Playerbots Got a Brain Surgery. Death Knights Got Their Freedom.

Playerbots Got a Brain Surgery. Death Knights Got Their Freedom.

We've been busy digging into one of Reforged's biggest troublemakers: Playerbots.

Don't get us wrong, we love our little AI companions. Even when they decide standing in fire is a perfectly reasonable life choice. What we don't love is when their behind-the-scenes nonsense causes the entire server to crash.

So instead of throwing another bandage on the problem and hoping for the best, we've made some major changes to how Playerbots operate.

Playerbot Stability: Fixing the Actual Problem

One of the biggest issues we've been tracking involved how Playerbots accessed player information while multiple things were happening across the game world.

For example, a player could log out while a bot was still trying to interact with information belonging to that player. Under certain circumstances, that could cause a server crash.

Not exactly the kind of dramatic exit anyone was hoping for.

We've now rebuilt the system responsible for tracking players and sharing information with Playerbots.

Here's what this means for players:

• Better server stability: Major changes to address crashes involving Playerbots, player logouts, and simultaneous game activity.
• Safer bot interactions: Bots now handle player information more safely, including interactions across different maps.
• Improved group handling: Changes to how bots identify group leaders, command owners, and travel targets.
• More reliable communication: Cross-map bot whispers now use a safer communication process.
• Better activity tracking: Bots can continue responding to nearby players and world activity without relying on potentially outdated player information.

Most importantly, we didn't accomplish this by disabling half the features people actually use.

Battlegrounds, Dungeon Finder, bot leveling, travel, friend interactions, and activity detection are all still enabled.

Because fixing a problem by deleting the feature isn't exactly our idea of a solution.

Death Knight Bots Finally Graduate

Apparently, some of our Death Knight bots have been stuck in the world's longest graduation ceremony.

We discovered that Death Knight bots weren't always receiving proper credit for completing their final starting-zone quest.

Normally, completing that quest is required before a Death Knight can use Dungeon Finder. Without that completion recorded, the game treats them like they're still supposed to be running errands for the Lich King.

Which is a little awkward when you're trying to recruit one for a dungeon.

We've fixed that too.

• Existing Death Knight bots automatically receive the necessary quest completion when they log in.
• Newly generated Death Knight bots receive the correct completion for their faction.
• Both Alliance and Horde Death Knights are covered.
• Bots that already completed their quests correctly are left alone.

Death Knight bots should now be able to participate in Dungeon Finder without being blocked by unfinished starting-zone requirements.

Congratulations, Death Knights. You're officially allowed to leave the tutorial.

What About Server Crashes?

We're not going to claim that one update magically eliminates every possible crash. AzerothCore, Playerbots, and our custom Reforged systems have a lot of moving parts.

What we have done is address a major underlying problem in how Playerbots track and interact with players.

This isn't another tiny fix aimed at one specific crash. It's a substantial overhaul of the system itself, designed to prevent an entire category of problems rather than chasing individual symptoms.

And yes, we're going to keep working on it.

Keep Those Bug Reports Coming

If you notice unusual Playerbot behavior, dungeon queue problems, or anything else that seems broken, please submit a bug report.

Include what you were doing, where you were, and what happened. The more specific the report, the easier it is for us to reproduce and fix the problem.

We know crashes are frustrating. They're frustrating for us too, especially when we're trying to build something that goes well beyond a standard Wrath of the Lich King server.

Reforged is constantly evolving, and we're committed to fixing the problems underneath the surface, not just making them disappear until the next restart.

Now get back out there and enjoy Azeroth. Your bots have had their brain surgery, the Death Knights have their diplomas, and hopefully everyone can stop trying to murder the server.

See you in Azeroth!
The Aethro Reforged Team