2020 Online RoboCup Rescue Agent Competition – Call for Participation

Call for Participation
2020 Online RoboCup Rescue Agent Simulation Competition
October 29 – November 1, 2020
https://rescuesim.robocup.org/2020-online-agent-cfp/

Co-located with the
RoboCup JapanOpen 2020
http://www.robocup.or.jp/japanopen2020b-en/

~ ~ ~

IMPORTANT DATES

Registration for JapanOpen Competition…..: September 25, 2020 (23:55 GMT)
Registration for International Competition…: October 15, 2020 (23:55 GMT)
Preparation date…………………………….: October 29, 2020
Tournament dates…………………………..: October 30 – November 1, 2020

COMPETITIONS

The 2020 Online RoboCup Rescue Agent Simulation Competition is composed of two competitions: JapanOpen and International competition.

JAPANOPEN COMPETITION

This competition involves primarily evaluating the performance of agent teams developed using the Agent Development Framework (ADF) on different maps of the RoboCup Rescue Agent Simulation (RCRS) platform. Specifically, it involves evaluating the effectiveness of Ambulance, Police Force, and Fire Brigade agents on rescuing civilians and extinguishing fires in cities where an earthquake has just happened.

The JapanOpen competition is composed of a preliminary round split in 2 phases, a semi-final round, and a final round. Each round is composed of a set of maps representing different scenarios used to evaluate and score each agent team at each round. A single score is assigned to each team per round.

Teams with the highest total score at the final round receive a prize.

This competition uses the usual RCRS Server that is almost the same as the last year’s server (some fixed bugs) and is available at https://github.com/roborescue/rcrs-server/releases/tag/v1.3

INTERNATIONAL COMPETITION

This competition also involves primarily evaluating the performance of agent teams developed using the Agent Development Framework (ADF) on different scenarios executed in the RoboCup Rescue Agent Simulation (RCRS) platform.

However, the International Competition will experiment some major changes to the simulator and scenarios that will help the organizers to plan for the RoboCup 2021. The major changes are:

  1. Scenarios without fires
  2. Fire Brigades allowed to rescue civilians
  3. Refuges with limited capacity

The changes were motivated (1) to make the simulation scenarios more realistic and (2) to allow teams to focus on a particular rescue challenge, i.e., civilian rescue. The realism of the simulation scenarios comes from the fact that in real earthquake situations, few to no fire spots are observed and those observed are mostly restricted to a building or a small area, while in the simulator the fire dominates the simulation if not controlled in its initial state. By eliminating the fire from scenarios, the most relevant challenge in the competition becomes the rescue of trapped civilians and their transportation to refuges. However, because refuges now have a limited capacity, the ambulances will have to decide where to transport their victims instead of simply taking them to the closest refuge.

The International competition is composed of a preliminary round split in 2 phases, a semi-final round, and a final round. Each round is composed of a set of maps representing different scenarios used to evaluate and score each agent team at each round. A single score is assigned to each team per round.

The team with the highest total score at the final round in each competition will receive a 1st place certificate.

The RoboCup Rescue Simulator release and additional information about the changes implemented are available at https://github.com/roborescue/rcrs-server/releases/tag/2020-online-competition.

REGISTRATION FEE

  1. There is NO FEE for NEW teams registering for these competitions.
  2. Only one team per affiliation is allowed to register per competition.
  3. One team can register for both the JapanOpen and the International competitions.
  4. There is NO FEE for NEW teams registering for both competitions.

REGISTRATION

All teams are required to register through the online registration form here:

NOTE: We may limit the number of teams in the case of overstepping our prepared computer resources.

IMPORTANT: This year we are not requesting a complete Technical Description Paper (TDP) document. All registered teams will be accepted to participate in the competition. Teams must submit a brief ABSTRACT written in English introducing the team members’ affiliation and technical interests, as well as a general description of the techniques and technologies used to develop the agent code. The ABSTRACT will be requested via email after the registration.

SIMULATION CLUSTER

  • AWS (Amazon Web Services) EC2
  • The performances are almost the same as the machines used in RoboCup 2019.

PRESENTATION

Teams may optionally release a video presentation describing their implemented strategy.
The recommended length for the video presentation is 5-15 minutes.
Please upload the video to YouTube and send us the link.

ABOUT ROBOCUP RESCUE AGENT SIMULATION LEAGUE

Natural disasters are major adverse events that cause large-scale economic, human, and environmental losses. They are usually difficult to predict and even more challenging to prevent. These characteristics demand disaster management strategies to be in place to mitigate damaging consequences when a disaster happens.

The mission of the RoboCup Rescue Agent Simulation League is to promote research and development in the socially significant domain of natural disaster with focus on multiagent teamwork coordination and decision support systems. The effective implementation of this mission is translated into three main objectives. First, the league aims to provide a simulator able to realistically represent natural disaster scenarios where response rescue plans can be assessed. Second, it aims to define evaluation benchmarks for response plans elaborated by policy-makers. Finally, it aims to promote research and development by organizing competitions to stimulate the exchange of ideas and experience between researchers and practitioners. These aims are designed to help in the development of more sophisticated and formalized response plans to effectively respond to natural disasters and reduce their negative impacts on society.