ok so the game mannual just came out and it is not good. honestly i was expecting it to be good. maybe vex would redeem itself. maybe the motor limits gonna be 110w or something. maybe they would add 3dp licesne plates back. maybe just maybe, they would change the poly limit. well unfortunately non of that happened. instead they literally banned coloring parts. LIKE WHY? whats wrong with anodizing parts. theres teams with a whole garage filled with anodized parts and yall are telling us we gotta throw all that away just cuz of one rule? coloring the bot is basically only asthethic so i do not see any reason for this considering there hasn’t been any incidents caused by this. like cmon we just wanna make our bots look better whats the worst that could happen. this is obviously just a cash grab. PLEASE STOP
you can’t use decorations that mimic Scoring Objects or Field Elements, as they might unfairly confuse your opponent’s vision and color sensors
I honestly don’t fully get that for v5. like I understand for vex ai but unless there’s people just using ai to code their robots in v5 this year, I don’t see why. and at that point you could just go for vex ai. totally understand that reasoning tho
Then just make it be no red, no blue, or no yellow. Done
The coloring rule goes beyond that. I guarantee that this was not the intention of the ban. Why would all colors be outlawed, if only red, blue, and yellow might interfere with sensors?
I really don’t think that’s why they’re doing this. Overall it’s just an easy cash grab for vex because they know the large organizations that colored parts in the past are loyal to vex and have the money to repurchase all their metal stock, even if they don’t want to.
I don’t see how disallowing anodising is a cash grab, surely if anything it saves money
I also heard that some teams were using paint and anodizing to hide welds and stuff
I think they are likely doing it to not confuse the apriltag camera.
In all honesty, it makes sense.
But practicality, it’s going to be insane how sterile the season will look.
I think an AI vision sensor can tell the difference between a colorful robot and an apriltag.
The reasoning behind the coloring ban, among other ones, is that teams were using illegally manufactured C-channels for increased strength and/or decreased weight. The ban was initially brought up in China, where the problem was more rampant, and apparently that was a successfull enough trial run to expand it to the rest of the world. I don’t mind the C-channel coloring ban, since it is possible to remove paint relatively cheaply, but the dyed parts ban I do not agree with.
It was really such a big problem they had to waste thousands of dollars? There will always be teams that break rules, banning paint will not prevent teams from making illegal c channels.
It is unfair to insist a team strip paint off or de-anodize parts in order to check wether or not a c channel is legal using traditional means. Its much easier to leave them all unpainted so that they can be verified easily.
I don’t really think that the fake C Channels affect performance that much; that sounds like an issue to be banned in China, which it already is. This should not penalize the teams that are using regular vex metal that now have to buy thousands of dollars of new metal. Last year, they banned antodized metal in China, which I feel like is fair, considering that’s where the majority of the cheating is happening. It shouldn’t affect regular teams outside of china.
Im not going to get into the weeds, but Ive spent a lot of time investigating how the various cheating systems work, in China and out, and while im not yet at the point where I can disclose everything I think I’ve discovered, all I’m going to say for now is that fixing things happening specifically just in China simply adds an insentive for operations to move out of China.
Theoretically, and entirely theoretically, if one had enough budget and wanted to escape China specific restrictions, a potential strategy could be to fly out teams to other locations to compete. Heck, its possible to do it as far out as London! Or California!
If a team has already modified parts, i.e. structural, gears, etc., then they are illegal and must be replaced if the team wishes to continue to participate. Many teams have colored parts that they must pay to replace. That’s not saving money, that’s costing many teams more.
Fair enough, your def right, I just think that overall, this rule harms more than it helps, as more teams are likely affected in the US who aren’t cheating than those who are using illegal parts china and elsewhere. In any sport, there will be cheating, and unfortunately, here in vex as well.
Anything about ‘rayguon’ teams? iykwim? There is a UK one and in the past there has been another Chinese team that was notorious for nefarious acts so I have always wondered as it doesn’t seem fair but at the same time, its so difficult because the actual team members are just students like us and seemingly normal people, I would love to speak to you about your research more in depth over dms, I will send you an email from my gmail (leo.t…)
It can, in fact the processing that detects an apriltag uses a monochrome image.
I would assume that he’s talking about them, AKa rayguon.