CIRC 2025 Interventions Guide
Interventions
Introduction
These rules govern the manner in which Judges and/or competitors may interact with the rover during the task. The intention of these rules is to serve and balance two divergent interests:
CIRC as a Mars mission simulator – A key feature of task design is that the rover is ‘on Mars’ and its operators are remote, and therefore helpless to perform manual maintenance or anything other than remote commands in the face of interplanetary distances or unsafe environments. This is one of the enriching challenges in competitions such as CIRC.
CIRC as an enriching technical and learning environment – Competition organizers are keenly aware of the personal dedication required to attend competitions like CIRC. We seek to maximize the ‘use’ of competitor rovers and to minimize dead-ends encountered during task participation due to gaps in design, build, operation, and circumstance.
The ideal balance involves a challenging competition which rewards superior rovers, while also providing an environment in which competitors may focus on continuing to use their rovers with minimal** **anxiety surrounding their rover’s ability to continue the task.
We facilitate this balance with 4 categories of Intervention. It is understood that determining which category is necessarily subjective. CIRC empowers its Judges with broad discretion in determining and adjudicating the applicable category.
Summary
While the intricacies of Interventions may seem intimidating, they are meant for Judges’ complete understanding. A summary of the Intervention types to give teams a ‘sense’ of the rules is as follows:
Emergency and Pre-task Commencement (0% penalty) – Covers two cases:
- Teams should not hesitate to use all means to prevent an unsafe environment.
- Also, there is no practical limit to team access to the rover before the task is underway.
Minor ‘Incidental’ Interventions (10% one time, unlimited use) – These are applicable to stuck rovers, malfunctioning components, systems, etc. ‘Flat tire’ Interventions for addressing malfunctions are not to be overly discouraged. These incur a 10% penalty one time to all subsequent points. Subsequent Minor Interventions incur no further penalty.
Major ‘Beyond Design Basis’ Interventions (15% each use, unlimited use) – These are applicable to circumstances in which teams’ rovers were never capable of accomplishing task activities. This can include replacing depleted batteries, manually gripping an object with a rover arm, or other short-cuts that you do not feel can be avoided. To discourage over reliance on this Intervention, Teams incur a 15% penalty on all subsequent points, with the penalty cumulatively increasing with each subsequent Major Intervention use to prevent ‘marionette-ing’ them to the finish line.
Abusive Intervention (minimum 20% cumulative, Head Judge’s discretion) – In short, these are applicable to events in which teams go unethically beyond the scope of other rules to secure an advantage. Examples can include on-site teams deliberately communicating task conditions to operating team mates, deliberately getting rovers stuck and Minor Intervention-ing them into advantageous positions, etc. The Competition tends to rely on the conscience and professionalism of competitors.
In short - if you feel like you are cheating, then you probably are.
If a Judge believes that a team is behaving in such an unethical way, then a 20% (or larger at judge’s discretion) penalty to all points in the task is incurred – cumulative with all other present and subsequent penalties.
Judge Authority – The particular Head Judge at a team’s particular task has final say as to which intervention rules apply and in what way. These rules necessarily have a subjective component, and therefore variance between tasks and Judges is also unavoidable. Judges are given broad latitude to interpret and apply rules to serve the interests described in the Introduction segment. CIRC also tends to rely on the conscience and professionalism of its Judges to adjudicate in a fair and consistent manner.
Examples
There are countless ways in which an intervention can be called and play out. We have examples listed here. We encourage competitors to postulate further examples and ask many questions of Competition staff, especially Judges.
| # | Description | Type of Intervention |
|---|---|---|
| 1.0 | A team sets their rover up at the start line, does not move, and then asks if they can debug something on the rover, like checking a connection or restarting the rover. | No Intervention |
| 2.0 | A team member in the field asks to take an intervention so the field team can talk to the operators about the task. | Not allowed (penalty) |
| 3.0 | A team wants to manually adjust the direction of the antenna (base station or rover) Remote control of the antenna is okay. Each repositioning is counted individually. | Major |
| 3.1 | The team wants to make a minor repair such as adding a zip tie, add or affix tape, tightening screws, reattaching a loose wire or connector, etc. | Minor |
| 3.2 | Replacing a component like an arm, or a battery. | Major |
| 3.4 | Replacing a blown fuse inside or on the rover. | Minor |
| 3.3 | The team removes a subassembly of the rover to work on it before re-installing. | Major |
| 4.0 | Connecting a laptop or other equipment directly into the rover to change, update, or reset software or settings. | Major |
| 4.1 | Remotely debugging software issues or remotely changing software configuration. | No Intervention |
| 5.0 | The rover is driving off the task area and the emergency stop button is pushed by a judge/at judges direction. The judge radios to the base station when ready to continue. | No Intervention |
| 5.1 | The rover is driving in risky terrain and the emergency stop button is pushed by a team member in the field to prevent damage. No further action is taken. The judge radios to the base station when ready to continue. | No Intervention |
| 5.2 | The team wants to return the rover to the starting line. | Minor |
| 5.3 | In the case of rain, the team wants to carry the rover to shelter to wait out the rain, returning to the task start line afterward. | Minor |
| 5.4 | The team wants to recover the rover to a nearby recent location as determined by the judges after becoming immobile or stuck. | Major |
| 5.5 | The team wishes to reorient or change the heading of the rover. | Major |
| 5.6 | The team wants to place the rover somewhere it has not been before. | Not allowed |
| 6.0 | A team member touches the rover while it is operating without asking for an intervention. The judge has interpreted this interruption to be accidental or inconsequential. | Minor |
| 6.1 | A team member touches the rover while it is operating without asking for an intervention. The judge has interpreted this interruption to be intentional. | Major |
| 6.2 | A team member collects a sample in order to carry out their experiment if the rover is unable to collect it. | Major. All parts of the report are considered to be after the intervention for the purpose of calculating the penalty. |
| 7.0 | Team members in the field ask for an update about what the rover operator is doing. | No Intervention |
| 7.1 | Team members operating the rover asking for updates from the field. | Not allowed |
Change Log
| Date | Changes |
|---|---|
| 2024-09-24 | Initial Publication |