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1973: SG6 Violation Assessment Clarification

Eric Schnurr
26-Feb-2024

At this point in the season more and more teams (during Qualifications and Elimination matches) are working together to help win a match by match loading on each other’s robots.

During a match, team A & team B are both on the Red Alliance. If a drive team member from team A performs an illegal match load onto Robot A, then clearly the SG6 Match Load violation is recorded against Team A. Which team should the SG6 violation be assessed to for the below situations? Team A? Or Team B? or Both? or Split?

  1. Drive team member from Team A performs a match load onto Robot B when Robot B is not touching the match load bar. (Hence a SG6 violation.)
  2. Drive team member from Team A performs a match load onto Robot B when Robot B is touching the match load bar, but the match load is illegal – IE the triball misses the robot entirely, or was thrown, or was dropped too far, or pushed through the robot’s trapdoor, etc. (Hence a SG6 violation.)
  3. Drive team member from Team A performs a match load onto Robot B when Robot B was touching the match load bar, but the robot drives away and doesn’t try to re-establish contact, and the drive team member reaches out to place one last match load. (Hence a SG6 violation.)
  4. Drive team members from Team A and Team B are side by side in the same corner and alternating match loads on Robot B. They get out of sync and both team members load a triball simultaneously. (Hence a SG6 violation.)
  5. Drive team member from Team A accidently drops a triball on the field when there is not a robot near the match load bar. (Hence a SG6 violation.)

If the violation is to be assessed on the drive team member in any of these scenarios, then clearly the Head Ref will have to also be monitoring who performed the illegal match load in addition to watching for the match load violation itself on the robot. There are also matches where drive team members are changing positions and moving between the 2 corners as the match progresses, so you cannot always count on the same person who may have performed an illegal match load to be at that same position at the end of the match.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

SG6  
Answered by committee
7-Mar-2024

During a match, team A & team B are both on the Red Alliance. If a drive team member from team A performs an illegal match load onto Robot A, then clearly the SG6 Match Load violation is recorded against Team A. Which team should the SG6 violation be assessed to for the below situations? Team A? Or Team B? or Both? or Split?

It is the human Match Loader's responsibility to ensure that Match Loads are introduced in a legal manner. If the Head Referee is able to accurately identify the Drive Team Member that incurred an <SG6> violation, that human Match Loader's Team should receive the penalty for any illegally introduced Match Loads.

If the violation is to be assessed on the drive team member in any of these scenarios, then clearly the Head Ref will have to also be monitoring who performed the illegal match load in addition to watching for the match load violation itself on the robot. There are also matches where drive team members are changing positions and moving between the 2 corners as the match progresses, so you cannot always count on the same person who may have performed an illegal match load to be at that same position at the end of the match.

In a situation where the Head Referee is unable to determine with confidence which Drive Team Member has incurred an <SG6> penalty, that penalty should be assigned to the Robot that was illegally loaded.