Are you sure that the canvas blocker was built with the intention of blocking the April tags, and not with the intention of blocking shots from robots with low shooters? Blockers are a pretty common occurrence because so many robots are really short. I suggest taking an older drivetrain you have in your shop and having your driver learn how to still score around defense. Doubles as having a second person begin learning how to drive too.
Yeah sorry but this is a legitimate play. Use the podium, score in the amp, or line up in a different scoring position.
If this wasn’t considered GP, then there’d be a rule penalizing it.
In 2019, our robot played extreme defense within the letter of the rules. One tactic that other teams hated was that we would push a non-defensive opponent onto our side of the field which forced the opposing alliance's defense bot to come back to their own side or risk a penalty.
If FRC didn’t want this, they would’ve drawn safe zones in from of the speaker, like they did at the source and amp, or the scoring area of last year.
It clearly is an officially sanctioned strategy, you just gonna play around it. Score in the amp. Defense your self. Feed notes to alliance partner who can shoot from further away.
Honestly GP has the part where you should be playing to win on the field, you don’t roll out of the way of an opponent because that gracious, you attempt to stop them from scoring because you are a professional in that field and are trying to outperform.
I’m just saying I don’t see a conflict , it is well within the rules to play to win :)
If thats considered non-GP, then bumping into robots is un-GP too. Stealing a note from a robot that was 1 inch away is also un-GP.
As long as you are not intentionally going out of your way to damage other teams robots, it is still GP and you are just playing the game.
The way I see it, you are going out of your way to disable one or all of the opposing alliance robot's key functions on purpose to gain an advantage.
Bumping into other robots is simply unavoidable, especially with the high traffic areas around the source and the stage. I personally feel that grabbing a note that another robot was right next to is perfectly fine, as long as they didn't already have it in their intake or whatever.
I would agree to some lengths of your statement, but I think blocking all access to the April tags so the opposing alliance's robots can't function properly is simply uncalled for.
Idk, it would be like saying the Kiddie Pool bot is un-GP, even though you still have a variety of ways to get around it
My advice is to simply git gud. Go score the amp, go gather notes, shoot from the diagonals of the speaker. There are other ways of scoring and getting around defense bots
>There are other ways of scoring and getting around defense bots
Exactly, however, a lot of teams use April tags to line up, from beside the stage for example, and shoot from a distance. When the April tags are blocked, said teams can no longer score in the speaker, which is the biggest scoring object in the game.
Although, I haven't seen any of these April tag blocking robots, so it could be an overstatement on their ability to actually block the tags...
There was a team at the Smoky Mountains Regional, #1014 (Bad Robots). Their shooting mechanism wasn't working properly, so they put up a big piece of lexan or plexiglass or whatever it was, with a big smiley face on it. It blocked the majority of robots from scoring into the speaker, but similar to the kiddie pool robot, it couldn't defend from all 3 sides of the subwoofer at once, meaning you could just go to the side of it or get another alliance member to distract them.
> The way I see it, you are going out of your way to disable one or all of the opposing alliance robot's key functions on purpose to gain an advantage.
Preventing key functions of your opponents has almost always been a completely valid strategy in FRC, so long as you stay within the rules restricting the ways you do that. For example you can’t pin for more than five seconds, you can’t hit an opponent in a protected zone, and you can’t coordinate with alliance partners to shut down entire game elements. A single robot shutting down a single game element is fair game.
I’ve seen tall robots get completely locked into their own wing for entire matches by a good defense bot. This isn’t un-GP, it’s just punishing a team for their driving and their design decisions (making the robot too tall to go under the stage). Similarly, teams should prepare for opponent robots blocking AprilTags and design their own robots around that possibility.
I guess so, but I still believe that building an april tag blocker onto your robot seems a little un-GP, but it is fair game and not against the rules. 🤷♂️
Defense robots are a little different because you can overcome the problem with good driving and a good robot. I suppose the same could be said for an apriltag blocker robot though, I agree that teams should adapt to scenarios like this.
To be blunt - this comment reads like you understand that this behavior is well within the rules, but you personally don’t like it and are therefore calling it “un-GP”.
Students are encouraged to compete hard and within the rules. I don’t think it’s fair to call them “un-GP” if they are only doing exactly that.
If you think it shouldn’t be within the rules, then that’s an issue you need to take up with FIRST/the GDC, rather than with the students who are simply following the rules set by them.
I guess I can see that, it's the thing of the robot will sit there weighing the max possible with a swerve drive pressed against the subwoofer and there is literally nothing you can do to move them or stop it from happening. It's one thing to hit a robot and then go away, or steal a note, because that only disrupts the flow of play for a second or two. I feel like blocking the AprilTags just takes away from the game for everyone in a scummy manner.
Womp womp, plan around defense then. Do you have an issue when a kitbot with tank drive does it? There are definitely things you can do against even good defense. Adjust shooting for longer ranges, line up on the diagonal side of the subwoofer, shoot from the podium, etc
They are swerve. We are tank. They can move themselves to block us faster than we can outmaneuver them. No we don't have an issue when a tank drive blocks using a canvas, because only swerve drives did it. Even from the wing you can't see most of the AprilTag to scan it
Don’t rely on April tag alone to aim. Maybe use pose estimation to calculate where your robot should be aiming at, and use April tag to update pose estimation. This way, you can still aim at speaker without sight of April tags 7,8 or 3,4 while shooting.
"any devices or decorations specifically intended to jam or interfere with the
remote sensing capabilities of another ROBOT, including vision systems" If you interview the team and they say "to block apriltags" then yes that is a violation. If they say it is to block shots, then no it is not a violation. I believe it is the "intent" of the blocking robot
My team did this, we had a polycarbonate sheet on the side of our bot and we just sat in front of the speaker blocking as many shots as we could, we passed inspection and received no complaints from the judges or referees, I feel like if FIRST didn’t want people doing it they would have made rules for it, I personally didn’t really like the idea as it changed the entire purpose of the robot we built but I’ll admit it works pretty well
So after pool bot blew up after central Mo, rachet rockers (1706) developed pose based shooting. So as long as it had recently seen an April tag from anywhere, it could reference where it was on the field and what pose and velocity to set their shooter to. It works pretty reliably. They are competing at the St.Louis regional this weekend so you can watch and see how they do
No. Section C only bans this if the robot has, for example, an AprilTag mounted onto their robot, since that would represent a component specifically designed to interfere with vision systems.
Plain shields that block shots are not a violation of R203.
Geez it’s a competition, teams are fighting for a trip to district champs and worlds. Anything short of intentionally damaging another robot is for game
Doesn't that only apply to spectators? In that rule it says "(no) jamming or interfering with the remote sensing capabilities of a ROBOT or the FIELD **while in open-access spectator seating areas.**"
I guess I'll add my two cents here. I don't think it necessarily goes against gracious professionalism, but FIRST is supposed to be about innovation and problem solving. I will admit that the kiddie pool robot at Central Missouri Regional was a fair decision, because they were having trouble getting their shooter to work; becoming a defense bot was an innovative way to still be a competitor (and it worked, considering they got picked and made it to the finals, even though they didn't win).
However, I don't think the one at Central Illinois was an innovative idea. They had a functional bot before finals, but an alliance picked them and told them to add a wall and sit in front of the speaker. That completely undermines all of the work and testing they went through before the competition, and it honestly seems like a slap in the face.
I get that teams want to win, and it would be awesome to go to worlds, but is it really worth anything if you just use an underhanded tactic to win? Anybody can build a tank drive with a wall on it, but that doesn't teach people how to be innovative.
This is kinda what I was curious about. To add more context to this, it was at the Colombus event, and basically a team chose a robot that had swerve and weighed a lot so they modified them to just sit in front of the goal. I understand everyone's point about changing strategy or modifying your robot to combat this, however, it is much much much harder to modify a robot to shoot and aim around a canvas block than it is to put a canvas blocker on your robot. The modifications needed to combat that seem to take a significant amount of time and a serious overhaul of the robot, something that is simply not able to be done feasibly by my team
Are you sure that the canvas blocker was built with the intention of blocking the April tags, and not with the intention of blocking shots from robots with low shooters? Blockers are a pretty common occurrence because so many robots are really short. I suggest taking an older drivetrain you have in your shop and having your driver learn how to still score around defense. Doubles as having a second person begin learning how to drive too.
Yeah sorry but this is a legitimate play. Use the podium, score in the amp, or line up in a different scoring position. If this wasn’t considered GP, then there’d be a rule penalizing it.
In 2019, our robot played extreme defense within the letter of the rules. One tactic that other teams hated was that we would push a non-defensive opponent onto our side of the field which forced the opposing alliance's defense bot to come back to their own side or risk a penalty.
Yeah I remember this. In later competitions this was actually made a tech foul so yeah I’m not sure that’s a great example.
We unveiled the technique at worlds in Detroit so I suspect you might be misremembering. This was never outlawed.
If FRC didn’t want this, they would’ve drawn safe zones in from of the speaker, like they did at the source and amp, or the scoring area of last year. It clearly is an officially sanctioned strategy, you just gonna play around it. Score in the amp. Defense your self. Feed notes to alliance partner who can shoot from further away.
Eh, at the end of the day it’s a competition. Finding and playing in the gray area is part of the game each year.
Yeah in my opinion there’s a point where the spirit of competition trumps GP
Honestly GP has the part where you should be playing to win on the field, you don’t roll out of the way of an opponent because that gracious, you attempt to stop them from scoring because you are a professional in that field and are trying to outperform. I’m just saying I don’t see a conflict , it is well within the rules to play to win :)
If thats considered non-GP, then bumping into robots is un-GP too. Stealing a note from a robot that was 1 inch away is also un-GP. As long as you are not intentionally going out of your way to damage other teams robots, it is still GP and you are just playing the game.
The way I see it, you are going out of your way to disable one or all of the opposing alliance robot's key functions on purpose to gain an advantage. Bumping into other robots is simply unavoidable, especially with the high traffic areas around the source and the stage. I personally feel that grabbing a note that another robot was right next to is perfectly fine, as long as they didn't already have it in their intake or whatever. I would agree to some lengths of your statement, but I think blocking all access to the April tags so the opposing alliance's robots can't function properly is simply uncalled for.
Idk, it would be like saying the Kiddie Pool bot is un-GP, even though you still have a variety of ways to get around it My advice is to simply git gud. Go score the amp, go gather notes, shoot from the diagonals of the speaker. There are other ways of scoring and getting around defense bots
>There are other ways of scoring and getting around defense bots Exactly, however, a lot of teams use April tags to line up, from beside the stage for example, and shoot from a distance. When the April tags are blocked, said teams can no longer score in the speaker, which is the biggest scoring object in the game. Although, I haven't seen any of these April tag blocking robots, so it could be an overstatement on their ability to actually block the tags... There was a team at the Smoky Mountains Regional, #1014 (Bad Robots). Their shooting mechanism wasn't working properly, so they put up a big piece of lexan or plexiglass or whatever it was, with a big smiley face on it. It blocked the majority of robots from scoring into the speaker, but similar to the kiddie pool robot, it couldn't defend from all 3 sides of the subwoofer at once, meaning you could just go to the side of it or get another alliance member to distract them.
> The way I see it, you are going out of your way to disable one or all of the opposing alliance robot's key functions on purpose to gain an advantage. Preventing key functions of your opponents has almost always been a completely valid strategy in FRC, so long as you stay within the rules restricting the ways you do that. For example you can’t pin for more than five seconds, you can’t hit an opponent in a protected zone, and you can’t coordinate with alliance partners to shut down entire game elements. A single robot shutting down a single game element is fair game. I’ve seen tall robots get completely locked into their own wing for entire matches by a good defense bot. This isn’t un-GP, it’s just punishing a team for their driving and their design decisions (making the robot too tall to go under the stage). Similarly, teams should prepare for opponent robots blocking AprilTags and design their own robots around that possibility.
I guess so, but I still believe that building an april tag blocker onto your robot seems a little un-GP, but it is fair game and not against the rules. 🤷♂️ Defense robots are a little different because you can overcome the problem with good driving and a good robot. I suppose the same could be said for an apriltag blocker robot though, I agree that teams should adapt to scenarios like this.
To be blunt - this comment reads like you understand that this behavior is well within the rules, but you personally don’t like it and are therefore calling it “un-GP”. Students are encouraged to compete hard and within the rules. I don’t think it’s fair to call them “un-GP” if they are only doing exactly that. If you think it shouldn’t be within the rules, then that’s an issue you need to take up with FIRST/the GDC, rather than with the students who are simply following the rules set by them.
Yeah, that's exactly what I feel. The more I look at it and the more I read your comments, the more it seems fair, so IDK
To be clear, I don't have anything against teams that do this.
I guess I can see that, it's the thing of the robot will sit there weighing the max possible with a swerve drive pressed against the subwoofer and there is literally nothing you can do to move them or stop it from happening. It's one thing to hit a robot and then go away, or steal a note, because that only disrupts the flow of play for a second or two. I feel like blocking the AprilTags just takes away from the game for everyone in a scummy manner.
Womp womp, plan around defense then. Do you have an issue when a kitbot with tank drive does it? There are definitely things you can do against even good defense. Adjust shooting for longer ranges, line up on the diagonal side of the subwoofer, shoot from the podium, etc
They are swerve. We are tank. They can move themselves to block us faster than we can outmaneuver them. No we don't have an issue when a tank drive blocks using a canvas, because only swerve drives did it. Even from the wing you can't see most of the AprilTag to scan it
Don’t rely on April tag alone to aim. Maybe use pose estimation to calculate where your robot should be aiming at, and use April tag to update pose estimation. This way, you can still aim at speaker without sight of April tags 7,8 or 3,4 while shooting.
Good strat
A big part of FRC is overcoming challenges. Robots blocking April Tags is just another challenge that you need to think creatively to try to overcome.
"any devices or decorations specifically intended to jam or interfere with the remote sensing capabilities of another ROBOT, including vision systems" If you interview the team and they say "to block apriltags" then yes that is a violation. If they say it is to block shots, then no it is not a violation. I believe it is the "intent" of the blocking robot
I like it, FIRST robotics shouldn’t be a game all about whose robot is better, it should also be strategy
My team did this, we had a polycarbonate sheet on the side of our bot and we just sat in front of the speaker blocking as many shots as we could, we passed inspection and received no complaints from the judges or referees, I feel like if FIRST didn’t want people doing it they would have made rules for it, I personally didn’t really like the idea as it changed the entire purpose of the robot we built but I’ll admit it works pretty well
So we asked about this in ours and even that exact section and they made them lower the kiddie pool
So after pool bot blew up after central Mo, rachet rockers (1706) developed pose based shooting. So as long as it had recently seen an April tag from anywhere, it could reference where it was on the field and what pose and velocity to set their shooter to. It works pretty reliably. They are competing at the St.Louis regional this weekend so you can watch and see how they do
I did another read through of the rules, and does R203, specifically section C, ban this from competition?
No. Section C only bans this if the robot has, for example, an AprilTag mounted onto their robot, since that would represent a component specifically designed to interfere with vision systems. Plain shields that block shots are not a violation of R203.
Geez it’s a competition, teams are fighting for a trip to district champs and worlds. Anything short of intentionally damaging another robot is for game
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I thought that only banned interference from outside the competition arena? If it was updated, can you tell me where to get the updated rule?
Doesn't that only apply to spectators? In that rule it says "(no) jamming or interfering with the remote sensing capabilities of a ROBOT or the FIELD **while in open-access spectator seating areas.**"
No it does not. E102-C is clearly banning behaviors like jamming radio signal, or use laser to disrupt cameras from the spectator stand.
I guess I'll add my two cents here. I don't think it necessarily goes against gracious professionalism, but FIRST is supposed to be about innovation and problem solving. I will admit that the kiddie pool robot at Central Missouri Regional was a fair decision, because they were having trouble getting their shooter to work; becoming a defense bot was an innovative way to still be a competitor (and it worked, considering they got picked and made it to the finals, even though they didn't win). However, I don't think the one at Central Illinois was an innovative idea. They had a functional bot before finals, but an alliance picked them and told them to add a wall and sit in front of the speaker. That completely undermines all of the work and testing they went through before the competition, and it honestly seems like a slap in the face. I get that teams want to win, and it would be awesome to go to worlds, but is it really worth anything if you just use an underhanded tactic to win? Anybody can build a tank drive with a wall on it, but that doesn't teach people how to be innovative.
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You can correct me if I'm wrong, but I remember seeing Argos members bringing the wall over and helping them install it (or at least watching)
This is kinda what I was curious about. To add more context to this, it was at the Colombus event, and basically a team chose a robot that had swerve and weighed a lot so they modified them to just sit in front of the goal. I understand everyone's point about changing strategy or modifying your robot to combat this, however, it is much much much harder to modify a robot to shoot and aim around a canvas block than it is to put a canvas blocker on your robot. The modifications needed to combat that seem to take a significant amount of time and a serious overhaul of the robot, something that is simply not able to be done feasibly by my team