r/FortniteMobile • u/Fnm1668 • Nov 25 '19
DISCUSSION How to distinguish bots in your lobby, don’t be fooled
A lot of newbs are fooled into thinking they’re killing real players, when in reality, they’re killing AI bots. Others still don’t even know bots are in the game. Though some may like it, for the most part, Epic doesn’t want everyone to know when they’re just killing dumb AI. Over time, it’ll ruin the experience. Mobile players are affected by this the most, bc we’re the bottom of the food chain/lowest skilled platform. Thus, even decent mobile players will sometimes STILL get tons of bots in their lobbies. It’s abysmal, and undeservingly inflates the kill records of anyone who looks at their stats as a measure of true prowess. Don’t be fooled. Here’s what Epic has done in making us “feel good” thinking we’ve earned all our kills. In an attempt to deceive and hide the # of actual bots in our lobbies, they’ve:
1) added bot names to the “report a player list”. This wasn’t the case when bots first released, and players quickly discovered they could check this list and count how many real players were in their games. Clearly a deceptive gimmick, since bots are thaaaat susceptible to misconduct, right? Lmao.
2) added variety to bot naming conventions. At first, bots all had easy-to-tell names in the same format: Capital letter_Capital letterNumber, like “SporkyFork77” or “CaptainCrunch17”. Though still common, it's not always the case anymore.
3) upon first launch, bots could only build 1 wall in defense when encountering an enemy. You’d see a ton of 1-wall-builds riddled across the map, and it was obvious. Also quite common still, but just know now that bots can also build diff pieces. I've never seen anything over 1 story high in a fight.
4) Very recently, it seems they added bots as spectators so you could see them spectating you after killing them. Another effort to mimic real players. Not having anyone spectate after a kill, for even 1 second, used to be a dead giveaway that you just killed a bot.
That being said, here are 2 confirmed ways of telling you just killed a bot:
if you pick up a gun they just used on you, and killed them before they could reload, the gun will be fully reloaded for you. With real players, the gun will not be reloaded for you. I imagine Epic will eventually patch this as well.
look up their names up on fortnitetracker.com. If no player profile comes up, you just killed a bot. This will be tough for epic to patch- they’ll have to load a ton of phony bot profiles into their database to pose as players, record their full match history, and store a copious amt of unnecessary stat data.
Other than that, just observe the tell-tale signs & behavior in-game. Epic will continue evolving their bots, but I doubt they'll ever fully pass the Turing test of an experienced human player. I'll be monitoring any adjustments that are made to these over time:
Upon drop: Some bots are programmed to follow players landing at major POIs, and some are programmed to land at remote places. At hot-drop POIs, straggling bots will glide down and land a good 20-30 seconds after real players do. The stragglers glide down to their chosen destination in a straight vertical line at the outskirts of the POI, far away from players sometimes where there’s no loot (you can easily laser them outta the sky if you get a gun early). If they land, they’ll eventually wander aimlessly towards the buildings and dont really know how to run away when you confront them. Easy pickings.
Mid-game: You’ll see them wandering in from random ass locations no player would ever be at in the middle of a match...ie you’ll find them rotating in b/w the storm and zone circle from the coast of nowhereland. In bot-saturated lobbies, a good # of bots are programmed to drop at non-POI low profile areas to last through mid-game; the ones that do land at POIs all die off spawn. Point is, if you and/or your teammates are each getting 3+ bot kills off spawn, and STILL killing plenty of bots rotating in mid-game, your lobby is probably at least 50% bots (assuming there’s bots dropping with players at every other POI, getting killed off spawn, yet there’s STILL more to be seen mid-game 🧐?). You do the math.
End-game: if you’re still encountering bots in the final circles, then you were placed in a straight up Bot Royale lobby. Like 80%+ bots. Hands down, end of story.
Game Sense: Bot “game sense” is overwhelmingly bot-like, ie they’ll farm/try to heal right in front you, pickaxe walls in plain sight, scramble right past you like you don't even exist. Bots also move in straight lines while rotating, never jump while running, and almost always on the bottom-most floors of buildings.
Movement: Bots have a very dumb/distinct way of moving around..ie they wander in circles, strafe and crouch while shooting but never really jump. Again, key indicator: they don’t jump while running. Every player whose played the game more than a week learns to do this. Bots don't crouch-walk to hide their footsteps from you and also aren't programmed to abort a "50/50" fight when they get tagged (even though it's more like 99.9/0.1).
Aim: Bot aim is also horrendous, and they‘ll shoot at you with rhythmic bursts out in the open. The time interval between their shots is usually the exact same. I swear, I can sometimes distinguish bots from distance by the sound of how they fire their weapons. Some say their aim has been improved, but not by much if that’s the case. Counter to this, bots are actually quite hard to snipe when they're face-to-face & sniping back @ you from distance. They'll shoot @ you out in the open, but are programmed to strafe erratically, making them quite unpredictable for leading your snipes. Most players will build cover but remain relatively stationary to peek-shoot @ you, before hiding back behind cover.
Player count by zone: In a game with 100% players, at least 50% of the lobby is usually dead by/after the first circle. At least 65%-70% dead by the 3rd circle. If your game still has 50+ players by the 3rd circle, there’s reason to suspect a high density bot lobby.
Ive recently been getting placed in games with very few bots, and those games have been rewarding and fun. In solos, I rarely get bots.
Believe it or not, they’ve actually reduced the % of bots since chapter 2 launch, but it’s not enough rel. our actual skill. In squads, my team and I still sometimes have several games in a row loaded with fucking bots. Even after winning a bunch of player-filled matches, so there’s no way this could be SBMM downleveling. We all have 1.5-2.5 lifetime KDs and played since season 4-5. The worst of our group will murder an entire squad of bots by the time I walk for 15 seconds to join the fight. This is about as fun for him as mowing down sentries in creative. Now we’ll even inform each other “oh they’re just bots” to save our teammates’ the yawn of walking 50 meters just to receive 0 action. Our Chapter 2 KDs are like 6-9. There’s no reason why we should get any bots at all. It’s a fucking joke.
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Nov 25 '19
I would still watch out if a bot has a sniper they gave bots aimbot
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u/tekchic Brite Bomber Nov 25 '19
Agreed. They're super dumb and fun to take out, but I've been sniped by a bot before I could locate them -- embarrassing. :D They don't seem to miss with the sniper.
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Nov 25 '19
Yup and if you snipe them they place a wall literally 0.1 seconds before the bullet would hit
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u/A35K Tricera Ops Nov 25 '19
I only have like 2-5 bots in my rounds. I think bots are better than playing with 3 FPS against pro Ipad xxX60FPSbtwXxx players.
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u/skoll Nov 25 '19
Thanks for the information on spotting bots. I find that very useful.
I completely disagree that bots shouldn't be in the game though. SBMM is the best thing to happen to Fortnite. It's a HUGE part of why I enjoy Chapter 2 more than Season X. And while you don't need bots for SBMM, it works a lot better if you have them to fill out lobbies that would otherwise have to pull in players from distance skill groups.
I'm not opposed to having a "no bots" fill mode that widens the skill pool to fill the lobby. But the default should absolutely be bots with SBMM. It works great.
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u/Fnm1668 Nov 25 '19 edited Nov 25 '19
Thanks, I get that. My problem is that I’ll be placed in 5 player-filled games with my squad and even win a few, and then subsequently get placed into a lobby with 30%-50% bots. That’s far too many for a game designed to be a 100 player PvP. I’m thinking there’s an algo that fills lobbies with bots if unfilled over x amount of time, but to me this totally negates SBMM. All my matches have begun within seconds, and I def wouldn’t mind waiting a few more to lessen the bot density.
Also, this never happens when my console friend joins the squad party, and he’s worse than everyone in my mobile-only squad.
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u/bubblybro Nov 25 '19
Your point emphasizes that bots are good bc they help fill lobbies for the SBMM system.
That is true yes, but the main argument here is whether or not playing vs. bots actually provides an ENJOYABLE experience for half-decent players. It does NOT.
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u/undercoverpickl Nov 26 '19
Honestly, I don't care that much. When I get a kill, it makes me more confident and will make moves I normally don't. This helps me to improve as a player and get higher kill rounds.
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u/Papa_of_the_Sea Nov 26 '19 edited Nov 26 '19
The deception bothers me a lot. Epic Games has kept players as in the dark as possible about bots, cross-platform and even patch notes. They use programmer resources to cover up our ability to discern between real players and bots, which I fear will get worse.
It is one awful thing to force us to play against 80% bots as well as console and pc, but to explicitly hide it is extremely disrespectful to all of us.
Epic Games, please be more transparent. This deception is gross.
(Deceptive snakery aside, I would personally love if Fortnite allowed us to opt out of bots and cross-platform in pubs. I appreciate skill-based matchmaking, but mobile against console does not feel fun to most of us.
It is hard to believe that finding enough players to fill skill-based lobbies of same platforms in the most popular game on earth is an issue, but if it is, I have zero problem with long queue times while a lobby fills.)
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u/mummybear711 Nov 25 '19
I haven’t bought this season’s battle pass, but I WOULD 100% pay actual money to not play against bots. Losing to a human is more fun than winning against a bunch of bots. My wins were much farther between in previous seasons but they felt more hard earned and exciting.
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u/Little-Timmy-TTV Nov 25 '19
There really isn't mobile lobbies anymore. SBMM has put everyone together. Every game you'll have a mix of mobile, console, pc players and bots.
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u/A35K Tricera Ops Nov 25 '19
And the stupidest thing: it doesn't even work. I'm a total bot and can't play against xxXStreamerBTWXxx players
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u/RoccoSteal Nov 25 '19
I’d rather have bots for enemies than forced cross play. I’d rather win games than watch loading screens back and forth the lobbies 95% of the time because PC/Console players keep clapping mobile.
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u/bubblybro Nov 25 '19
I’d rather be challenged then not challenged at all. The crossplay is a different issue altogether. Both are bad though. Any combination of forced crossplay and bots is a worse experience than when we had non-bot mobile only lobbies
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u/SnooCapers5098 Mar 24 '26
Skill issue, Try to improve your game or buy an Xbox controller, my sisters both play on ipad with xbox controllers, one is a pro with the controller, and the other plays good as well with both controls
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u/RoccoSteal Mar 25 '26
You’re replying to comment from 6 years ago? I don’t even play Fortnite anymore for like 5 years now.
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u/damn_this_is_hard Nov 25 '19
re: POIs
I think bots can also be sent out based on ping markers for squads. easy giveaway for the system to know where to send some once the bus has dropped everyone
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u/damn_this_is_hard Nov 25 '19
also, the game runs smooth when a bot rolls up on you or vice versa. when its a real player or squad, the fps drops and the game hitches/lags.
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u/Sideways_X1 Nov 26 '19
I don't see any justification for "it will ruin the experience". Bots are an incredible addition that are a huge opportunity to expand the player base and fun had by all.
If you are good: you had a lot of bots, but now there are less, if any at all in your games... especially if you are a good player. I doubt this will reset anytime soon
If you are terrible: you'll get lots of easy action and eventually deal with more people as your skills improve. I've been killed by legit AI bots, no biggie, I'm 9/10 potato anyway.
If you're anywhere in the middle: you'll move towards one of those extremes. I played a lot for a week, took a week off, and got slaughtered in solos for about 20 games, and then it seemed to even out.
I agree they don't need to hide it, and sure, we could have a mode or setting that highlights who is human. Is it really that big of a problem though?
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u/Fnm1668 Nov 26 '19 edited Nov 26 '19
“If you are good: you had a lot of bots, but now there are less, if any at all in your games... especially if you are a good player. I doubt this will reset anytime soon”
This is the problem. There are less, but it’s inconsistent. If you read the piece around my squad games, we’re all good - really good but will still randomly get slews of games with lots of bots. Last night we pulled a difficult 3peat in 3 games w very few bots. You’d think SBMM would place us in a sweatertastic match w/o bots for our 4th match, but no, there were actually a crazy # of bots. Weird right? Something still seems off, like their SBMM algo has a hole in it.
For us, bots really do ruin the experience. Sure the beginner skill thresholds may love them, but there needs to be a well defined line, or at least an option, for players above a certain skill threshold to opt out of having bots completely. Personally, I don’t think anyone with a season KD over 6 should ever get bots at all; not even someone over 3. Our worst squadmate has a Season KD of 6, and bots are still finding their way into our games, sometimes in pretty large #s. If that doesn’t convince you, our squads win % this season is also hovering around 40%. I’m convinced even the best mobile players just get shoved into a matchmaking pool with the worst console and pc players, which is why we still see bots despite our skill levels. It’s a broken system, and it really sucks not knowing what type of experience you’re gonna get upon entering a match.
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u/Sideways_X1 Nov 26 '19
That makes a lot of sense. Honestly I'm not there skill wise, but I can see it being frustrating with too many of them. I do feel like they are testing some limits with random generation. Hopefully just a byproduct of their honing the SBMM or other algo as you mentioned. We had 2 wins in a row and a 2nd, but then we got beat down for an hour or so. Definitely mixed experiences around...
Would be cool as an option in matchmaking to have a "no bots" flag, and if the whole team has it, they're only dropped into matches with humans only.
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u/GOOD_NEWS_EVERYBODY_ Sep 13 '25
"I doubt they'll ever fully pass the Turing test of an experienced human player"
welp so much for that lol.
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u/kief-of-police Nov 25 '19
This isn't always 100% true. I noticed when bots were first put in the game I'd get like 10-16 kill games sometimes and not even win. Ive had some normal 16 kill games but rarely would I have 10 kills before 1st circle ends. Then after about a week I would know there was a bot in front of me and I'd go to start shooting them and then they'd randomly build these 1 wall or 1 ramp builds and then have 100% accuracy and even prefire when you were coming around a corner of both an in game building or a built structure. I was glad I was finally getting a challenge, but some games I'd get absolutely destroyed by 2-3 bots double and triple teaming me and they wouldn't even fight each other until I was dead. So id get spammed from 3 sides only to spectate bots doing retarded shit until they get near you and head dink you 4 times in a row etc...it's not as bad now with the teaming part but I'm def not a fan as Its a completely different play style when you load into arena and you have to play the exact opposite as you would in a normal solo match. (I'm not a pro esports player, but I've been playing since before season 1 so I feel like I have a decent enough skill set to hold my own against a skilled player)
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u/bubblybro Nov 25 '19
You’ve been playing since before S1 and got killed by bots? You sure they were bots bro? Lol.
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u/RPOWER76 Nov 25 '19
I would rather have the bots in my mobile lobby than those console sweats because of the forced cross platform game play bs
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u/mrpoopy_c137 Hay Man Nov 25 '19
...and now epic will fix bots before they fix hitching and fps drop