Robotics

WE MOVING ON TO STATES BOYS

I recently discovered this sub, and want to contribute some drama. This popcorn is about a decade old at this point but hopefully somebody here will find this interesting! This is drama from the "Varsity Sport of the Mind": the FIRST Robotics Competition, specifically revolving around the 2012 Greater Toronto East Regional.

Background: What is FIRST

For Inspiration and Recognition of Sicence and Technology, FIRST is a sports-styled international robotics competition founded by Dean Kamen, the guy who invented the Segway and the insulin pump. The High-School level is called the FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) and is the most "serious". Teams build 120-lb robots to compete against each other and win the World Championship. It's a big deal. Will.i.am once said of the competition:

In FRC, FIRST releases a new game every year. Teams then have 6 weeks to build a new robot to play that challenge, and then they take that robot to competition. The games are always played in alliances of 3v3 - during qualifying, those alliances are randomized, but for the elimination playoffs, those alliances are set. Sometimes you just pick the next-best robot and steamroll the other teams. Other times, you pick specific robots that can help you achieve a different part of the challenge.

How are alliances chosen? The top-8-seeded teams choose their partners in a snake draft. You're allowed to pick within the top-8 (in which case everyone else moves up a spot), and you're allowed to decline an invitation. The catch is, once you deny an invitation, you can't accept an invitation from any other team.

A major part of FIRST is Gracious Professionalism. It's the idea of competing on the field but cooperating off of it. It's not uncommon to see one team's members help another rival team fix their robot or lend them parts - even in the finals. I'm mentioning this because it's a level of civility that really does permeate FIRST culture - and it shows just how crazy this infighting drama was.

FRC in Canada, 2007 - 2012

In 2007, Team 1114 Simbotics (teams are given a number when they register, which they keep forever, and then they can choose other names and branding) helped to found Team 2056 OP Robotics (OP being their school name, not a reference to Over Powered like in video games). The two teams quickly started dominating the Canadian scene, winning both Canadian regionals every year between 2007 and 2010, and then all three regionals after a third one was added in 2011.

One of them would seed first and then pick the other team, then round out their alliance with a final team - which people called "winning the lottery," since being the third robot on the top-seeded alliance meant that you probably didn't have a great robot (especially at smaller events like Waterloo). That meant that if you were the 3rd to 23rd best teams, your chances of qualifying for Worlds was practically nil.

This built up a lot of animosity from the Canadian teams towards 1114 and 2056. It's hard to describe exactly how much animosity there was until 2013. At least three times, there were boos in the crowd when they selected each other during the Alliance Selections, something actually unheard of at FRC competitions (see: Gracious Professionalism). While other regions had powerhosue teams - and even powerhouse couples - none were as dominant as 1114 and 2056.

This actually forced a lot of the Tier-2 teams to compete in the US to try to qualify for Worlds. And they did: at some point 188, 772, 610, and 781 (the standard strong Canadian teams) all won regionals abroad. They just couldn't compete against 1114 and 2056 at home - and of course, international travel wasn't possible for a lot of the smaller, less-sponsored teams.

FRC 2012: Rebound Rumble and the Coopertition Bridge

2012's game was called Rebound Rumble. It was basically basketball, but with these huge bridges in the middle of the field. There were three bridges: one for each alliance, and a third "neutral" bridge. In qualifying matches, balancing the neutral bridge with one robot from each alliance gave everyone extra ranking points. You could theoretically seed high just by winning matches, but realistically you needed to coopertate. Some teams actually ended up seeding very high because they concentrated 100% on coopertating, not actually playing the game at all.

Maybe you can see where this is going.

2012 GTR-East: Finally, the Drama

Thanks for holding on, we're finally here. For most outside observers, GTRE 2012 went about as expected: 1114 seeded first, picked 2056, and they won the event. There was one moment of drama where it seemed like 610 was going to seed first, only for 1114 to clutch out a last-minute coopetition balance in their final match, maintaining their top seed. But still, business as usual, right? Wrong.

All of the drama unfolded on Chief Delphi, specifically

First, people watching the event on webcast

Okay, I can understand refusal of the coopertition bridge for strategic reasons, but it looked as if there was a team that was (intentionally?) ramming the bridge to prevent another team from getting coopertition points after they were already balanced. I hate using the GP card, but how is that at all Graciously Professional?

Viewers watched on as one team tried to aggressively block another team on their own alliance from balancing on that middle bridge. They repeatedly rammed the bridge to try and knock the other teams off of it.

Another user :

A lot of (presumably) unintended consequences of the Coopertition Bridge have been manifesting at this regional. It’s not pretty.

There were lots of allusions as to what was happening at the event, but it wasn't until afterwards that allegations and stuff started to fly around. Surprisingly for a competition for a bunch of robotics nerds, wifi was famously spotty at these regionals. If you paid close attention (or just knew the Canadian FRC scene), you could piece together what was going down. For everyone else, they had to wait until after 1114 and 2056 had won.

Basically, what had happened was that a few of the tier-2 teams (mostly long-time rival 610 Crescent Robotics) had deduced that the only way to beat 1114 and 2056 was to not let them seed 1st, therefore preventing them from teaming up for eliminations. If, say 610 seeded first, they could either invite one of 1114 or 2056 to join them - which would practically guarantee their victory - or they could break them up, forcing them onto weaker alliances. So these teams had gone around to every other team at the regional to convince them not to coop with either 1114 or 2056.

Some teams got on board. Others, didn't. And eventually, :

We had numerous partners tell us that they had been approached by a team, and asked to intentionally take fouls and cause us to lose.

We had our opponents approach us, and tell us that they had been told not to coopertate with us by their partners, and if they tried, their partners would block the bridge, and that the entire regional would be mad at them if they did coopertate with us.

This is not the FIRST we know and love. The actions we saw from certain teams at this event were despicable, and defy Gracious Professionalism in every way. To see actions like this, especially from well-respected veteran teams was simply astonishing. I don’t even know how we got to this point. I understand wanting to win, and doing everything within reason to win, but what we saw this weekend was over the line.

I’d like to thank teams (This list obviously isn’t full inclusive, just the teams who talked us about the specific issues.) 188, 548, 781, 865 ,1114, 1219, 1241, 1547, 2852, and 3386 who rose above the garbage, and competed with honestly and integrity. It seems to be in short supply these days.

It's hard to state how crazy this post was. People just don't air this kind of drama out in the open. Especially from members of 1114 or 2056. 2056 especially really limited posting on Chief Delphi specifically to avoid this sort of drama. For Holtzman - the coach and lead mentor of the team - to say this about another veteran team immediately blew up. This was the equivalent of Except, you know, for the fact that this is a high school robotics competition.

The community immediately split: Canadian teams start arguing that US teams immediately call them

Holtzman again comes in and (god, what a stupid word), but condemns strongarming other teams to act against their best interests. This becomes the dominant "sane" view of the thread:

We have no objections with a team choosing not to coopertate with us for strategic reasons. For example, Team 188 chose not to coopertate with us in our last qualifying match. We then approached their partner, team 2626, who agreed to coopertate with us. While the attempt was ultimately unsuccessful, team 188 made no attempts persuade team 2626 not to, or made any attempts to block or otherwise interfere with our attempted coopertition balance. I can’t make that statement for all of our matches though.

What I do have a problem with, is a team actively trying to sabotage the success of another on or off the field.

with 2056's members, and reveals that the actual events were worse than previously reported:

One situation we encountered when discussing co-opertating with another team they told us their alliance would not allow them to attempt the bridge and that “it was best for the regional” to not perform this way. This team considered themselves a second round pick and wanted to demonstrate their ability to get on the bridge with us, however, we found out after the match that they were told if they tried to get on the bridge that another team would hold the bridge down or knock them off.

We also heard from a rookie team that they were told if they were to balance with 2056 that every team at this regional would be mad at them and it wasn’t the way they wanted to start off in FIRST.

They then make it clear exactly where they stood in relation to 610's actions.

1114 definitely would have declined had 610 attempted to select us. Their robot was fantastic throughout the weekend, but due to the weekend’s events, 1114 did not feel it was right to compete alongside a team who would act in such a way.

So, we have a grand conspiracy to bully other teams into sabotaging regional powerhouses, anything else? You bet your ass there was.

Side-Drama 1: Winning Team takes a little off the top

1219, the third winning robot, replaced their shooter (which didn't work) with some ballast so that they could balance on the bridge better, from one of the teams that lost in the semifinals:

They did not report this change to the inspectors, nor did they get reinspected afterward. The inspection sheet with weights confirmed that they very well could have been overweight during that match.

Later posts (from the teams in the finals that were actually talking with the refs) reply that they were actually making sure that 2056 wasn't interfering with their attempts to balance their bridge; doing so would be an automatic match win (playoffs are best-of-three matches).

The weight issues are explained after other team members call the event staff's integrity into question. Basically a nothingburger that was only a thing because events need to clean up quickly after they're finished:

An alliance member was sent to the pits to inquire about re-weighing only to find the inspection station, including the scale had been packed. The shooter that was removed was approximately 25lbs, and the vice and chain that were added were approximately 12lbs combined, so we were not concerned that 1219 was over weight and did not pursue the issue further. Had the LRI requested 1219 to be reweighed, we are fully confident they would have passed.

I know a lot of these snippets from 1114 and 2056 sound like PR statements, but again, just having members of both teams in this thread is a testament to how crazy things are.

Side-Drama 2: Robot-builders don't build robots, destroy dreams

Things kick off again when a former student from 2185 - one one of the teams orchestrating the conspiracy and the team that rammed the coopertition bridge - makes a post and then deletes it basically calling 610's actions justified because 1114 and 2056 students don't build their own robots, anyways ().

This wasn't an uncommon allegation, but you can see just how much further she actually went with her post. Normally when these sorts of claims are made, a few posters will chime in and say "knock it off" or "here we go again" and that's it. To have such long, immediate responses paints a pretty bad picture (this was 11 years ago, so I forget the worst of what she said in the thread).

She later reveals that she wasn't even at the regional, and also that she (and was surprised when said 2056 students acted defensive). saying that "It’s nice to know that other people have noticed this."

Another deleted post (reserved in quotes) really sums up the general feelings towards 1114 and 2056 at the time:

teams like this tear the dreams of others away from them by removing any chance of getting to the worlds, by cleaning up on the field and in the awards section of comp.

Guys, this is a high school robotics competition. That deleted post was written by a member of team 907. A mentor later replies:

please do not use this account–I want to know who this is, it’s very upsetting and should not be representative of the team in its entirety by using the teams account.

Send me a personal message and do not use this account for your personal use again. This was a decision made in poor taste. Ownership of opinions should be one of the lessons you learned by being a member of this team.

Like I mentioned, Gracious Professionalism is Very Important in FIRST, so saying these sort of things under a team's account is a BIG no-no.

BUT WAIT, WHAT ABOUT 610???

To this point, we haven't heard anything from 610, the third-best team at the event and the one most involved in pressuring other teams not to coopertate.

A mentor from 610 can't get into the GTR-East thread before mods lock it, so he creates a whole new thread defending his actions as architect of the "Bully Rookies" strategy, . He doesn't ever really bring up the fact that his team bullied others. There's lots of carryover from the GTREast drama in this thread but this is getting waaaaay too long so I won't include any here.

But he keeps on bringing up his points for the rest of the season:

Specifically for this year, the trickier question is whether you should KEEP a weaker team OUT of the #1 spot to prevent this situation from happening. Say you are in the top 8, and have a match against a weak team who will move into the #1 position with 2 CP. Should you decline co-oping with them so they don’t get the #1 seed and break everyone (including you) up?

The Aftermath

610's plan actually comes to fruition later in the season at the Greater Toronto West Regional. Team 3161 legitimately seeds first - without bullying any rookies - and selects 1114. 2056 declines a later invitation and makes their own alliance as the 5th seed, and beats 1114 in the finals.

1114 and 2056 both qualified for the World Championships, get sorted into the same division, team up with another Canadian team (4334), and make it to the Grand Finals before they are literally sabotaged and their robots are hacked (that's a whole different thread, though).

The next year, FIRST creates a Wildcard rule. Before, as mentioned, if a team qualifies in more than one spot, that second spot just doesn't get used. Post-Wildcard Rule, if event winners have already qualified for the World Championship, the finalists will qualify in the empty slot. Since they were no longer gatekeeping other teams from qualifying, 90% of the animosity towards 1114 and 2056 disappears overnight. Nobody in FIRST ever says that the wildcard rule is because of 1114 and 2056 (or the events at GTR-East that made it clear just how bad things had gotten), but everyone knew that this was basically the 1114/2056 Rule.

One user in the GTREast thread :

But seriously guys, this is HS robotics. Lets all cool out a little.