I’m curious how many teams actually benefit from being in the top 50 for skills. In our state, we had two or three teams with skills scores in the top 50. The qualifiers in our state competition are the normal 5 plus tournament finalist, robot skills plus the top 4 skills teams not already qualified. So in our state it is pretty much impossible for a team in the top 50 skills to NOT qualify for worlds at our state competition.
Is that the case in other states and regions? I’m truly curious.
I wish the top 50 skills cut off was earlier in the season so states with a lot of top teams could benefit and qualify more for Worlds.
In regions with fewer worlds qualification spots, being the skills winner does not qualify for worlds. Thus, a team may have top 50 skills but not qualify through the states championship.
Since top 50 does not in any way affect who your state sends to Worlds, I don’t see how making the date earlier would allow more teams from a state to qualify. The top 50 is blind to every other qualification method, and Virginia’s qualification is blind to top 50. Given that, they can’t affect one another.
But consider this hypothetical: You’re a very good match play team with equally solid skills. On the day of your state tournament, you get a really tough schedule. Let’s say you drop two matches. Also, (important this year) you lose autonomous more than half the time. (That’s also a consequence of the tough schedule.) You’ve spent all year in the first or second alliance, but this time, it doesn’t work out. you’re the alliance captain for seed 8 after all the shuffling is done.
Chances are you’re not going to get a bid to Worlds. It happens, but it’s not likely.
Though it’s likely that Excellence and Design winners are among the six teams in the finals match, that leaves only two spots to be filled by top state skills. You don’t have to be very far down your state’s list to miss the state skills cut.
Maybe you never hit your best programming run and driver run on the same day,
What to do? Well, after your state settles, and REC invites 8 teams to Worlds, you still have a couple of weeks to sharpen your skills, and go enter a skills-only event. Run like it’s your last chance, and do everything you can to get in.
In Colorado, top fifty is extremely beneficial, there are 3 high school qualification spots to get to worlds.( two tournament champions and one excellence spot. There are 6 teams that are worlds competitive so it is extremity important for those three teams to get in though skills.(this exact situation happened last year, Luckly all 6 teams where able to qualify)
I guess what I was thinking was that if the top 50 skills cut off was before the state competitions, any team that qualified to worlds that way would not need to participate in their state competition. So that would leave more spots for other teams in the state.
However, I do see how the top 50 skills benefits states that have very few worlds spots. In Virginia, though, there is really no benefit - except bragging rights. Even though my organization does not have a team in the top 50 in Virginia, I take great pride that Virginia does and that we get to compete with top notch teams in this state.
If you move the cut off before the state competition, then for many states, there would not need to be a reason to run skills at the state event. For many states, that is the last chance for teams to get in a skills run that might qualify them for Worlds, either through their score in the state or through the top 50. Even if a team of mine had qualified for Worlds through the top 50, I would still expect them to compete at state.
I believe that this is untrue. Correct me if I’m wrong, but don’t they also use Skills in case someone double qualify at State? For example, we have 5 spots in Mississippi. 3 Champs, Excellence, and Design. If one of the Tournament Champs also wins the Design award, there would only be 4 teams that are qualified for Worlds. Someone needs to fill that 5th spot, so it goes to the winner of Robot Skills at State.
I could have been misinformed, but I believe that’s how it goes.
It goes to the highest skills scores in the state, which is determined after State Skills Scores are confirmed and finalized after the State Championship.
So effectively, whoever your best remaining skills teams are, yeah they stand a good shot of going to Worlds.
As puzzler pointed out that qualification spot then goes to the highest Robots Skills in the state, for the season, that is not one of the automatic qualifiers at state. Or as stated so eloquently by OscarNVCC above.
You are correct, you don’t get automatically qualified for having the highest skills score in the state. But some states rely on Robot Skills for some qualification spots. (and this is where I got confused). But again, thank you @puzzler7 , @OscarNVCC , and @536Mentor for correcting my mistake
