Lesson 2: Match Affecting Decisions

After you identify and classify a violation, one question often decides everything that follows: was it Match Affecting? That single judgment usually determines whether a violation is Minor or Major, because — unless a rule says otherwise — every Match Affecting violation is a Major Violation. The good news is that the test is simpler than it sounds, and it always comes down to one idea: did the violation change who won?

Before continuing, read the following in the current Game Manual:

• Appendix C, which defines Match Affecting and includes specific details about violations by rule.

What “Match Affecting” Means

A violation is Match Affecting when it changes the winning and losing alliance in the match. That wording matters: Match Affecting is about the outcome, not the size of the point change. A violation can add or remove points without flipping the result, and a violation that does not flip the result is not Match Affecting.

This is the difference between score impact and match outcome impact. Almost any violation has some score impact. Only the ones that change which alliance actually wins have match outcome impact, and only those are Match Affecting.

Determining Whether a Violation Was Match Affecting

Two things shape how you make this call:

• It can only be decided after the match ends, once the final scores are calculated. You cannot know whether a violation changes the outcome until you know the outcome.
• Start with one question: did the team that committed the violation win? If they did not win, the violation could not have changed which alliance won, so it was not Match Affecting, and it was very likely a Minor Violation. If they did win, look closer: if you removed the advantage the violation gave them, would the other alliance have won instead?

When you look closer, focus on the robot actions directly tied to the violation, and remember that multiple violations in a match can add up to be Match Affecting together even if no single one would be. Some rules also set their own specific guidance for this calculation; when a rule does, Appendix C is where you will find it, so you do not need to memorize those thresholds.

Worked Example

At the end of a Qualification Match, the Blue Alliance wins 102–66. During the match, a blue robot committed a violation that you estimate gave the alliance about 10 points it should not have earned.

• Did the offending team win? Yes — Blue won, so the violation could have been Match Affecting. Look closer.
• Would removing the advantage change the outcome? Take away the 10 points: 92–66. Blue still wins.
• Result: the violation is not Match Affecting. It changed the score but not the outcome, so it is most likely a Minor Violation.

Now change one number. If Blue had won 70–66 instead, removing those same 10 points would make it 60–66 — a Red win. That violation would be Match Affecting, and therefore a Major Violation. Same violation, same 10 points; the only thing that changed was whether it flipped the result.