Sand in your electronics…
bleh.
Electronics are made of sand.
Well done.
Seriously though, sand wouldn’t be too horrible with the electronics. Just put your electronics in a box with some seals, and you’re good. The thing to worry about is those sprockets, bearings, gears…
no rookie team was selected for alliance parings at the Florida Regional. and the Great Lakes Regional.
i’ll believe this when a rookie team leads a team to a championship
Didn’t that happen at VCU?
VCU was using the old match selection algorithm. While it didn’t change how good their robot was, it might’ve helped them win more matches. I still support the new algorithm - I just wanted to bring it up.
Did FIRST actually change the algorithm? They said they did, but we ran into the same problems at FLR. The problem being playing with the same teams over and over and not getting to work with a large majority of the competitors. And yet still having super short turn arounds and uber long turn arounds later.
I didn’t like the new algorithm they used. At the Pacific Northwest Regional we were against the same team nearly every match. And for the next match, we always were against one of our previous allance members and with one of our previous opponents. They did that every single match.
And with the Rookie thing, at the Pacific Northwest Regional, the rookies rocked. I dont know what the statistics were for how many went into the finals but we took team 1983 (Skunkworks) into the finals with us. They also won the Imagery award.
A rookie team (2122) took top 3rd seed and lost in the semifinals to the team that eventually won.
I wonder how well the rookies did in past competitions…
Unfortunately, I think this lack of advantage for veteran teams is due to the dumbing down of the game.I believe that only having one tube at a time, made this game fairly simple from a design stand point.I think that in the attempt to keep rookie teams form being killed by veteran teams First in eliminating a lot of the creative designs and strategy. The first years I was in first ,It was three teams and you finished first ,second or third. Sure, we got killed by some veteran team , but we also won. ( you can learn a lot by finishing second or third)When the real quality of your robot is being hidden by alliances and rule that frankly limit teams to build very similar robots. It is very difficult to determine a advantage one way or another. These limit have now spread to the pits.(update 16).A veteran team knows what tools to bring to fix a robot quickly and safely. I am VERY sorry if this seems like a rant. I have been participating in First for ten year and know how it can impact students future. I understand change comes with time. I just hope First will strive for excellence and not average.
jim schaddeleee
I do understand your concern, but in my opionion, they are doing a fine job, I mean sure its been “dumbed down” a bit as you have said, but it isn’t a huge step down, I believe, like was said before, that they are trying to even the playing fields for rookies, this way more people get involved and stay involved, instead of getting owned by vetrean teams and leaving because of that very same reason.
I don’t think this game is ‘dumbed down’, as you say, and especially not because we’re only allowed to handle one tube. This year’s game provides quite a few different choices in effective arm and grabber design. You can use an articulated arm, a 4-bar linkage, a sliding elevator, a telescoping arm, and anything else your team can come up with. Grabber designs include pinch-type grabbers, curved pincers, two spatulas, wheel type, and grabbers that deal with the inside of the tube. Optimization and automation can be done with sensors and programming. In terms of ramps, I have seen many clever designs, including lifter types where the lifting robot does the work, cable driven ramp extensions, ramps where a robot driving up will extend the ramp, and so many others.
The focus this year is on tube handling and lifter design, rather than storing game pieces.
I dont know if anybody watched but the lower four alliances at wisconsin were led by rookies and a combined total of 10 rookies made eliminations. The winning alliance was also led by a rookie.
Alright I finally got around to investigating a hunch I have. The results we are seeing, the fact that team number has little to do with record has nothing to do with the game or how good the new teams are.
In each match with the exception of the last one or two in each round (ie when all except 6-12 teams have played the same number of matches) the sum of the team numbers on the red alliance is very close to the sum of the team numbers on the blue side. I am writing a program now to gather data from all of the regionals but from the three I have looked at it seems that in order for one alliance to win they must give losses to three teams with simmilar numbers. This Prevents any group of numbers from getting significantly more wins than any other. It seems that any data you have collected relating win percent (or seeding) to how well these groups are doing is invalid.
There really isn’t any merit to any of the claims in this thread.
I agree ,You have given great example of how to do the task.(lift a tube),what I am trying to say is that
why limit someone creativity. How cool would it be if a team score a entire row in autonomous or the rules allowed for more than placing a tube, drop a ramp or climb a ramp. Just a quick example. I think it was 2002 the game had 3 large goals on casters .These goal were multipliers .Team 71 designed a robot that dropped down ,grabbed the three goals in seconds then walked them into the scoring position.
That was truly INSPIRING .First is about inspiration. If a team uses a 4link or sliding elevator is that inspiring?
Your Friend
Jim
Great job by those rookies but after looking at the entry list almost half of the teams were rookies.
The same thing could be argued for any rule. Isn’t a weight limit stifling creativity? I could build a really awesome robot if I didn’t have to worry as much about weight.
Rules don’t limit creativity, they channel it in different directions. In this game, the rules reward a creatively and effectively designed mechanism, rather than a creative way around the way most people play.
Only holding one ringer is part of the game, like not using your hands in soccer, and not traveling in basketball.
I would be inspired if a team can manage to score all of their team’s ringers in one match.
This year, awe-inspiring moments like that will most likely come from the drivers and coaches. That’s not to say robots can’t be inspiring. I’m impressed by the lifter robots that can manage to lift 2 robots, and also by the really effective scoring robots.
when i said they didn’t get selected for alliance parings i ment
“team so and so, who would u like to invite to join your alliance”
in outher words, no rookies in the elimination matches at GLR or UCF
I don’t like it very much…
At Pittsburgh, we ended up with a rookie team as first seed… They were an awesome team, and a VERY awesome alliance captain and we couldn’t have asked for more. That being said… The were a drivable base that hadn’t run in some of their matches. They were undefeated in qualifying.
When you get this happening, the First alliance is automatically handicapped against. The first seed rookie chooses whatever bot is in their best interest for the first alliance selection (at Pittsburgh, that team was us), but when you get around to choosing again, quite a few of the top scoring or ramp bots are gone. This left us with two exceptional defense bots and one exceptional hybrid. This is different than having a team earn their way up by being an exceptional scorer.
Any rookie team (no matter how AWESOME they are) that doesn’t earn their way to the very top of the regional is not being given a gift. They are being handicapped against. This leaves the first alliance in a very tight predicament when the other alliances have two or three scorers each, and they have one.
I am not complaining, And I couldn’t have asked for the Pittsburgh regional to go any better for us than it did, I am just relaying an unfortunate situation that happened to a rookie that got stuck in the new algorithms.
In my opinion, FIRST should not give precedence to rookie teams. It shouldn’t be about team number, it should be about the ability of the robot.
True enough. I was just using the word used before me instead of making up my own I suppose. I am completely fine with the game as it is right now, and I like the fact you can focus on very very specific parts of your design now because you don’t need a complicatied robot to be able to do everything. I am still impressed with what they can come up with
I will be inspired with you ,IF or when this happen. Thanks for the intelligent debate. You seem like a very thoughtful young person. That is what is inspiring .Good luck to you and your team.
jim