Further Clarification on post "Was This Pinning"

VEX Robotics Competition Discussion VRC > Previous Games
1

Since this year’s competition is very complex, it is extremely important for everyone to be aware of the rules to avoid confusion

Pinning is defined under game definition as: A robot is considered to be pinning an opposing robot if it is inhibiting the movement of an opponent robot while the opposing robot is in contact with the foam playing surface and another field element. Please note the definition of pinning does not require contact between the pinning and pinned robot. Trapping a robot in the corner of the field is considered pinning.

Definition of field element is: The foam field tiles, field perimeter, fence, gates, and circular goals.

Pinning is further explained in section <SG4> A Robot cannot Pin an opposing robot for more than 5 seconds during the Driver Controlled Period while on the foam playing surface. A Pin is officially over once the pinning team has moved away from the pinned robot by two feet (approximately one) foam tile. After ending a pin, a team may not pin the same robot for a duration of 5 seconds. If a referee determines this rule to be violated, the offending robot will be disqualified for the match.

Furthermore right under <g11> the rules state: In the case where referees are forced to make a judgment call on interaction between a defensive and offensive robot, the referee will err on the side of the offensive robot.

One thing that isn’t very obvious from the video

VEX Robotics Gateway Washington Jumpstart 2011 17 04 40 - YouTube

except in the last few seconds is that the defensive robot has long metal standoffs which make the robot larger than it appears. In response to there not being a visible violation of the pinning rule. In the video from approximately 1:47-1:53 the offensive robot is stuck between the goal and the defensive robot .They also reinitiated the pinning rule by repining in less than 5 seconds as seen at time 1:54 and 1:57.In addition the defensive robot never moved the approximate 2 feet back in order to officially end the pin. In this case the pin would officially go on to 2:04 making the total pin time 17 seconds.

This posts intent is to help clarify what the video does not clearly portray. Since pinning has never really been an issue before hopefully this will clarify pinning for all teams and future competitions.
Thanks for your time.

P.S.
Once again it was a great and fun tournament. Congratulations to the winning alliance of 1492x, 1492Z, and 1107B.

2

You’re correct in saying that there are metal standoffs on the robot that increase its size, however I see no way that these standoffs would be pinning the offensive robot in the video within the time frames you have suggested. The robot is playing, in my honest opinion, “hard defense.”

At all times, the offensive robot has the option to drive backwards instead of continuing its pursuit forwards (as is QUITE clear in the video). The defensive robot is always at an angle with the offensive robot that gives it a clear lane to back off from the middle goal. It is the offensive robot’s choice to continue driving forwards into the defensive robot.

I’m not saying that the defensive robot isn’t inhibiting the forward movement of the offensive robot, that is quite clear from the video. I’m just saying that unless there was some unseen entanglement (highly unlikely considering the outward design of the defensive robot has no regions that could possibly cause entanglement), the offensive robot has open space behind it.

Looking back at the definition you quoted of pinning: A robot is considered to be pinning an opposing robot if it is inhibiting the movement of an opponent robot while the opposing robot is in contact with the foam playing surface and another field element. Please note the definition of pinning does not require contact between the pinning and pinned robot. Trapping a robot in the corner of the field is considered pinning.

You seem to interpret “inhibiting the movement of an opponent robot” to be in a single direction. But it seems the intention of the pinning rule is more geared towards preventing the complete lack of mobility of the pinned robot. I would say that this match can be easily compared to the match immediately following it: www.youtube.com/user/rhtyler#p/u/4/eJriEJUbRmc

In this match, from 2:20 to the end of the match, Team 1492X plays a defensive strategy almost identical to that of 1492Z in the match in question. During this match, 1492X was not disqualified at any point for pinning, even though at numerous times it can be seen that the sole intention of 1492X is to “inhibit the movement of” 10D.

The two matches are of slightly different circumstances, but in both I believe that the defensive robots (1492Z and 1492X respectively) each played similar defenses that inhibited the movement of the offensive robot in one direction but left the other direction completely open to them. Additionally, the defense was aimed at keeping the offensive robot in the isolation zone. This is completely legal as shown by the answered question: [https://vexforum.com/t/answered-pinning-definition/19593/1

The question proposed and the answer by Karthik seem to model this situation almost perfectly.

I leave it up to the VEX community to decide as this is indeed a point of disagreement that should be settled early in the season, sorry for the long post, thanks for your time!](https://vexforum.com/t/answered-pinning-definition/19593/1)

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The team whose member was yelling during that match should have been disqualified in my opinion. Talk about ruining the experience for everyone, I can’t imagine that any of the other spectators there were enjoying this team member’s raging on the side of the field. Discuss your issues with the referees after the match, don’t distract or detract from everyone else’s competition experience.

4

Sorry for the confusion, When 10D was up against the goal they were being pressed so hard against it that they lost all traction and they could not move either forward or backwards. This was all settled at the tournement and the purpose of this post is to help get a better clarification of the pinning rule and not to argue the point.

The crowd involvment was never part of the issue and it is hard to pass judgment on what cannot be seen and when one is not at the tournement. At the tournement no complaint was lodged against the crowd involvment or any of the team yelling thus this was never an issue.

We need to remember that this is a opportunity to learn from, and to help better ourselves and make the compititions more fun as well as fair.

5

I’m not sure anything can be gained by further dissecting this situation.

There are plenty more tournaments to play. :slight_smile: Why don’t we all focus our attention on those?

-John