Stay tuned for the release of the finale tomorrow. We played against B-Human and unfortunately lost 4-1. But hey, what was that? four to one (1)? Yes, we struck a goal and had 2 other major chances, but in the end it was just not enough. But does that mean we can turn the tides over the next three months? Only one way to find out, you know it!
We'll upload the final as soon as we can, we'll update you here, but in the meantime. Check out the entire German Open 2024 Playlist! [Link]
If playing against the HULKs is establishing itself as a new ritual, we probably all need a new cardiologist soon. Like in 2023, the game was full of suspense, robot-battling robots, laughter, groaning, shouting (at referees *cough) ... but goals, too? You will find out by watching the video ;)
You can count on the HULKs to deliver a really worthwhile and entertaining spectacle when we're up against each other! They are a great team that, no doubt, plays at our level and would beat us if we don't pay attention. You can watch the great development of our gameplay from 2008 till today - from searching the ball for 10 minutes straight to dribbling and passing across the whole field. With that, the matches mature and become more and more dynamic and in our match against the HULKs, we depended on every last thing we ever developed. And yet - right up until the end, you can never be sure: Will it have been enough?
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Having fought our way through 5 group rounds, great ups and, well let's call them 'memorable' downs, we made the cut and the opponent du demain (well at least the first one, that is) could hardly be more thrilling and daunting at the same time: the HULKs from Hamburg. So we got our work cut out for us. We collected a whole lot of data with Eindhoven on our mind but that certainly doesn't mean that we're not going to try whatever is possible (and maybe even then some!) to win! If you, dear reader, can't remember the showdown battle royale of Bordeaux, check out the Youtube video I linked on the bottom of this post.
We got into the finer details of localization logic. For instance, as I teased in the first blog post, we're now looking for the ball while getting up under external assumptions where the ball is most likely to be found. Robots that get a lot of action als tend to need a lot of time face down on the field - but falling can be messy and the NAO is not famous for its gracefully feline intuition. So what do? Well, in addition to our revised ball search after the fall, we've tweaked and calibrated various parameters when to - and crucially, when not to - look for the ball. A striker usually doesn't need to run all that quickly, as long as he's consistent; but more control could mean losing the ball less since dribbling would be more precise and we could avoid unnecessary ball-searches. A robot can spontaneously lose sight of the ball, and adjusting the window of blind trust can be pretty
The final match-up of the group phase put us up against the only non-European team that made its way all the way here to participate in the German Open! I'm of course talking about the Canadian team Naova from Montréal. Naova certainly had a good run this competition - even scoring a goal against the ironclad defenses of B-Human and almost wrangling the mighty HULKs. So there was certainly a sense of nervousness when the first half just wouldn't quite get going as we needed it to. There is no comfort in a 1:0 lead. Luckily, we were able to turn it around in the second half, but I won't give everything away.
As a bonus treat: our team member Felix and Adrian from R-ZWEI KICKERS are giving commentary and insider knowledge in German - you won't get sound like this in the live stream!
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For this match we're facing B-Human against whom we've played so many times! Good thing that we just had a break by getting to skip round 4 via Wild Card. But don't worry, it wasn't realxing. More time is just more time to fix what can be fixed, improve what can be improved upon and leave alone what needs to be oh-my-god-don't-touch-it-it-works left alone. This time, however, it might seem like there could be light at the end of the tunnel? Are we getting closer to salvation or is it just a train speeding towards us? Let's us know what you think in the comments!
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Some of our team members only know them from last year's RoboCup but they are a team with a great tradition. This year, they are back again and certainly a competitor not to be taken lightly
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