Event Results, Cyber Monday and This week in FIRST Tech Challenge Oregon

EVENT RESULTS  
ORTOP is pushing our event results up to The Purple Alliance, an online service for FTC results - Look for the date of your event.   This is the URL - https://ftcscores.com/
Event Results are also available off the ORTOP home page

This Week in FIRST Tech Challenge Oregon
What we saw in during League Meet 1 events 
In League Meet 1 weeks we saw most robots able to score minerals in the depots, quite a few robots parking partially or completely in the crater, a few robots latching to the lander and successfully deploying and reattaching in end game, and very few robots are scoring in the lander. 

A modest number of robots had some sort of autonomous program.  A few robots attempting to drop team markers, a few robots attempting to move the gold mineral off its mark. Partially parked in the crater seems to be the most successfully accomplished task.  
 Moving on to League Meet 2
Upcoming meets for Nov 26 - Dec 2  

• WED - Nov 28 - Central Oregon at Culver
• THURS -Nov 29 - MidColumbia (League Meet 1),  Columbia Basin
• FRI -Nov. 30 - Rose City 
• SAT - Dec 1 - Silicon Forest, North Coast

Upcoming meets for Dec 3 - 8 

• THURS - Dec 6 - MidColumbia 
• SATURDAY - Dec 8 - SOAR (Meets 2 & 3), Capitol ( Meets 2 & 3), Cedar Mill ( Meet 3) 
• Note this is also FIRST LEGO League Qualifying Tournament Weekend #1 -
    Please check the calendar and volunteer for an event. Lots of volunteers are still needed.

PREP FOR LEAGUE MEET 2 
Teams are still lollygagging getting through inspection. ugh....  This is slowing down the schedule. Please show up on time and ready. 

• League Meets and Tournaments are events for play, not redesigning your robot. 
• Use your meeting time to do major changes to your bots.  
• Use League Meet time to get your robot inspected early, tweak what needs to be fixed, practice, scout and be ready to play.   
• Show up at your event ready to go through Inspection. 
• Have the Robot Inspection sheet (left column) completed and a blank Field Inspection form ready to hand to the inspector. 

Still having trouble printing the Team Roster for the Team Check-in table? 
Click here for directions 

CYBER MONDAY 
REV ROBOTICS AND SERVO CITY are advertising good deals on their merchandise today, Monday, November 26th.   
Be sure to check Game Manual 1, the Legal/Illegal Parts Guide and the Forum before purchasing parts. 

NASA MARS INSIGHT LANDER

OH!!!! And the NASA MARS INSIGHT LANDER is GO FOR TOUCHDOWN ON MARS TODAY! You can watch the live broadcast starting at 11:00 AM PST. 

FTC Oregon - Keeping on the right track!

This is Week 10 of our Rover Ruckus Season.

Dates of Importance 

• Payment Deadline 
• Friday, November 16th is the last day to pay for League or Non-League Play.  
• If a Purchase Order, Check or Credit Card payment is not received on/by Friday, November 16th, those teams will be ineligible to take a discounted event fee.   
• Teams not paid by November 30th, and haven't communicated a reason why to ORTOP, risk losing their slot in their assigned events. 
• Was our PO or payment received? Check here 

Events for the next couple of weeks - details can be found here 

• Nov 15 - Rose City League 
• Nov 17 - SOAR, Silicon Forest, Midwestern, Cedar Mill 
• Nov 18 - Tualatin Valley  
• No events the week of Nov 19 - 25 - Happy Thanksgiving! Step away from the robot! Enjoy the family time. Put down the cell phone! 
• Nov 28 - Central Oregon at Culver
• Nov 29 - MidColumbia, Columbia Basin
• Nov. 30 - Rose City 
• Dec 1 - Silicon Forest, North Coast
  
  PLEASE THANK OUR VOLUNTEERS!!! They are awesome people to give their time to our program. 

Game Manual Highlights 
Mentors - Please take time during your practice/meeting time to go over Game Manual Rules.  As always the FTC Forum is the ultimate answer to Game Rule Questions.

• FIRST Tech Challenge Forum
• Forum Registration Instructions

I'd like to mention a few items from the game manuals that can impact the design of your robot to avoid penalties and others to keep your team on right  track.

#1 --  From Game Manual #2 - Page 22  <GS3> .  

What does this mean?  Don't design your robot is such a way that the referees can't see how many minerals are possessed by your robot. It must be transparent to them. Gone are the days of the big black box. 

#2 - From Game Manual #2 - Page 23 - <GS10> and <GS11>

#3 - And look for the rule about mineral possession. If a mineral accidentally lands in your robot and you are already in possession of the max amount, your team will be assessed penalties for over possession if you can't eject minerals out. Moral to the story: Build your robot to avoid unintended minerals getting stuck  in your bot.  

Homework! Find the rule and email the Number and Page to me!

UPDATE: Thanks Kraxberger Gearheads! You were the first team to email me the answer.
<GS3>Control/Possession Limits of Minerals – A Robot may Control or Possess a maximum of two (2) Minerals at a time. However, due to the density of Minerals within the Crater, Robots may temporarily exceed this limit while collecting Minerals that are In the Crater. Robots are required to shed excess Minerals before performing any other game play activities. Within the Crater, plowing through any quantity of Minerals is allowed but herding or directing multiple Minerals beyond the allotted maximum to gain a strategic advantage (i.e., Scoring, accessibility, defense) is not allowed. The Penalty for Controlling or Possessing more than the allotted maximum is an immediate Minor Penalty for each Mineral above the limit plus an additional Minor Penalty per Mineral for each 5-second interval that this situation continues. A Major Penalty will be assessed

#4 "There is no more important tool than these your safety glasses." - Norm Abram, This Old House
We are serious about this one. If you think this is a frivolous rule, think again. The rule is crystal clear.
Game Manual 2   <S3>  page 17 

#5 And this question came up last week at our North Coast League 
Are the craters owned by a specific alliance?  Look at Page 22 Game Manual 2 
ALSO,  Check out <G30>

League and Non-League Assignments

FIRST Tech Challenge Oregon ! 
Event Sign up is now closed  and we have 207 teams participating in FIRST Tech Challenge Oregon. That 4 more teams than last season! And welcome to the 95 new people added today to our ftcoregon@ortop.org  Google Group

Getting Your Ducks (or Beavers or Wolves or Vikings, etc.)  in a Row for a successful Rover Ruckus season!

• Check the new updated roster - no more Relic Recovery references - it's all new with Rover Ruckus Names and Team #'s AND team league or non-league assignments. 
• Non-League teams - please check your assignment. About a 1/3 of all teams were not given their 1st preference. 
• Check Columns A, B and C. Does it say PAID, YES, YES? If so, your team has Paid the FTC Oregon event fee, is signed up for an event(s), and holds a nationally paid registration. 
• And if it says UNPAID, YES, YES ????  Payment information is HERE 
• ABOUT PAYMENTS TO ORTOP:  I am giving both non-league and league teams until November 16, 2018 to submit their payments to ORTOP.  After that date, any team not paid will need to pay the full cost of the program and will be ineligible to take a sliding scale discount.  
• Why the harsh payment deadline this season?  Truth is the amount of time we spent last season during tournament time, chasing down payments was time consuming and took precious time away from preparing for tournaments. We want teams to pay on time so that we can move on to do what we need to do. ORTOP FTC programs staff consists of Cathy Swider and Jacie Fortune. And I share Jacie's time with FLL and FRC and other ORTOP business.  

• NEXT: Check your FIRST Team Profile. Do you have a Lead Coach/Mentor1 and a Lead Coach/Mentor2? Have both passed Youth Protection Policy background screening? That is a requirement. Bonus! sign the electronic consent and release form. 

• NEXT: Bonus points! Have each team member create a FIRST account.  More about this went out yesterday in a national FIRST Team email blast. You can read about it here. 

UPDATED FTC Oregon Tournament Page - I deleted the sign-up information, cleaned it up highlighting links that are currently most useful . 

• Links to Printing Team Rosters for events  
• the New Inspection Policy - print and bring with you 
• updated League/Non-League  Pages with teams inserted and dates updated

ALSO - If you have heard rumors that FIRST Tech Challenge has a Live Scoring System like FIRST Robotics Competition, I confirm the rumors to be true. However, the software is still in BETA. Today version 0.5.1 was released with critical improvements for leagues. We'll be using paper score sheets until I feel the system is stable and reliable. I anticipate using live scoring by our QTs if not sooner.

UPCOMING THIS WEEK!  

• Friday, Nov 2 - Rose City League 
• Saturday, Nov 3 - SOAR, Silicon Forest, Cedar Mill (League Meet 1), Tualatin Valley 
• Wednesday, Nov 7 - Central Oregon (League Meet 1) 
• Thursday, Nov 8 - Mid-Columbia 
• Saturday, Nov 10 - North Coast (League Meet 1) 

As always, I am here to help you. Please do not hesitate to contact me.