Obviously with the new bo1 system working with your partner is key, so I’m going to start a thread on strategies for doing just that. Some that come to mind:
Zone coverage (each of you takes a certain area of the board)
One takes caps one takes flags
One takes defense one takes offense
Anyways feel free to add to my list and to discuss which strategy you think is best. I also think it would be cool to hear some ideas for team moves like 8059s idea of using one robot to shove someone off the center platform and the other to secure it
I feel like having a robot that can do both is huge. Most of the time (at least near me) not all the robots can do everything, so having a “middle man” robot can really help during the qualifying matches. Basically your robot should cover what your alliance isn’t good at. Also being transparent about your robots abilities is important
I wish that more teams were transparent about their abilities (or lack thereof). The tendency to exaggerate is pervasive (“We have 97% shooting accuracy, so we must have all the driver loads!”)…
Yeah I’ve run into that problem a lot. A way to combat that is to watch their matches (especially in the qualifiers, because thats where it can be the biggest problem). Scouting is key
Yeah this is annoying… I understand teams that are trying to vie for a pick from you, but teams on your own alliance for an upcoming match should really be honest about what they can do. I had that happen a few times at worlds where we asked for an ally to put just one mogo in the 5pt zone with a couple cones, and as it came time to pick it up, we would find that our partner hadn’t managed to take care of a relatively simple task.
Yep. The teams I’ve coached have run into this several times, especially when it comes to autonomous.
The philosophy we used most of the time last year was to use our 22-point autonomous, except when our partner had an even better autonomous.
I agree completely.
Sometimes they might think they can do it, but they fail when they’re with you.
Also, with autonomous especially, sometimes they may be fairly sure that they can do it, but they’re not as sure that you can do it.
Then there are other times when your partner truly can do something better than you can, but they’re less consistent than you are. In these cases (particularly for autonomous), you’ll have to decide whether to use the better tactic with a chance of failure, or the simpler tactic with a greater chance of success.
I am assuming drive team roles - in a three member configuration:
One dedicated to driving the robot and tactical decisions.
One watching the whole field analyzing the opposing alliance play and scoring opportunities.
One interfaced to the alliance partner - communicating tactical needs between the drive teams.
Having the two non-drivers on either side and as a buffer between the driver seems to work well to reduce information overload. Quality communications is key to working well with alliance partners.
Lance – you are right, managing an alliance effectively is an incredibly important feature of the game that most teams largely ignore. The best teamwork I’ve seen on a team of mine was a while ago, but their division of labor was:
One base driver
One game system operator
One coach
They divided the scoring areas up and gave them shorthand names. A typical play might be:
Coach: “Score two in six”
Drivers execute play while coach talks to alliance partner and watches the field.
Lead driver: “Done” (although the coach usually could see it)
Coach: “Move right, pick up four and score in two.” The coach has seen his alliance partner on the left and directs the drive team to the right to avoid alliance-partner blocking.
The drivers don’t think about strategy, just tactics, and the coach only worries about strategy and alliance partner teamwork. It was extremely effective (most times…), especially if the alliance partner had an organized drive team, but I have had a lot of trouble getting other teams to really use it. Every time I hear a coach yelling, “lift your arm, lift your arm!” I know they have not figured out effective division of labor.
Oh, yeah. If the coach is watching his own robot scoring, he’s wasting time. He (or she) needs to be figuring out the next play, and the drivers need to do what they’re told.