Hey all, Verc and Rocket here!

For the past couple years Rocket has pestered me to add bots to the game, but I've always shrugged it off and said it's too difficult. A couple months ago I finally decided to give it ago and I have loved every step of the process. There's still a lot I'd like to improve but they are still a stack of fun to play against.

Playing Against Bots

One server in each region will now have 12 bots for you to play against. If the server is full and a human attempts to join, the server will kick a bot to make room.

You can also claim a lobby and send /botcap N in chat, where N controls the amount of bots (must be a number between 0 and 24).

Bot Mechanics

Bots operate via a 'memory' system. They are constantly scanning the environment around them via raymarching and are only aware of what they can see. Events they see - like enemies, enemy spotted pings and blocks being destroyed or built - and events they hear - like enemy gunfire and blocks being destroyed or built - are added to their 'memory'.

Bots then pursue the event in their memory that has the highest appeal. Event appeal is based on many factors such as:

• + appeal if the event is related to an enemy they have already dealt damage to / received damage from
• - appeal as time passes since the event occurred
• - appeal if the event is far away from them
• + appeal if multiple events are clustered together, e.g. lots of enemies firing or lots of blocks being destroyed/built
• + appeal as they commit more time to this event, if they have the committed personality
• - appeal as they commit more time to this event, if they have the distracted personality

Bots will also engage enemies with the intention of dealing the most damage possible with the most appropriate weapon available to them, e.g:

• Using a shotgun over a railgun for engaging a close enemy
• Using a rail gun over an empty shotgun for engaging a close enemy
• Reloading a shotgun rather than swapping to a railgun for engaging a close enemy
• Swapping to a pistol after firing a shotgun for engaging a close enemy

Bots also have a 'bravery' characteristic, which controls how the appeal of dangerous events changes based on how low their HP is. Most bots will attempt to run away from enemies when on low HP, but some bots may experience bursts of stupidity.

Bots will also join cluster spawns to help humans spawn faster. Be careful hanging around the enemy spawn though, these clusters can be quite large.

Check out the bot roadmap here.

Advertising

We have just started experimenting with online advertising for Sector's Edge. We'll be figuring out what kind of ads and platforms perform the best, so that when the Attachment Update trailer is launched we can really push our marketing.

We may both be working full time, but we are still dedicated to providing the best for this game!

Community Spotlight

I'd like to thank Dusk for his help and advice with marketing the game. We're still marketing noobs but he's given us insights and advice that help us immensely.

Guess the map - we commissioned two art pieces from the concept artist Juan Moreno, check out more of his works on Instagram and ArtStation! If you use these as your wallpaper, post them somewhere with the #sectorsedge hashtag so we can see!

Attachment Update Progress

Slowly but surely we are getting the Attachment Update ready. Things are coming together which is an incredible feeling and I have been having a blast testing it locally with bots.

Here are some videos I've shared recently, showcasing incendiary rounds, cluster grenades, ricochet shotguns, rail pistol and more:

Recently I've experimented with increasing the health of all blocks by 3x, reducing the block capacity of the Midi and slightly increasing the block damage of explosions (to compensate for the stronger blocks). This surprisingly felt great to play with; I can rely on cover, I'm not spamming structures everywhere and I am re-using and building upon the towers and walls I built. It feels like a breath of fresh air from the chaos of the current build of the game and I am excited for you all to experience it.

We will be running the Attachment Beta event soon and will release an announcement video to let you know when it is.

Until then we hope you enjoy playing against the bots. Please leave a review and let us know your thoughts on the game!

Full Changelog Since v1.3.8

Fixes:
- Fixed issues with clicking scoreboard buttons when joining a match mid-round
- Fixed Soltrium Temple spawn area rendering
- Fixed other player's automatic weapon fire not showing sometimes
- Fixed localisation toggling not affecting some UI elements
- Fixed autobalancing not taking into account current player KDR correctly
- Fixed issues with window flickering when pressing Alt
- Fixed fall damage kill display in the killfeed
- The 'Close' button in the settings window works again
- Localisation phrases for in-game announcements, spectator UI and rich presence
- Fixed issues with joining custom lobbies
- Fixed issues with projectiles + collision in FFA game modes
- Fixed Trial UI issues
- Fixed enemy flag carrier colour on the minimap in CTF
- Fixed flag/bomb spawns in Laboratory
- Fixed startup OpenGL issues that caused issues with rendering
- The kill SFX now plays when killing the flag/bomb carrier
- Autobalance messages no longer show when both teams are full
- Loading Workshop maps in custom lobbies now works correctly
- Fixed water rendering
- The hurt SFX no longer plays loudly when picking up an ammo bonus with the Scavenger 3 mod
- Fixed issues with diving and resurfacing SFX
- The resurfacing SFX no longer plays when adjusting settings
- Fixed player outline rendering
- Fixed trial text rendering
- Fixed player-map collision issues causing jerky player movement and teleportation
- Fixed issues with shotgun spray patterns at certain angles
- Bots now have the minimum possible influence over total team power (for autobalancing)
- Players will now be correctly shown as holding a flag when joining mid-match
- Fixed Salvage canisters spawning too low
- Fixed autobalance not moving players sometimes
- Fixed duplicate gun fire SFX sounds playing when another player starts shooting
- Fixed Breakthrough zone rendering when testing maps locally
- Fixed issues with floating structures not falling
- Bots are no longer included in the online/active player counts
- Fixed glass rendering in bare minimum
- Fixed "+1 Magazine" text rendering when spectating
- Fixed server listings showing incorrect bot/player counts
- Fixed structure placement highlight rendering at the edges of maps
- Fixed 'Return to Battle' text not rendering when inside the enemy team spawn on some maps
- Voxel engine and networking stability improvements
- Fixed voxel map edge brightness in bare minimum
- Fixed explosion particle colour
- Fixed outer scope blur effect lasting too long when firing the last round in a magazine
- Fixed client freeze when the match finishes
- Fixed render distance issues while spawning on maps with fog
- Potential fix for dark maps
- Falling snow now renders in local custom maps
- Fixed particle flicker when it first starts raining
- Rain sounds now properly stop playing when leaving a local custom map
- Fixed OpenGL errors when generating snow particles
- The team with less players now has slightly more influence when contesting a Salvage canister, scaled in a way that for example if Aegis has 3 players, Helix has 5, and all 8 players are in the canister region, the canister is evenly contested by both teams
- Fixed muffled sound issues when finishing a match underwater
- Fixed networking issues with fall damage and player health

Changes:
- New and improved map JSON format and documentation at https://sectorsedge.com/workshop
- CTF and Escort now support multiple flags/bombs per-team
- Custom lobbies will reset 5 minutes after all humans have left
- When un-selecting both 'empty' and 'full' server filters, only servers that have players and aren't full
will be shown
- Reduced the amount that bots build
- When a human joins a match, they will join the team with the weakest human power
- Reduced max match time from 30 minutes down to 20 minutes

Additions:
- Bots!
- Custom lobby owners can say '/botcap N' in chat to control the amount of bots
- Announcement text now has a dark background behind it

Optimisations:
- Multithreading optimisations and stability improvements
- Voxel engine refresh and cleanup - faster floating voxel checks, block creation, block removal, explosions and structure placement
- Engine optimisations (boring stuff like function calling and memory management)
- Audio engine optimisations and fixes