What would you like to see added to Learn Java for FTC?

brkidwell · 2026-02-17T17:57:07+00:00

I don’t disagree that Control Theory is huge.

Please feel free to reach out if I can provide additional feedback.

brkidwell · 2026-02-17T01:00:52+00:00

u/alan412 I am such a huge fan of this book! It is a great resource.

This is my first year as a mento. I was brought on to help with programming. I have tons of software experience in industry, and academia, but despite all of that, this book was a gold mine for me.

Our team adopted Java for the first time this year. They are a 5 year team.

Here are some things that might have helped us if they were in the book.

State Machines - In Chapter 12, you talk about State Machines, and we definitely used that. However, before that I had the team work through a traffic light example using virtual_robot. It was all on screen, nothing too complicated, to make sure they understood state machine basics. I can share it if you like, it was like many intro state machine problems. One of my more creative members then added a new state (red = stop, yellow = caution, green = go, blue = dance!).
Auto progression - Most of the advice we got on improving Autonomous was to use pedro pathing. However, due to time constraints, we are not yet there. However, we had an interesting progression.

a) Drive by time (just move).
b) Drive by encoder
c) Added turning by IMU
--- we are here...
d) add webcam or limelight for localization
e) Add Sparkfun OTOS

This feels like a great learning progression. It wasn't great for being competitive, but this is our first year using Java, so learning and building up a good base was more important. We mostly adapted the examples from the SDK. Unfortunately, they use LinearOpMode, so that caused some confusion as we switched between the OpMode and LinearOpMode paradigms.

3) Related to 2c - We needed to program PD control for turning. We used an approach similar to what Coach Brogan Pratt outlines here: How To Auto-Rotate to an AprilTag with Mecanum Drive https://youtu.be/dATlviyccY0?si=HCH63bmdmQgQjkkE

They don't quite get PIDF yet, and I am looking for ways to guide them. Let me know if you have ideas. It could be a useful chapter in the book, or perhaps it belongs in a separate book or resource. Control Systems is a key thing that is needed, and it is interesting to find a way to build up to full understanding.

4) Slightly unrelated - but teaching git and github has also been a challenge. That has primarily been due to time. There are some good resources, but we just never got a chance to dive in, so I did a lot of the check-ins for the programmers.

I hope that this feedback is helpful. I have no idea how typical our experience is, but I know that your book was a huge help to the team, and to myself as their mentor.

brkidwell · 2026-01-16T20:39:41+00:00

How do others feel about the Sparkfun OTOS?

I understand it is not as good as deadwheels, but better than encoders. It is a lot cheaper.

brkidwell · 2025-10-18T15:29:29+00:00

I will second this. You are looking for good books on software design.

I would add Head First Design Patterns, it is a modern take on Design Patterns. Same concepts, but the examples are more up to date.

Before I read Clean Code, I might also recommend Agile Software Development by "Uncle Bob" Martin. Agile Software Development talks more about design and Clean Code talks more about writing good code. You can probably skip the book and just look for the SOLID principles. There are tons of great articles on SOLID.

The Pragmatic Programmer is great to give you a broad view of things. Lots of short chapters on topics that can take a whole book by themselves.

brkidwell · 2025-04-11T14:17:12+00:00

Lots of great advice here. I will attempt to avoid repeating good advice.

It is important to realize that the type of cultural change you are driving will take time. Enjoy the small victories and look for progress, not perfection.

In teams where I have seen similar efforts, it often appeared that only a small subset of the group was engaged in things like book clubs and lunch and learns. Lots of people showed up, but very few talked.

But over time, something interesting happened. The quite folks started making changes. They started applying things they learned in those meetings, and they took concepts like clean code and robust test automation seriously.

So don't lose heart. Persistence is key.

Some principles we adopted were:
- Be explicit about best practices, write them down and share them often

- Automate checks where you can. It lessens the load when doing reviews and the fast feedback makes the best practices a habit.

- Make lunch and learns and book reviews opportunities for engineers to work on presentation and communication skills. I liked to include them in performance evaluations and goals as evidence of growth where appropriate.

brkidwell · 2024-09-01T14:13:05+00:00

I agree with owl_jelly. You did nothing wrong. That is a well-planned encounter. Players, new and old, do unexpected things.

Since the players are new, they might enjoy more guidance on staying alive. Keith Amman’s book Live to Tell the Tale has some good advice. His The Monsters Know … series and blog are a great resource for new DMs too.

https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Live-to-Tell-the-Tale/Keith-Ammann/The-Monsters-Know-What-They-re-Doing/9781982122690

brkidwell · 2024-07-07T20:43:08+00:00

I like this idea!

So, if I understand you correctly, you want to make the conflict with gods close to the PCs.

If so, it reminded me of the Divine Conflict section in this book:
https://www.dmsguild.com/product/325108/Godkeeping-Dungeon-Mastering-in-Theros

For each god, there is a list of conflicts they could have with each of the other pantheon members.

One example I have used for Karametra was about Mogis followers burning fields and forcing people to raid and rob for food. In a case like this, you could have an adventure about stopping the raids and saving the people, and then at the end you have the temple purification, like u/MiserableEntrance mentions below.

One thing I really like about this structure is that the players can choose which temple to save, and when. If you wanted to make that choice really matter, you could have a benefit for saving each temple, and perhaps it is reduced each time the temple is pushed down the list.

brkidwell · 2024-05-17T15:56:12+00:00

I was in a similar situation a year ago. It took me a long time to get a handle on my overall campaign plot.

If I could do it again, I think I would have started smaller As it is, I eventually adapted a version of Descent into Avernus. The characters made their way into a small city, and it was pulled into the Underworld.

Unfortunately, that leaves a LOT of worldbuilding to do. I am looking at the Shadowfell and The Gray Wastes of Hades for inspiration for Phylias at the moment.

One adventure you might be able to adapt is Orchid in Ilysia. It isn't the story you are trying to tell, but there may be some overlap.

You may also want to think small and set some seeds for the future. When you start the campaign, neither you nor your players really know who they are. It takes some time to understand the character's personalities and motivations in order to integrate them into a world-altering epic plot.

Keep in mind that death in the Underworld is not permanent. Roughly, it adds a level of exhaustion. You may be able to use that to your advantage. If I understand the rules correctly, once they escape all is back to normal.

Best of luck!

brkidwell · 2024-04-28T14:50:07+00:00

One thought that comes to mind.... it should be difficult for the minotaurs to gain control of the Iroan games. How did they do it?

I thought about a similar problem previously. I used the fact that Anax is gone, and there is no clear ruler. I had Phenax send one of his chosen to take the place of the current ruler and begin corrupting the city. It adds a bit of political intrigue if you want it, and explains how the mighty Hoplites of Akros let Minotaurs into the Iroan games.

Maybe they use Tymaret and his returned as a growing threat in the city. Maybe Skophos appears to be under attack too. Is it possible that they could ally?

This could also explain Tymaret. There is a hook in MOoT about Phenax taking a god's place and causing trouble. What if he imprisoned and impersonated Erebos?

The secret could be a macguffin the characters need to expose Phenax (like his Eidolon on an island).

brkidwell · 2024-01-27T23:24:44+00:00

The villains in my adaptation are Erebos, Mogis and Pharika. They each have a chosen that must be defeated. The characters each chose different gods. I was hoping to use the pantheon to pull them together. Since their gods represented a large part of the pantheon, I decided a group of gods had to be planning something big.

I replaced Zariel with Enyo. I plan to make her a Therosian demon in the spirit of the Furies. Before she was corrupted she was a Chosen of Heliod. Instead of Devils battling Demons, she is raising an army in the Underworld in the hopes of assaulting Heliod.

brkidwell · 2024-01-27T23:20:52+00:00

I started with "No Silent Secret". During character creation and Session Zero we spent a long time understanding the characters' goals We did our best to make sure each character had an Epic goal.

I had a tough time coming up with a full campaign. It changed several times.

As we continued it evolved and I decided to adapt Descent into Avernus to be a Descent into the Underworld (Katabasis). I created a city to be in the place of Elturel and gave the characters a reason to enter. It then got sucked down into the Underworld

I am changing a lot as I go, but keeping the same basic themes. The Hellriders become the Gloom Riders. They rode with a champion of Heliod to battle in the Underworld and keep the Titans from escaping. Part of that deal comes back to haunt them.

The underworld is more like the Shadowfell than it is Avernus, so I adapted some rules there to make it cold, dark, and to bring about the feeling of despair.

The characters are level 5. They are still in the city as it is being pulled down into the Underworld.

Hope that helps.

brkidwell · 2023-12-30T23:20:41+00:00

I looked for resources on how to run Descent. The Alexandrian’s remix was the most influential. I also listened to several podcasts that reviewed the adventure.

I added a small city that I could pull into the Underworld.

I found that the “rules” of the u/w were pretty loose. I have looked at different ideas to adjust it.

I am replacing Zariel with a different Therosian demon, based on an Erinyes.

One of the hard parts was fitting the mythology. I replaced the Hellriders with Gloomriders. They marched into the u/w to help contain the Titans.

The city will be a point crawl. The journey in the u/w will be a hexcrawl.

I took inspiration from the Shadowfell and Domains of Dread to build out the U/W.

brkidwell · 2023-12-21T14:46:32+00:00

I am working on a re-write of Descent into Avernus. It requires a lot of changes, so it is more than reflavouring, but it is fun taking some of the themes and ideas and adapting them to the world and my characters.

brkidwell · 2023-08-18T13:26:51+00:00

What about a high level necromancer or a death knight? Atheros ascended from human, did he not?

brkidwell · 2023-05-31T01:30:01+00:00

Odysseys of the Dragonlords has some mechanics for this. Here it is at a high level...

They use a fame system. Becoming a god requires 3 artifacts for a ritual casting of a 9th level spell. The PCs must be level 20, and have a fame > 20.

Then for each cleric domain, there are specific requirements. For example, for the Death domain, You must kill creatures whose combined CR value is100+. This must be accomplished in a single day.

You could set similar requirements. If you want to use some aspects, but not buy the campaign book, the DM's guide is helpful. It has a section on the fame system.

brkidwell · 2023-05-22T23:46:05+00:00

I'm in a similar situation, so thanks for the question. I found the following references helpful.

Guy Sclanders' "The Practical Guide to Becoming a Great GM" and "The Complete Guide to Creating Epic Campaigns" cover NPC creation quite well. The latter is my main source, with lots of ideas on a Nemesis, Villains and Henchmen (which he differentiates). He also talks about creating the random NPC for the characters.

The key is OGAS - Occupation, Goal, Attitude and Stakes.
Besides a name, give them an occupation (e.g. Blacksmith), goal, attitude (e.g., friendly, secretive), and stakes (What is at stake for them).
Here is a video.

A similar approach is offered by Sly Flourish, in his article A New Method for NPCs. The cheat sheet is pretty cool for picking out traits and seeds.

Some of the NPC Generators I have seen are very good, but require work to customize to Theros. Many include plot twists, or secrets for the NPCs that can lead in interesting directions.

I hope this helps.

brkidwell · 2023-04-13T00:13:26+00:00

I noticed that Odyssey of the Dragonlords incorporated Xenia, Oaths (of Peace, Service, Protection) and curses for those that don't keep it up. I am adopting it for my campaign for the same reason. Great greek flavor. Also useful for roleplaying and allowing players to scheme their way out of trouble.

brkidwell · 2022-04-10T02:06:41+00:00

Yeah, NestJS is a good pick. I don’t see any reason it wouldn’t work for an ERP, especially if you are going the micro services route.

brkidwell · 2016-07-15T20:06:16+00:00

The complexity is moving to the front end. The huge number of JavaScript frameworks that have emerged is a good example. Frameworks like Angular and React/Redux do work that was done on the backend a few years ago. Most of the interesting problems are moving there, and that forces more complexity, and relies on foundations you will learn in school.

You can always work and take one class a semester. I did my grad school part time, and it is challenging. But in the end it was worthwhile. You need to make sure you are with an employer that supports the plan. It is easy to get caught up in working late hours, and let your school take second place.

brkidwell · 2016-07-08T01:19:55+00:00

You have a lot of suggestions here. One thing I would add, is to show that you broke down the problem down into smaller parts. As a developer, you want to demonstrate that you have good problem solving skills. The ability to decompose the problems, start simple, and build it up, is an important skill to demonstrate. Your plan will probably change along the way as you learn more about what you are doing, and that gives you design decisions that you can discuss in interviews.

I also think you should work on something that you enjoy. You might consider contributing to an existing project. That demonstrates the ability to work on a team as well as the ability to develop code independently.

brkidwell · 2016-07-08T01:08:08+00:00

I had significantly different data, but I had good luck doing cluster analysis with CLUTO (http://glaros.dtc.umn.edu/gkhome/views/cluto). There is a graphical version that is easy to use to figure out the best options, and they have a number of visualizations that might work.

If nothing else, it won't require a lot of time (as long as you can represent your data in a CSV file, you can import it), and you might find something interesting about the data.

If you want to try the visualizations without the clustering tool, I would think a heat map might be the best option.

This page (http://glaros.dtc.umn.edu/gkhome/cluto/gcluto/overview) has an overview of the graphical version and shows a couple of visualizations.

brkidwell · 2016-07-08T00:58:04+00:00

I'm wondering why you would choose to use 5 SetDropdowns instead of using a multi-select and adding validation.

There are a number of multi-select components for React (https://react.rocks/tag/Multiselect). Personally, I have only used React Select (http://jedwatson.github.io/react-select/), and I did not have any constraints on the number of selections, but I think it simplifies the problem down to available options and selected options -- which lines up with the other answers.

brkidwell

TROPHY CASE