[robocup-small] Rule changes for 2005

Tue Nov 23 22:08:02 EST 2004

Hi,

The other half of RoboDragons, i.e. Aichi Prefectural University's opinion, 
is here.

We basically support Jim's (or CMU's) opinion. A couple of comments 
questions are here.

1. Change 2
I don't understand this change clearly. Does this mean "to be moving the 
ball right after the restart (by the referee)" or " to put the ball on the 
imaginary line and stay there"?

2. Change 7
We are also against this change.

3. TC should devide the rule changes into  short term matters and  long term 
matters. The long term matters have changes such as the change relating to 
the team's budget or the change that needs drastic change in the team's 
system. Others are the short term matters. In the changes the TC propesed, I 
think changes 6 and 7 are long term and others are short term. Changes of 
the long term matters should be done on 2006 or later after sufficient 
discussion.

Tadashi Naruse
RoboDragons / CMRoboDragons
Aichi Prefectural University

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "James Bruce" <bruce at andrew.cmu.edu>
To: <robocup-small at cc.gatech.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, November 23, 2004 3:08 PM
Subject: Re: [robocup-small] Rule changes for 2005

> Here's the opinion of at least the CMU half of CMRoboDragons.  On the 
> issues, as far as I know we're in agreement with Aichi University (the 
> other half of CMRoboDragons).  We don't have a single spokesperson 
> however, so they may make a separate statement if they wish.
>
> Sean Verret wrote:
>
>>Change 1:
>>
>>The dribbling distance will be set at 500mm for both active and passive
>>dribblers.
>>
> We agree with this change.  Since it is difficult to tell whether a 
> potentially active dribbler is actually running, it makes sense to apply 
> the same rule in all situations.  This makes it easier on the referee, and 
> encourages multi-robot involvement in gameplay.  500mm seems a good match 
> for the current field size.
>
>>Change 2:
>>
>>For all restarts where the ball has gone out of bounds and the rules
>>state the ball is too be placed ON a boundary line or within 10cm of a
>>boundary line, the ball will be instead moved towards the middle of the
>>field to an imaginary line that is 10cm any of the boundary lines that
>>the ball is within the 10cm wall.  Needs rewording but I think it makes
>>sense.
>>
> We agree with this change.  Moving the ball in even a small amount should 
> make it much easier for robots to kick the ball such that it stays in 
> play.
>
>>Change 3:
>>
>>The referee box will send a neutral restart command 10 seconds after all
>>restarts.
>>
> Does this mean a team has to take its kick within 10 seconds, or it 
> becomes a neutral restart?  That's fine with us, but we want to understand 
> the rule completely.  This will allow teams to more easily be conservative 
> on restarts, avoiding kick-detection problems in poor lighting.
>
>>Change 4:
>>
>>No more bluetooth is allowed in the small-size league, and all other RF
>>decisions will be left to the OC based on local conditions.
>>
> How about just saying "No radios within the 802.11b frequency range are 
> allowed.  Specifically this includes bluetooth."  I assume that is what is 
> meant by the rule.  On the other hand, some teams (such as CMRoboDragons) 
> have radios in the 2.4 GHz range, but which can operate completely outside 
> the range used by 802.11b.  We'd like to know if this is allowed, though 
> of course if its up to the OC we'll ask them.  From my understanding of 
> bluetooth, it cannot be made to operate completely outside of 802.11's 
> range.
>
>>Change 5:
>>
>>Corner kicks will follow with change 3.
>>
> Ok.
>
>>Change 6:
>>
>>The EC/OC/TC will decide upon ALL yellows, blues, greens, cyans, and
>>pinks allowed to be used by robots before the competition and will make
>>enough of these colors available at the competition for each team to
>>field 6 robots.
>>
> We think this is in general a good idea, but don't have a very strong 
> opinion.  We provided the samples of the previous official colors (in 2002 
> I think?), and would be happy to do so again if people are happy with 
> those colors (we have found a much better blue that does not fade 
> however).  We can get large sheets of all the colors.
>
> Importantly however, if we use official colors, we will need at least the 
> guarantee of a minimum brightness level on the fields.  Last year, we were 
> promised a certain lighting level, but found the actual level to be 
> between 1/2 and 1/4 of the promised value.  We had to use a backup system 
> because our primary system could not work on that dark a field.  We feel 
> this is important enough to bring up, because uneven lighting is a 
> software problem, but a very dark field is a camera problem, and penalyzes 
> teams that cannot buy expensive top-of the-line cameras.
>
>>Change 7:
>>
>>We will have 6 robots per team
>>
> We are against this change.  Several teams have only 5 robots (such as CMU 
> and Aichi), many would have trouble affording more, and it is too late to 
> ask people to build more for this year.  Other teams building robots are 
> probably already part way through building them, and it might be expensive 
> to add one now.  A change like this should be a longer term goal, and 
> stated concretely well in advance.  In other words, now is a good time to 
> talk about how many robots to have in 2006, with a demo game this year by 
> the teams who would like the change.
>
> Additionally, we do not feel we know the effects of last year's rule 
> changes, as teams were still adapting.  I think adding a robot now is 
> premature;  It doesn't seem to solve any concrete problems present right 
> now.
>
>>Change 8:
>>
>>The time of game will include 12 minute halfs, 5 minute half time
>>breaks, each team retains its color for the duration of the match and
>>colors are decided along with the referee 1 hour before the match.
>>
> Longer halfs are fine, but we don't see much of a need for it either.  We 
> disagree with changing the color arbitration.  In poor lighting 
> conditions, one color really can be better than another, so it is most 
> fair to allow switching.  Teams only need only set down tops with both 
> colors to let the other team calibrate.  Most of the time, teams don't 
> care about colors and will simply agree not to switch.  So we would prefer 
> something like:
>
> 1 hour in advance of the game, teams must decide if they are going to 
> switch colors at half time, and which color they will start with.  If both 
> teams agree not to switch, they will keep the same colors, otherwise they 
> will switch at half time.
>
> Additionally, we would like each team to provide blue and yellow "example 
> covers" to the other team 1 hour prior to the match.  These can be simple 
> paper cutouts with the same patches as the real covers, or actual tops. 
> In this way, even without official colors, or with odd tops, all teams 
> should be happy.  In general this is not currently the case, but it is not 
> really fair for a team to change its top patterns or colors a few minutes 
> before the game.
>
>>Change 9:
>>
>>There will be no chip kicks allowed during any restart.  Chip kicks (of
>>any height) will be allowed during all other situations.
>>
> We prefer Raul's suggestion of all kicks being indirect and having to 
> touch another teammate before being counted as a goal.  We don't have a 
> strong opinion however.
>
> We do feel strongly that the 20% rule should be applied without exception. 
> It has served us well for a long time, and relaxing it leads to problems 
> where an "attempted kick" might actually grab the ball.  Is that dribbling 
> or kicking?  This actually happened to us in 2001 due to a poor kicker 
> design, so it will come up.  Also, how long is too long for scooping?  I 
> think it is best to avoid the problem by enforcing the 20% rule at all 
> times.
>
> This also effectively makes chipping difficult but possible, which is a 
> good situation.  FU-Fighters and CMRoboDragons chip kickers are hard to 
> control in accuracy, which means they are not as much of a huge advantage 
> as they might seem.  The also show you can chip within the current rules. 
> Scoop-based kickers which violate the 20% rule have no limit to their 
> accuracy, and raise all sorts of problems in terms of corner cases for the 
> 20% rule.  Since we are not going to eliminate the 20% rule in all 
> situations, the only way to avoid those cases is the enforce it in all 
> situations.
>
> Jim Bruce
> CMDragons / CMRoboDragons
>
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