo-coach and they had to know how to send signals to the robot but this is the first time since my involvement in first where the Human Player actually needs to thing strategically. I say this because your Human player will not be at the Driver’s station like in previous years so they’ll have to know the strategy fairly well if they want to be effective.
Personally, i don’t think this allows for the best teams to be the best. What happens if one team gets a bunch of lucky shots and they win. The game is good if FIRST wants the teams to have closer games, but that brings the truly good teams down.
I think this is the year of unknown teams coming out of nowhere and winning the Championship.
Highly doubt that.
You said it yourself, odds of turning a match around using the human player is slim to none unless they are used to directly load a robot (if a robot has a crappy loader system or something inefficient).
My .02? I think that human players wont be as effective as some think, yes I think they’ll score a lot of points but the really good teams will have robots that can still outscore them.
I do agree with cyberphil though, I really hope a truly well build robot isnt cost an important match due to a random great shooting hp on a team thats robot isnt as great or a few luck shots, it would negate the effectiveness of what that team spent so long engineering.
Anyway, there’s no telling how things will turn out until regionals so until then!
I think what he is trying to say is, this will interest the kids more involved in sports to join to team, once they join they can see how great FIRST is and become interested in science and technology.
well u see it doesnt really matter if u have basketball skills. look, a basketball player is used to shooting at a net that doesnt move and is 10 feet high. now he/she has to shoot at a moving trailer on a very slippery surface, and has to shoot down. and also has 6.5foot gaurd in front of him/her. so really i dont think it matters.
I’ve got to agree here. I think that some people are overestimating the ease of human player scoring in these goals. In the heat of competition, with the robots slipping around, bumping each other around, etc., I feel that many more balls will end up on the field than in the trailers. Plus, It may prove to be very difficult to project a swinging trailer’s path accurately enough as it gets bumped around to score reliably, while at the same time avoiding scoring in a robot of your own alliance’s trailer.
Now robot scoring… well, we’ll just have to see about that.
EDIT: Plus, I can’t imagine a robot being in any danger from the outposts, unless it manages to get right next to an opponents. How good does your depth perception, coordination, and skill need to be to throw a ball over a wall, from a sitting position on the ground, into a trailer that would be obstructed from your view by another robot? Well… rather high.
How many moonrocks can payload specialist have in his possesion at one time? I know you have to pick them up with claw but could you pick up 3or 4 and hold on to them and what for best time to throw?