Playing Against Bots in Warzone
Warzone added a new “casual mode” to its Battle Royale at the start of Season 4. This reduced the number of real players in-game and substituted them with AI bots. The ratio is approximately one fifth real players, four fifths bots. This new mode for Battle Royale solos, duos and quads was well received, especially among the mainstream players who are more focused on fun than progression. Veteran players who still wanted the challenge of playing against real players were free to continue playing the traditional BR modes. Hence all parties were pleased as they were both being catered for. However, and there is always a “however” when it comes to Call of Duty, the developers saw fit to remove the standard solo Battle Royale mode, leaving just the Battle Royale Casual mode with AI bots. Subsequently, a lot of players were perplexed and annoyed, as taking away choice is seldom good customer service. As a result of subsequent backlash, the mode was added back to the game mid-season.
Warzone added a new “casual mode” to its Battle Royale at the start of Season 4. This reduced the number of real players in-game and substituted them with AI bots. The ratio is approximately one fifth real players, four fifths bots. This new mode for Battle Royale solos, duos and quads was well received, especially among the mainstream players who are more focused on fun than progression. Veteran players who still wanted the challenge of playing against real players were free to continue playing the traditional BR modes. Hence all parties were pleased as they were both being catered for. However, and there is always a “however” when it comes to Call of Duty, the developers saw fit to remove the standard solo Battle Royale mode, leaving just the Battle Royale Casual mode with AI bots. Subsequently, a lot of players were perplexed and annoyed, as taking away choice is seldom good customer service. As a result of subsequent backlash, the mode was added back to the game mid-season.
After several months of consistently playing the new casual mode, I wanted to share my thoughts on replacing players with bots. It is in many respects both a boon and a bane. The principle is sound enough, replacing veteran players with less skilled bots ensures that new or less skilled players (IE the majority of the playerbase) don’t get repeatedly stomped on and thus driven from the game. However, the way the bots behave in-game is inconsistent, resulting in some rather anomalous behaviour. As there is no data publicly available regarding how the bots “work”, all I can provide are my own observations. Overall the bots mimic player behavior. If a bot sees you, it will engage. It will also pursue you but it can be lost. They will use skills such as air strikes and mortar attacks to flush players out. However, they also use some unique abilities to keep the game play “engaging”.
I play Warzone cautiously. I often go to specific locations on the map which are easier to defend or can be used for cover. I will often wait in elevated positions observing and not directly engaging in firefights happening around me. Theoretically, such a strategy should leave me unassailed except by the occasional and genuinely random incursion by a bot. But this is not the case. After a while of what the game probably classifies as inactivity, bots often appear close by. I suspect that they simply spawn near me. Similarly, the moment I collect my loadout of choice from a drop, this will often trigger a bot attack, irrespective of whether I’m in an “active area” or not. It would also appear that as your kill count against the bots goes up, the bots themselves become harder to kill. That is not to say that they become more skillful but they seem to increase their ability to be “bullet sponges”.
Another matter worth considering is that of server tick rate. Warzone has a tick rate of 20Hz, meaning the game server updates player actions and the overall game state 20 times per second. This is lower than many other popular first-person shooters, which then contributes to issues such as hit registration and perceived lag. Simply put, I can start shooting at a bot (or a real player if need be) who then returns fire but I lose the exchange. The killcam then shows the opposite of what happened with the bot firing first. Even when you take into account the type of weapons being used and their respective quality, this seems to happen a little too often. You can engage a bot who has demonstrably inferior weapons and still get “short changed”. As a player, you instinctively know when you’ve encountered this problem and the fact that it’s a known issue that persists due to infrastructure costs, makes it more annoying.
Overall, playing in a casual manner against bots and a handful of players works quite well. From time to time you’ll find a skilled real player who plays this mode to effectively troll the other players. So far I have not found that to be a common experience. Personally, I would like it if we had the option of playing a private Warzone game, exclusively against bots that you could vary the skill settings. It would finally dispense with the risk of anyone abusing voice or text chat, which is still an issue. As it stands at the moment, the casual mode is acceptable and fun, as long as you’re aware of the concessions the developer’s have made to make the game feel like a regular Warzone game. Hence you will get bots behaving as described and don’t get to play exclusively on your own terms. If you embrace this trade off then you can enjoy casual mode.
Jason vs. Bots
I returned to Friday the 13th: The Game today, only to find a substantial 3GB patch waiting to be downloaded. I last played in late December when I bought the game in a Steam sale. I stated in a blog post at the time, that the game was flawed and very much a work in progress. The patch has addressed several issues with the game; the most important one being offline play. You can now play Friday the 13th: The Game offline as Jason Voorhees against seven bot camp counsellors. It should be noted that you cannot play offline as a counsellor against a bot Jason. However, playing as Jason has a more complex learning curve, whereas playing as one of his potential victims is a lot easier to figure out. So I can understand why the developers opted for this arrangement. Hence, I spent a few hours this evening, fooling around offline, slicing and dicing various camp counsellors and trying to master the basics of playing a Jason. It did prove quite useful and I found myself far more prepared for online play as a result.
I returned to Friday the 13th: The Game today, only to find a substantial 3GB patch waiting to be downloaded. I last played in late December when I bought the game in a Steam sale. I stated in a blog post at the time, that the game was flawed and very much a work in progress. The patch has addressed several issues with the game; the most important one being offline play. You can now play Friday the 13th: The Game offline as Jason Voorhees against seven bot camp counsellors. It should be noted that you cannot play offline as a counsellor against a bot Jason. However, playing as Jason has a more complex learning curve, whereas playing as one of his potential victims is a lot easier to figure out. So I can understand why the developers opted for this arrangement. Hence, I spent a few hours this evening, fooling around offline, slicing and dicing various camp counsellors and trying to master the basics of playing a Jason. It did prove quite useful and I found myself far more prepared for online play as a result.
The bots have three settings, which broadly scale. On easy mode the bot counsellors tend to panic and run around ineptly. They’re often oblivious to Jason until he’s really close. On hard mode the bots are more proactive and will actively defend themselves. However, regardless of the settings, the bots at times can get stuck in loops or simply make incredibly poor decisions. On one occasion a counsellor threw themselves through a window to avoid Jason, only to then exit the hut and run straight back into him. I allowed this cycle to repeat a few times before I dispatched them. At present as I haven’t played much of the game, I only have a few Jason skins unlocked. I’m currently using the Jason from Friday the 13th: Part III. One of the advantages of this skin is that Jason has improved run skills. The bots on easy setting allowed me to experiment with the various grab kills such as Jaw Rip, Crotch Chop, Head Chop and Heart Punch. All were quite satisfying but there was no real challenge at this level. Hard mode facilitated a more credible gameplay experience. Offline play also affords you a great opportunity to learn the maps which is key to being successful in the game.
I was also surprised that offline play counted towards your levelling and progression in the game. You can therefore unlock new counsellors and Jason skins by playing in this mode. But playing with bots does have its limitations. The AI is still somewhat erratic, so you never get a 100% comparable experience to playing with other people. However, Friday the 13th: The Game attracts a lot of pubescent imbeciles which can make online play a little tedious. You find yourself having to mute everyone by default and abandoning games where players are more interested in pursuing their own agenda. Bots offer a welcome alternative to this. I suspect that later this year when this game finds its way into a discount bundle of some kind, the overall player population may be a lot lower. Thus, offline play may well prove to be a god send for those in time zones outside North America and Europe. Hopefully, the developers will expand this functionality further in future patches. It would certainly improve the longevity of a game that is essentially a one-trick pony at present.
