A game bot or ‘robot’ is a software program that is able to automate gameplay usually in order to automatically farm in the case of farming bots, quickly and automatically perform short actions in the case of scripts or quickly perform actions at the press of a button on the case of macros. The use of bots is called ‘botting’ and is game cheating technique that is extremely effective in gaining free game resources in many online games.
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Of the 3 main types of ‘bots’, namely Farming Bots, Scripts and Macros, only 2 are technically A.I. since macros do not actually make any autonomous decisions. However, they are all commonly referred to as bots and generally considered a game cheat, even though some games do allow for certain macros for casual play, but all of them are generally not allowed in competitive play.
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Game Farming Bots explained
Faming bots for games are software that is able to long into, play and farm any online game for resources, premium currencies and max out your game account over time. As more and more games, namely online games, require more and more time investment and farming to get all the good stuff for free, farming bots are becoming increasingly popular, especially on mobile games.
Bots are generally external software apps that scan the memory of the game to determine the current game state to then generate user input to farm the game. – Very rarely are bots modded into the game itself of are using visual recognition and macros in order to function. Generally, the more complex a game, the more complex the botting software has to be. Fully-fledged farming bots are the most complex having the ability to make decisions and automatically fight for example, macros are less complex as they make no actual decisions, but usually only follow the same loop of user inputs over and over. Overall, farming bots are the closest thing to a cheat for unlimited money and resources in online games, as it is impossible to get unlimited money any other way due to server-side processing.
Most common Features of Game Farming Bots
- Automated fighting / ability use ect.
- Configurable / Recordable paths using an editor.
- Auto questing, auto daily missions, auto achievements.
- Automated looting, selling, stashing, item identification.
- Botting multiple accounts at once.
- Auto farming mobs, missions, dungeons ect.
- Auto farming gold, gems, diamonds, crystals, coins, money, items ect.
- Many bots can be set up with multiboxing, making it possible to farm dozens of account all at once.
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Most underrated Cheating Method in existence
As hacking money, health, items and other goodies is impossible in games that require an internet connection due to the fact that this data is stored on the online game servers, farming bots are actually the closest thing one is able to get to an ‘unlimited money hack’ for online games, making it the most underrated and underappreciated cheat in existence. – Everyone knows that a ‘game hack’ is, but only very few people know that, especially in recent times, game farming bots are actually better for not having to spend a lot of money or time in your favorite online games.
Scripts explained
Scripts for games can be described as ‘mini bots’: They are mainly used in extremely competitive online games, such as ARPGs, MOBAs, FPS shooters and similar games where having extremely short reaction times and godlike mechanics are vital to success. A bot or ‘script’ is quicker in realizing a problem such as for example a low health bar and then triggering an action such as for example the drinking of a potion in an ARPG. – While a human may be able to perform this task in 300 milliseconds, a computer script can perform this task in fewer than 10 milliseconds.
What separates a script from a bot is that is only performs quick and fast actions and is used to augment reaction time, rather than to automate gameplay for the purpose of automatically farming. So it is about a competitive edge over other players with time being a vital factor, rather than just amassing game resources over unlimited time. And what separates a script from a macro is that the macro is triggered by a human and uses no A.I. to make decisions, while a script can both use A.I. to make decisions and also is automatically triggered by A.I. Overall, scripts are extremely powerful but usually only used by the top most competitive players in the most competitive games.
Macros explained
Macros are kind of like scripts but ‘dumb’. They are simply a series of button presses and user input that are entirely preprogrammed and will never change depending on the state of the game. So recording your mouse and keyboard inputs for example, then replaying them in a loop is a popular technique that uses macros to farm online and mobile games. As soon as for example visual recognition and ‘IF loops’ are in the mix, then the macro becomes a ‘bot’. So if the macro creates a different input when the button is read than if it was green, then the macro is now a bot.
Macros are mainly used to automate tedious processes, such as changing from one gear set to another, processes that have to be done often and are long and tedious. They can also be used as dumb scripts, for example to unleash a specific skill rotation in PvP or PvE, but the macro will be unable to react to the game state. Overall, macros are a really easy way to learn about bots and many online games actually allow macros for certain purposes. They can also be used to automatically farm very simple games with static navigation by creating macro / editor loops. Macros can also be programmed into hardware, such as gamepads, mice and keyboards, making them extremely hard to detect in competitive eSports.
Sources / References
[1] https://hackerbot.net/wiki/11-game-hack
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheating_in_online_games
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_bot
[4] https://springerplus.springeropen.com/articles/10.1186/s40064-016-2122-8
[5] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0898122112000442
[6] https://link.springer.com/referenceworkentry/10.1007%2F978-3-319-08234-9_13-1
[7] https://news.mit.edu/2019/deeprole-ai-beat-humans-role-games-1120