Plea to server owners. (bots)

[Sah.]

So let me get this right..

Server Admin pays for server from his own pocket (or as part of a group) and provides this server free to anyone who wishes to play on it yet somehow he is being selfish because he wants to use bots to help seed his server because if he does not then players join and leave because they won't play on an empty server.

I see this all the time on servers and my sympathy is with the guy trying to justify the costs of paying for a server that he cannot fill because people won't and don't stay on an empty server but they do occassionally stick on a server with bots.

As for those who think we need less servers..Cheers for not supporting your community..Losing servers degrades the diversity and choice from any games community and is something this community should be working hard to avoid.

I would strongly suggest that those complaining try renting and running their own servers.
Its a very simple thing to do and if you are so convinced that you are right then where is the issue?
Not everbodies sense of community extends to beyond purchasing the game, which is fine but that also means that you can not expect those that do invest via a server to make changes because you don't like a particular aspect of that servers setup.

So instead of complaining about servers with bots run by admins who won't listen, simply go rent your own and run it without any bots at all..Argument over and you win..

no, don't, i'll be running one soon and i don't want any competition :IS2:

 

[melipone]

Butch, you pay for a server and put the time in to run it, but you have to accept that there is a finite amount of players to go around. Why would I want to add another empty server to the server list? That won't solve the issue i'm talking about. Some server owners don't appreciate how it affects the rest of the player base, you only think about the fact you paid for a server and so that gives you the right to make the game look completely dead with nothing but bot servers in the area where populated servers should be.

You sap players from servers that could literally be populated if they werent hidden in amongst the pure bot servers, and the game looks like a joke with no playerbase

If I could get rid of all these bot servers in the ~20+ player range I would, and i'm sure we would more than cope with the servers that don't run so many bots even if those other servers were literally taken down. A few bots is fine, the current situation is not imo

I've had experience getting servers populated, and I know what it can be like with only a few people trying to get the server going and a few bots can help. But thats not the same as taking the server list hostage and demanding people notice your empty server

Oh and the TWB server in RO2 has 20 bots and 5 real players. Go through the list and see how many of these bot servers with <10 players there are. We could have another 64 player server with these guys or more. Not only that, think about the servers that do really have ~20 players that don't get noticed because of these bot servers

 

[u-s-e-r]

Just popping in to say that I usually wont play on servers with bots, actually I feel like I have been cheated when I join one as the bots rack up to the player count and when I join one, I see theres only a couple real human players.

 

[Kerc Kasha]

It seems the people defending bot servers are the people who actually like farming/playing against bots. Okay that's fine, make it a new game mode. Mount and blade had something similar called 'commander battle' or something like that where players commanded bots against each other, it worked pretty well and was fairly popular. Why not have something like that for the bot lovers while the people who actually want to fight players don't have to dig through servers to find one that isn't full of bots with a single person in them?

It's ironic that the white knights are claiming that you shouldn't push your will upon others especially if those your pushing it on are the ones out of pocket, when really it's the opposite. Bots are being forced upon those who don't want them! No server currently can survive without bots, when the game first came out there were no bots at all, then when ranking got fixed some 'smart' admins noticed bots can be used to farm ranks and put up servers with bull**** like 'fast levelling' 'bot server' etc to attract people who wanted to level quickly, and it caught on. Now it's everywhere, like achievement servers used to be/still are for TF2 etc.

It is a problem, limit the damn bot numbers to actual seeding levels and make full bot servers their own game mode

 

[u-s-e-r]

But I have to say that the one good thing about bots is that they actually follow orders unlike human players

 

[Mike_Nomad]

So let me get this right..

Server Admin pays for server from his own pocket (or as part of a group) and provides this server free to anyone who wishes to play on it yet somehow he is being selfish because he wants to use bots to help seed his server because if he does not then players join and leave because they won't play on an empty server.

I see this all the time on servers and my sympathy is with the guy trying to justify the costs of paying for a server that he cannot fill because people won't and don't stay on an empty server but they do occassionally stick on a server with bots.

As for those who think we need less servers..Cheers for not supporting your community..Losing servers degrades the diversity and choice from any games community and is something this community should be working hard to avoid.

I would strongly suggest that those complaining try renting and running their own servers.
Its a very simple thing to do and if you are so convinced that you are right then where is the issue?
Not everbodies sense of community extends to beyond purchasing the game, which is fine but that also means that you can not expect those that do invest via a server to make changes because you don't like a particular aspect of that servers setup.

So instead of complaining about servers with bots run by admins who won't listen, simply go rent your own and run it without any bots at all..Argument over and you win..

Well said.....
Unfortunately some for whatever reason, will either never understand or refuse to understand the logic of it all.

Again, we'll run our servers, not some Johnny come lately. Right now, there's only ten bots in ONE of our servers and its been that way for a month. We do a month on and off unless the regulars ask for otherwise. Our other servers are bot free.

 

[mattlach]

Bots keep me entertained until enough players show up. Without them & without players joining in shortly, there's no incentive for me to stick around. Bots keep players on the servers long enough until more show up. If all I see are empty servers, I'll either play single player or another game.

I agree with this.

I just wish that the server browser didn't include bots in their player totals. That way you know what you are getting when you join.

 

[Mike_Nomad]

I agree with this.

I just wish that the server browser didn't include bots in their player totals. That way you know what you are getting when you join.

Just LOOK in the bottom right corner of your browser... no names means all bots. That box only shows human players.

 

[Gudenrath]

It seems the people defending bot servers are the people who actually like farming/playing against bots.

Where do you get this from? I don't see anyone saying that in this thread, instead I see a lot of server admins, you know the people who actually run the servers, giving good reasons why at least a certain amount of bots are necessary.

 

[Kerc Kasha]

Where do you get this from? I don't see anyone saying that in this thread, instead I see a lot of server admins, you know the people who actually run the servers, giving good reasons why at least a certain amount of bots are necessary.

Praxius for one. Reread my post, I didn't say remove them entirely I said limit them. Having 64/32 bots on a server is ridiculous. The only reason you need that many as a server admin is because everyone else is doing it.

 

[=GG= Mr Moe]

Server owners can do whatever they want, but I really do wish they would limit the numbers of bots. In my opinion, some are fine to seed a server. More than 10-15 bots and I actively try to remember the server and just avoid joining it altogether. It sounds like more than a few others do this as well.

It will be nice if TWI gets the beta browser working properly that tells a player how many bots are on a server.

 

[TrOOper]

the entire community has been crying out about the bloody bots since day 1. Why not be a proactive server admin and give people what they want?

The entire community? Im a member of this community and i have not complained about bots at all...In fact, i think there is a need for bots to seed the servers...i think you mistake the vocal minority for the "entire community."

 

[omniconsumer]

....More than 10-15 bots and I actively try to remember the server and just avoid joining it altogether. It sounds like more than a few others do this as well....

That's great and I would agree, if there weren't so few player that play at this right now. Not enough people can seed a server to population.

We have it set on our |LMC| servers to disable bots as soon as a certain number of human players join. Don't want wait long? Start a bot kick vote using the bot detonator installed on the servers.

 

[Floyd]

It seems the people defending bot servers are the people who actually like farming/playing against bots. ....

I hear an equal number of people complaining that the bots hack and how frustrating it is because they get headshot by one they don't see.....

==================

I, too, am a long time server admin. I'm all for a few bots (no more than half the total player count of the server). With the current state of the AI, I (personally) can't see the need for a 64 man server to have 64 bots. Though I think they are being a little ridiculous, I acknowledge that there are those that won't play with even a single bot. So running too many bots rules those players out from playing on your server. They might stay and play with 14 humans and 2 bots until 2 others join. If they won't, they are doing more harm to the community than the server owner, imo. They are being a little selfish.

Bots at least give the owners something to shoot at while trying to seed the server. I can't tell you how many countless boring hours I spent on my CoD server waiting for someone to join. Back in that day, one or two would join and respectfully play a map or two waiting to see if someone else joined. After days and nights of three or four of us playing, the same people would come back. After weeks, the server would be rocking.

But today, players want instant gratification ("I paid for the game, I want to PLAY...blah and blah and blah".... Today's player (I'm generalizing, of course) can't be arsed to play 20 minutes with just a couple of players. They can't be arsed to play with even a couple of bots that would go away as soon as a couple of others joined.


Its a two way street guys. Find a server that has what you like (bots, maps, rules, good ping, like minded players) and PLAY on it. CONSISTENTLY. Put in just half the effort that the server admin puts in and see what happens.

If you don't like bots, you shouldn't have to sit on the botless server very long before like-minded players join you. But if you, the player don't put forth the effort, don't point fingers at the admin who is trying his best....

Hopefully, the server player/bot count issue will be resolved with the patch. Perhaps that will help. But somehow I think there will be those that find something else to complain about....

 

[Major_Day]

The dramatic drop in the number of people playing this game, is the reason for the empty servers, and why some desperate server admins fill their servers with bots in a vain, but pointless attempt to attract real players.
Removing ALL bots from ALL servers will do nothing to increase the playerbase,it will only increase the number of servers owners who will admit defeat and shut them down.
While some people might welcome this, it would do nothing for the players who CAN only play on servers with bots,because that's the only servers they get a decent lag free, low ping on.
With a playerbase of about 400, this game only needs 8 X 50 slot servers to accomodate everybody who wants to play, but what if those 8 servers were all in Europe or the USA?, how many more people would stop playing altogether because of high ping/lag, or those servers are always empty at the time of day when they wanted to play?
Bots aren't the problem with this game its the low numbers of people playing it.
So lets remove all the bots,shut down all the empty servers, keep just 8 servers, and watch this game being slowly lowered into the grave, so that a few whiners can be happy,and not have to play against the bots.

Steam says i have over 1400 hrs. playing this game,but little does Steam know that 75% of that total was spent seeding my server, hour after hour waiting on a few real players to play against, bots are the only reason i never gave up this game,and shut down my server, at the end of last year.
Most of the server admins who have made comments on this topic have put in the same amount of hours, waiting to play,we are the people who bought into this game,and intend to stick with it til the end,bots are the only tool we have to try and attract real players, but if the bot haters don't like it they are free to go play elsewhere, it won't make any real difference to us,since our servers are empty most of the time anyway.

 

[Ducky]

I'm hopping that the free weekend will do good to the player count. But still I believe that 50 slots servers would do us more good. It will force players to spread out over more servers.

 

[mowskwoz]

This is frustrating to read.

The bot "problem" has been solved by this mutator: http://forums.tripwireinteractive.com/showthread.php?t=76273[url]http://forums.tripwireinteractive.com/showthread.php?t=76273[/URL]

Admins, I beg of you, use this. Players, learn what it does and how to use it. To be blunt, the botdetonator should just be part of the game. Everything about it is easy. Servers are still ranked and the download takes all of 10 seconds.

The real issue to me is, there's just not enough people playing the game. Shutting down servers just limits the player further. I don't know if it's TWI's fault or MW3 or BF3 or Skyrim or ****ing facebook's fault that more people aren't playing the game but it's just the truth. There ain't that many of us.

So I am simply asking you all, get educated. There are solutions to your problems, but you may have to go out and find them. One of them is at the top of this post.

Is there any admin or player here that wouldn't want to give themselves the power to add or remove bots at will while in game? Isn't that what every one of you is saying? Some admins say "We need bots to help seed!" while some players say "We don't want so many/any bots!" I will say, yet again, you can do all this and more with the mutator.

@ Ducky, I cant imagine how frustrating these threads must be for you to read. You pretty much solved the problem all of these people have and yet...

For real though, use the mutator.

 

[Ducky]

---SNIP---
@ Ducky, I cant imagine how frustrating these threads must be for you to read. You pretty much solved the problem all of these people have and yet...
---SNIP---

I'm starting to grow elephant skin

I already found out that it doesn't matter on how much we advertise this mutator, they just ignore the posts as if they have never been written and continue whining. Maybe I should write a mutator so that everyone will be running around on the battlefield with tears in there eyes and making sobbing sounds.

 

[Mike_Nomad]

I feel for you Ducky...

Another point of contention; A bot gets gone with every new human player that joins. They seem to ignore that fact too. Oh well such is life.

 

[Das Bose]

Well said.....
Unfortunately some for whatever reason, will either never understand or refuse to understand the logic of it all.

Again, we'll run our servers, not some Johnny come lately. Right now, there's only ten bots in ONE of our servers and its been that way for a month. We do a month on and off unless the regulars ask for otherwise. Our other servers are bot free.

Listen, we ( my GF and I ) have been running gaming servers since the 1990's, and never have we felt the need to add bots. It would be great if you and others could accept the fact that we understand exactly what is going on, but we simply don't share your blinkered opinion.

Thanks, although I'm sure this will fall on deaf ears

Edit: No, we don't run an RO2 server currently, but when classic arrives this may change.