A variety of team resources, including rules, are posted below. Please note that a team member cannot participate on more than one RoboCupJunior USA team. So, team members need to pick one competition to participate it. In addition, teams cannot share robots.
Soccer Team Resources
COMPETITION RULES
The rules for the 2017 season will be the same as the 2016 RoboCupJunior Soccer League Rules, with the exceptions noted below. While the US will largely follow the 2016 rules, the international competition in Nagoya, Japan, will follow the 2017 RoboCupJunior Soccer League Rules. Please note that the 2016 and 2017 rules are substantially different from each other. If a team advances to the international competition, it will be that team’s responsibility to make sure that their robot complies with the 2017 rules. Exceptions to the 2016 rules for the US competition:
1. All references to "Open League" shall be changed to "Standard Weight League". In the International rules, the US Standard Weight Sub-league is called the "Open League".
2. The preamble to Section 2 shall read as follows: "Each sub-league will use the type of soccer ball specified in Section 4.1."
3. Section 4.1 shall read as follows: "A well-balanced ball shall be used. The Lightweight League ball will emit infrared (IR) light set to a pulsed mode. The Standard Weight League will use a passive orange ball roughly the same size as the IR ball used by the Lightweight League."
4. Section 4.2 shall read as follows:
"Official suppliers for balls:
- Lightweight League: HiTechnic Infrared Electronic Ball (IRB1005) operating in MODE A (pulsed)
- Standard Weight League: Orange Mylec Warm Weather Street Hockey Ball, Warm weather 60° & Over. See Mylec Catalog. Available at Amazon in packs of six."
5. Section 5.1 shall read as follows: "The game will consist of two halves. The duration of each half is 5-minutes. There will be a 3-minute break in between the halves."
6. The rules will be modified such that all one-minute penalties in the international rules will be half-minute penalties in the US competition.
7. In League Regulations 2016, Section 2.1 shall be amended so that the ball-capturing zone for the Standard Weight (i.e. Open) league is 2.5cm. (Roughly 40% of the diameter of the ball.)
8. The sections entitled "Technical Specification for pulsed Soccer Ball" and "Technical Specification for passive Soccer Ball" are superfluous and therefore deleted.
9. The maximum team size for RoboCupJunior USA Soccer is six members while the maximum team size for the international competition is five members. Should a USA team with six members qualify for internationals, they will need to leave one team member off the team for the international event in order to bring the team total to the required five members.
Awards
In addition to the bracketed robot matches, a panel of experts will interview each soccer team and be responsible for awarding six judged awards. The teams will be judged as a combined pool of Soccer participants, not by sub-league. This year, those awards will be:
- Teamwork, given for dedication to collaborative processes internal to the team
- Programming and Control, given for high quality code and software technique
- Design, given for excellence in the robot’s form and features.
- Creativity, given for surprising or novel ideas expressed on the robot
- Documentation, given for clear and accessible explanation of the robot at all levels.
- Impact, given for a team's efforts to help support robotics and engineering education in their community
Teams will be judged for these awards based on their performance throughout the competition, their presentation to the judges, and artifacts and documentation of their process submitted to the judges.
As the US qualifier for the RoboCupJunior 2017, Nagoya, Japan, the teams that we nominate to represent the US will be the top ranked team in their division who ALSO won a judged award. We hope this emphasizes our commitment to excellence in robotics in all dimensions, and our desire to celebrate a diverse array of teams.
FIELD CONSTRUCTION
If you want to build a soccer field that is nearly identical to the fields used at the competition, please refer to the following pdf: Soccer Table
Rescue Team Resources
COMPETITION RULES
The Rescue Line and Maze competitions will follow the draft 2017 international rules are posted below:
2017 RoboCupJunior Rescue Line Sub-League Rules - Draft (pdf)
2017 RoboCupJunior Rescue Maze Sub-League Rules - Draft (pdf)
Rescue Line at the RoboCupJunior 2017 championships in Nagoya, Japan will have ONLY the Open category and not a Primary category. However, the RCJ USA Rescue Committee has decided to include a Primary category at the USA Championship in order to allow younger kids to compete locally. Please note, however, that teams wishing to be able to qualify to participate in internationals must compete in the Open category at the USA competition.
The maximum team size for RoboCupJunior USA Rescue is six team members, but note the maximum team size for the international competition is five. Should a USA team with more than five members qualify for internationals, they will need to leave team members off the team for the international event in order to bring the team total to the required five members.
AWARDS
In addition to the robot rescue challenge, a panel of experts will interview each team and be responsible for awarding six judged awards. The teams will be judged as a combined pool of Rescue participants, not by sub-league. This year, those awards will be:
- Teamwork - given for dedication to collaborative processes internal to the team
- Programming and Algorithm Design - given for high quality code and software techniques
- Mechanical Design - given for excellence in the robot’s mechanical form and features
- Sensor Usage - given for surprising, clever or novel ideas in the use of sensor feedback on the robot
- Interview - given for excellence in presentation during the interview process
- Documentation - given for clear and accessible explanations of the robot at all levels in team documentation (journals, websites, posters, etc).
The awards listed above supersede the awards listed in Section 4 of the international rules.
COMPETITION FIELD CONSTRUCTION
If you want to build a Rescue Line field that is nearly identical to the fields used at the competition, please refer to the following pdf: Rescue Line Table
Unfortunately, we do not have design documents for the Rescue Maze field.
RESCUE LINE
RESCUE MAZE
OnStage Team Resources
COMPETITION RULES
The rules for the 2017 season will be the same as the 2016 RoboCupJunior OnStage Leipzig Rules, with the exception noted below:
1. There is no maximum team size for RoboCupJunior USA OnStage, but note the maximum team size for the international competition is five members. Should a USA team with more than five members qualify for internationals, they will need to leave team members off the team for the international event in order to bring the team total to the required five members.
AWARDS
As the rules linked above describe in detail, the competition is comprised of the following three components:
• OnStage performance. 1-2 minute stage performance showing originality, creativity and innovation.
• Open technical demonstration. A 5 minute stage demonstration to showcase the capabilities of the robot(s). Teams need to also present a technical description of how the capabilities have been developed, the challenges overcome and the technologies involved.
• Technical interview. An up to 15 minutes face-to-face interview between the team and judges.
A panel of judges will use the 2016 OnStage Score Sheet to judge each of the three components. The team with the highest combined overall mark will receive the OnStage Individual Team 1st place award.
In addition, the panel of experts will also interview each team and be responsible for awarding six judged awards. The teams will be judged as a combined pool of OnStage participants, not by sub-league. This year, some or all of those awards will be (depending on the number of teams competing):
- Best Robot Communication
- Best Mechanical Hardware
- Best Electronic Hardware
- Best Technical Demonstration
- Best Programming
As the US qualifier for the RoboCupJunior 2017, Nagoya, Japan, the team that we nominate to represent the US will be the top ranked team in their division who ALSO won a judged award. We hope this emphasizes our commitment to excellence in robotics in all dimensions, and our desire to celebrate a diverse array of teams.