AscendRobotics/AscendData · Datasets at Hugging Face

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Tournaments
Trial by fire...
Filming Matches
But why?
You should film every match. Why? Because later, after the tournament, you will:
* Analyze why and how the robot broke or malfunctioned
* Reflect on your team's game strategy and compare it to other strategies
* Study other team's effective robots and game strategies
There are 120 seconds in a match--15 for autonomous, 105 for driver control. Examine the videos carefully; did you waste a single second? What can be improved on the robot? Do you need more driver practice?
Yes, that's a high standard. That's what it takes to win. Don't waste a single second.
Team Interviews
The interview is just as important as the notebook for winning judged awards at VEX Tournaments. A good interview is professional, clear, and concise.
Interview Tips
To ace the interview, you need to know the ins and outs of what they will ask. You can learn more about what the judges will be looking for by checking out Interview Scoring.
⛳
Interview Scoring
But, success requires knowing more than just what is on there, it requires knowing how to approach it as well. Here are some interview tips for success:
1. 1.
2. Delegate each teammate to a specific part of the rubric. Doing this allows for a clean organization of who will say what during the interview, and will reduce teammates talking over each other, which can cost you points
3. 2.
4. Not every teammate has to be at the interview. If not all teammates are comfortable with the interview or if you have a big team, not everybody needs to be present at the interview since all present members are expected to contribute meaningfully to the interview process, which can be hard if there are too many or are uncomfortable with it.
5. 3.
6. Focus on what makes you stand out. The interview is also a time to show what makes your team unique from the others, so if you have an unorthodox method of solving a problem make sure to emphasize why you chose that method and why your team uses it.
7. 4.
8. Don't get stressed. Remember, this isn't a job interview where you'll be asked questions you don't know the answer to. This is a robotics interview so everything will be about robotics, so if you know how your robot works you will be fine.
9. 5.
10. Keep track of time since the interview only lasts 10 minutes. You can have a great interview without using all the time but if you run out of time you could potentially miss out on the 8 rubric points given. Be sure to keep a rough outline of how much time you will allot to different components of your robot and design.
11. 6.
12. Don't be afraid to let your personality shine. The interview is your team's chance to stand out from the rest of the competitors and show what is unique about you and your team that the robot can't show. Just make sure you keep it in control and the conversation still covers what is needed for the points in the rubric.
Interview Scoring
Interviews are scored based on the following rubric, taken from the VEX Judging Guide:


Interview Rubric
Let's go through each of the categories:
1. 1.
Engineering Design Process - The engineering design process is the backbone of robotics and is critical to success. To get a good score, you need to show definitive proof that you used this process in your notebook and you can explain how you used it to make your robot.
2. You can learn more about the engineering design process here: https://vrc-kb.recf.org/hc/en-us/articles/9628278280215-VRC-Engineering-Design-Process
3. 2.
4. Game Strategies - To gain this point you need to showcase that you came into this competition with a plan on how you were going to play and what factors affected this plan and how.
5. 3.
6. Robot Design - This one goes a bit hand in hand with the engineering design process and shows that your team actually utilized it in the building of the robot. To get this point, you need to showcase how you got from your initial robot design to your current robot design and how and why the design changed.
7. 4.
8. Robot Build - To gain this point, you have to show that you are knowledgeable about your team's bot and know its ins and outs. To earn this point, you will need to be able to answer any questions the judges might have about your robot's build and parts.
9. 5.
10. Robot Programming - This one follows the same pattern as the build, where you need to be able to explain in depth how your robot's programming works to earn the point.
11. 6.
12. Team and Project Management - To earn this point you need to show that you took measures to keep your team operations on track and managed the project properly to maintain optimal efficiency
13. 7.
14. Teamwork, Communication, Professionalism - To earn this point, your team needs to perform well in the interview itself. This can be done by avoiding talking over one another, communicating clearly with confidence, and being professional. More importantly, every team member must contribute meaningfully to the interview questions being asked.
15. 8.
16. Respect, Courtesy, Positivity - This point comes from your attitude during the interview. If your team is doing the interview with positivity, interest, and respectfulness, you will earn the point.
Interview Practice Questions
Practice makes perfect
To sharpen your team's interview skills, you can try out some practice questions to test if your team is well prepared. This is not an exhaustive list, but it's a good start.
Most Common Questions:
* What are your roles/jobs on the team?
* How did you develop your robot design?
* What part of your robot are you most proud of? Why?
* Did you use any sensors? What are they used for?
* Has your game strategy been effective? How and why?
Other Questions:
* What does your robot do and how does it score points?
* What were the challenges you identified before designing your robot? How did you design your robot to meet those challenges?
* Which team members built the robot?
* Were there any other robots that inspired your robot design? How?
* How do you manage your time?
* How do you manage your resources?
* What changes did you make to improve your design during the season?
* What iteration/version of your robot is this?
* What was the most difficult challenge your team has overcome so far?
* What problems did you have in working on your robot? How did your team solve them?
* If you had one more week to work on your robot, how would you improve it?
* How has your strategy changed over the course of the season?
* Tell us about your robot’s programming – who was the primary programmer?
* What were the challenges of this year’s game that you considered before designing your robot? How did you design your robot to meet those challenges?
* What are your goals for Driver and Autonomous Coding Skills scores? What are your average scores?
Skills
Your path to States and Worlds
Skills is perhaps the most important part of any robotics competition, at least for new teams. There are two types of Skills runs:
* Driver Skills: The driver gets one minute (1:00) to score as many points as possible on the field
* Programming Skills: A program has one minute (1:00) to score as many points as possible on the field
At every competition, you get three Skills attempts for each type of run. Your total Skills score is the sum of your best driver run and your best programming run. Even more, get your skills runs in early! Don't wait until the last minute--the line usually gets extra long near the end.
But why does it matter?
Well, skills rankings are the best indicator of a team's true skill level--that's because the randomness of qualification matches can cause even the best teams to rank poorly. However, Skills is only dependent on your team.
Because of this, VEX uses Skills to award qualifications to teams for extra spots at States and Worlds. For example, when there are any extra spots left over in the State tournament, the remaining spots are awarded to the highest unqualified teams on that state's Skills rankings. That means it's relatively easy to qualify to state; you just have to run Skills and do decently well.
The same thing applies for Worlds. When a team qualifies twice for Worlds (at States), then the extra Worlds spot is awarded to the highest unqualified team on the States Skill rankings. This is, by far, the best way to qualify to Worlds. At TN States in 2023, all teams that ranked at least 16th in Skills qualified to Worlds.
In conclusion, do Skills--you won't regret it.
Ranking and Stats
Who's the best?
In tournaments, VEX Via reports a number of statistics: WP, AP, SP, OPR, DPR, and CCWM. These can seem confusing at first, but we'll go over what each one means here.


This is from Haunted 2023
Ranking Stats
These determine your overall ranking going into Alliance selection.
WP (Win points)
Win points are the primary factor when it comes to determining the rankings of a team. Winning a match earns you 2 win points and tying a match earns you 1 win point. Additionally, the Autonomous Win Point (AWP) gives you a single win point.
AP (Autonomous points)

Tournaments

Trial by fire...

Filming Matches

But why?

You should film every match. Why? Because later, after the tournament, you will:

* Analyze why and how the robot broke or malfunctioned

* Reflect on your team's game strategy and compare it to other strategies

* Study other team's effective robots and game strategies

There are 120 seconds in a match--15 for autonomous, 105 for driver control. Examine the videos carefully; did you waste a single second? What can be improved on the robot? Do you need more driver practice?

Yes, that's a high standard. That's what it takes to win. Don't waste a single second.

Team Interviews

The interview is just as important as the notebook for winning judged awards at VEX Tournaments. A good interview is professional, clear, and concise.

Interview Tips

To ace the interview, you need to know the ins and outs of what they will ask. You can learn more about what the judges will be looking for by checking out Interview Scoring.

⛳

Interview Scoring

But, success requires knowing more than just what is on there, it requires knowing how to approach it as well. Here are some interview tips for success:

1. 1.

2. Delegate each teammate to a specific part of the rubric. Doing this allows for a clean organization of who will say what during the interview, and will reduce teammates talking over each other, which can cost you points

3. 2.

4. Not every teammate has to be at the interview. If not all teammates are comfortable with the interview or if you have a big team, not everybody needs to be present at the interview since all present members are expected to contribute meaningfully to the interview process, which can be hard if there are too many or are uncomfortable with it.

5. 3.

6. Focus on what makes you stand out. The interview is also a time to show what makes your team unique from the others, so if you have an unorthodox method of solving a problem make sure to emphasize why you chose that method and why your team uses it.

7. 4.

8. Don't get stressed. Remember, this isn't a job interview where you'll be asked questions you don't know the answer to. This is a robotics interview so everything will be about robotics, so if you know how your robot works you will be fine.

9. 5.

10. Keep track of time since the interview only lasts 10 minutes. You can have a great interview without using all the time but if you run out of time you could potentially miss out on the 8 rubric points given. Be sure to keep a rough outline of how much time you will allot to different components of your robot and design.

11. 6.

12. Don't be afraid to let your personality shine. The interview is your team's chance to stand out from the rest of the competitors and show what is unique about you and your team that the robot can't show. Just make sure you keep it in control and the conversation still covers what is needed for the points in the rubric.

Interview Scoring

Interviews are scored based on the following rubric, taken from the VEX Judging Guide:

Interview Rubric

Let's go through each of the categories:

1. 1.

Engineering Design Process - The engineering design process is the backbone of robotics and is critical to success. To get a good score, you need to show definitive proof that you used this process in your notebook and you can explain how you used it to make your robot.

2. You can learn more about the engineering design process here: https://vrc-kb.recf.org/hc/en-us/articles/9628278280215-VRC-Engineering-Design-Process

3. 2.

4. Game Strategies - To gain this point you need to showcase that you came into this competition with a plan on how you were going to play and what factors affected this plan and how.

5. 3.

6. Robot Design - This one goes a bit hand in hand with the engineering design process and shows that your team actually utilized it in the building of the robot. To get this point, you need to showcase how you got from your initial robot design to your current robot design and how and why the design changed.

7. 4.

8. Robot Build - To gain this point, you have to show that you are knowledgeable about your team's bot and know its ins and outs. To earn this point, you will need to be able to answer any questions the judges might have about your robot's build and parts.

9. 5.

10. Robot Programming - This one follows the same pattern as the build, where you need to be able to explain in depth how your robot's programming works to earn the point.

11. 6.

12. Team and Project Management - To earn this point you need to show that you took measures to keep your team operations on track and managed the project properly to maintain optimal efficiency

13. 7.

14. Teamwork, Communication, Professionalism - To earn this point, your team needs to perform well in the interview itself. This can be done by avoiding talking over one another, communicating clearly with confidence, and being professional. More importantly, every team member must contribute meaningfully to the interview questions being asked.

15. 8.

16. Respect, Courtesy, Positivity - This point comes from your attitude during the interview. If your team is doing the interview with positivity, interest, and respectfulness, you will earn the point.

Interview Practice Questions

Practice makes perfect

To sharpen your team's interview skills, you can try out some practice questions to test if your team is well prepared. This is not an exhaustive list, but it's a good start.

Most Common Questions:

* What are your roles/jobs on the team?

* How did you develop your robot design?

* What part of your robot are you most proud of? Why?

* Did you use any sensors? What are they used for?

* Has your game strategy been effective? How and why?