welcome

Hey everyone, in light of some recent events, I'd like to provide some clarity on the game's policy regarding cheating and be transparent with how I've handled both past and recent situations. My primary responsibility is to protect the integrity of the game for everyone who plays fairly, and the inconsistency with recent enforcement has created confusion. I want to own that, explain the history, and outline the clear, formal policy that will be in effect from this point onward.

Let's start with the elephant in the room. Last week, the player known as Osh was caught using an autoclicker, which was impacting the July clan race with his clan clearly dominating the month. As a result, 857 of his bots were locked/reset. Shortly after, he began playing again on new bots. This understandably caused confusion and concern within the community.

To set things straight: Osh's additional bots have now been locked/reset, and he is now permanently banned from the game.

How we got here and the corner I painted myself into

My long-standing, though implicit, policy has been that players caught cheating are permanently banned. As seen in the Hall of Shame, there are currently 6 instances of "Banned player". While not all cheaters have attempted to return, those who did were typically discovered and had their new bots locked/reset again.

This is where my own actions created a difficult precedent. A couple years ago, the long-banned player Alan reached out to me. After multiple failed attempts to return in the past, he sent a sincere apology, explaining that was younger when he cheated and had matured since. I made a judgment call to allow him back. My error was not necessarily in accepting his story, but in making a private exception that undermined the implicit policy and created an inconsistency I never properly addressed.

This brings us to Osh. After he was caught, he was cooperative, admitted to his actions, and even provided his script to help me improve the game's detection systems. In light of this, and thinking of the precedent I'd set with Alan, I tentatively told Osh he could start fresh, but that I reserved the right to rescind the offer after further consideration.

After seeing the community's reaction and reflecting on the situation, I realized that was the wrong call. The impact of Osh's cheating was immediate and fresh in everyone's minds, directly corrupting the game's primary competitive event. Allowing him to return just days later sends the complete wrong message about the importance of game integrity.

The path forward: A clear policy for everyone

After a lot of thought, I've decided on a path that I believe respects past decisions while establishing the firm foundation we need for the future:

• Decision on Osh: As stated above, I have reversed my tentative offer. The harm from his recent cheating is too significant to overlook. He is permanently banned.


• Decision on Alan: Alan was reinstated years ago under very different circumstances. He has been an active player since his return. I feel it would be unfair to retroactively apply this new formalization to him. He will be "grandfathered in" and is welcome to continue playing.


• Clarification on Ville: It's important to differentiate between bans for in-game cheating and bans for more severe, community-damaging actions. Ville was banned not just for cheating, but also for actions that included real-money scamming of other players. The "grandfather clause" will not apply in his case. While I have heard some occasional rumors of his return, I've not yet seen definitive evidence of this myself. If he surfaces, the permanent ban will be enforced.


• New formal policy: To eliminate all ambiguity from this day forward, I have posted a new, official policy thread outlining what constitutes cheating and its consequences. You can read it here: Cheating and unfair play policy.

The core takeaway is now simple: Players caught cheating will be permanently banned.

My goal is to provide a fair and competitive environment. This clear and consistent policy is a crucial step in upholding that commitment. Thank you for your understanding as I work to correct my past inconsistencies and formalize these important rules.

Congrats to Esvrainzas [359] for leading <Lusitania> to victory in the June 2025 clan competition and securing a 17th George Washington platinum trophy! Monthly energy has been reset and a new round has begun.

rank		clan	owner		energy month
1		<Lusitania>	Esvrainzas [359]		11,890,080	(x28.05)
2		<Mount Wario>	Starbot [145]		8,552,511	(x24.55)
3		<No Clan>	Dragon Summoner [140]		3,147,269	(x8.34)
4		<FUNNY FARM>	TheRealFlaxShady [148]		1,676,253	(x4.42)
5		<The Gunners>	Dewsberry [342]		1,595,099	(x5.02)
6		<Valhalla>	Nosferatu [364]		1,383,466	(x3.69)
7		<DOOM>	DrEvilZal [100]		1,305,790	(x3.11)
8		<dogs>	Mr Tomato [81]		1,226,815	(x2.86)
9		<Apex>	Guardian Angel [75]		1,193,839	(x2.77)
10		<Tarnished>	Brainstorm [174]		1,069,649	(x3.55)

Also see:

• June 2025 clan rankings
• June 2025 bot rankings

I've just posted the game's new Code of Conduct. This more comprehensive set of guidelines is now the definitive guide for community standards and replaces the previous shorter Player communication rules. The new CoC thread is locked to serve as a stable reference, and this announcement will be the official channel for feedback and discussion about it.

For many years, the game operated with a very loose "be civil" approach to moderation. While that worked for a time, I believe our community has reached a point where more explicit guidelines are necessary to achieve the primary goal: making bots4 a more positive, respectful, and welcoming environment for everyone, both our dedicated veterans and any newcomers who join us.

Many of you may have noticed an increase in moderation activity over the past couple of months. This wasn't arbitrary; it was the first step in a deliberate effort to curb the toxicity that can sometimes make our forums an intimidating or unpleasant place to be. This new Code of Conduct is the next step in that process. The goal isn't to be heavy-handed, but to be consistent and transparent, providing a clear foundation so everyone knows what is expected.

To be perfectly clear: This is not an attempt to eliminate conflict, rivalry, or "spicy" discussion. bots4 is a competitive game, and the rivalries that form are a core part of its history and fun.

The Code of Conduct explicitly outlines the difference between acceptable, game-focused trash talk and unacceptable personal attacks or hostile goading. My aim, and the aim of these rules, is to moderate toxic behavior, not to stifle competition. You can still work to defeat your rivals, but you must treat them with a baseline of respect as fellow players when you communicate.

I believe these rules are a vital step towards ensuring the long-term health and enjoyability of our community, and I am committed to upholding these principles.

That said, this thread is an open channel for you to share your thoughts and feedback on this new direction. I am interested to hear if you are supportive of this renewed focus on a more respectful environment and any constructive thoughts you have on how we, as a community, can best uphold these standards together. While the core principles of respect and civility are non-negotiable, your feedback on the application and clarity of these rules is valued.

Thank you for taking the time to read the new Code of Conduct. I look forward to your constructive feedback and to working with all of you to build a better bots4 community.

It's been close to 6 months since my last patch notes post, so it's time to go through my code commits and collect the list of player-facing changes. If you have feedback on the format of this type of update, please let me know. Going forward, I plan to use announcements threads like this for both (a) comprehensive patch notes posts every so often that exhaustively list everything that's changed from a player-facing perspective (the idea being that going through these can fully catch you up) and (b) one-off threads for bigger or more important changes that would benefit from more immediate feedback. I think this balance lets me make small tweaks and fixes on the fly without having to spam everyone with announcements for every little thing. With that said, on to the details...

Features:

• Stash reordering: Items in stash can now be re-ordered. Click/drag on desktop. Long-hold/drag on mobile (see announcement).
• Buy unequippable items: All items can now be bought to make upcoming upgrades a bit smoother (see announcement).
• Overflow stash items: Stars are no longer needed to see inaccessible stash items (see announcement).
• Monthly Crescendo: To keep competition relevant throughout the entire month, energy exchanged per battle will increase steadily throughout the month. This is currently set to 5% per day in June (down from 10% per day in May) based on player feedback. See the May announcement thread, May feedback thread, and June annoucncement thread for plenty of discussion.
• 10 member clans: The ranking clan member cap was reduced from 20 to 10. This was done to lower the barrier for a clan to effectively compete and make the top spots more attainable for smaller, focused teams. See the links in the previous bullet for discussion on this as well.
• Click-to-pause buffs: Click/tap buff icons to pause/unpause. A small QoL change to make it easier to quickly stop/start buffs (from suggestion).
• Clan energy history: Added an energy history chart for the top 10 clans to the clans homepage (see discussion).
• Cancel showroom orders: Arrived orders can now be canceled, just like unarrived orders (from suggestion).

Bug fixes:

• Buff purchase: Fixed a bug where a global buff being active would prevent you from buying its regular version (from bug).
• Mobile stash: Fixed a bug making opening the details popup for stash items on mobile unreliable, which was caused by the stash reordering feature (from bug).
• Emoji bar: Fixed a bizarre and oddly-specific (Firefox-only + only when logged out) rendering issue with this (from bug).
• Historical clan rankings: Fixed a small rounding error that could lead to the wrong level being displayed on the clan history page in a very narrow set of edge cases.
• Unread post count: Forum posts from deleted threads will no longer contribute to your unread post count.
• Buff sort order: This broke when adding global buffs in December. It is now fixed (from bug).
• Start-of-month energy: Fixed a bug that caused energy to not enter the game until 1am instead of midnight on June 1 (from bug).

Misc:

• Text input font: Changed in places like forum post entry boxes from fixed-width to the same font as the game (from suggestion).
• Anti-cheat: Invested further into the system, continuing with past increased focus after November 2024 cheating.
• Deleted forum posts: Rather than be totally hidden, deleted posts now have a "removed by moderator" stub to (a) give transparency on forum moderation actions, (b) give a signal that the forum is actively moderated, and (c) give a hint of when a thread may be confusing because of context that was formerly present and possibly replied to but now removed.
• Forum moderation: In an effort to make the forum a more welcoming environment for new players and veterans alike, player communication rules are being more regularly enforced.
• Ranking clan members: On clan profile pages, the rank column now has a yellow background for rows where that bot is contributing to ranking.
• Unequippable items in stash: Just like in the showroom stock, unequippable items in your stash now have a red background.
• Mobile stash: Added light haptic/vibration feedback when starting/ending drag.
• Global buffs: Global buffs are now visually distinct from regular buffs. They have a 2 pixel gold outline. This may change (see post.
• Daily energy exchange increase: The daily rate is now visible to players as a global buff named Monthly Crescendo, rather than being a hidden system detail (see post).

As for what's next: I'll mostly be continuing to focus on the clan competition aspect of the game. The Clan competition changes for June + looking ahead thread has a list of specifically what to look out for (but note that the list is tentative and may change). I'll continue making smaller QoL updates and bug fixes in parallel with these larger changes. Some additional items to look out for at some point (no timelines just yet) are better player analytics to understand engagement/retention (I talked about this a bit in my last patch notes post), Discord server setup (see post), and introducing a comprehensive player code of conduct that will likely replace the existing player communication rules in the interest of making the game and community aspect a more welcoming place for all players.

Past patch notes (I'm going to start including this list in all patch notes announcements):

• August - December 2024
• June 2024

Hi everyone, as we kick off the June clan race, I want to thank you all for the fantastic amount of detailed feedback and thoughtful discussion over the past month regarding the May experiment and future ideas for the clan race. I've been reading through all of it - in the official May feedback thread, the All Bots Gain Monthly Energy discussion, and more. It's clear how passionate everyone is about this core aspect of the game, and I truly appreciate you sharing your insights.

This post will outline changes for June, as well as my current thinking on longer-term directions based on that feedback and ongoing observation. First though, a note on future plans: The ideas below for "later in June" and beyond are currently in various stages of planning or early consideration. Game development, especially for a solo developer, can have unpredictable timelines, and details may evolve as I work through implementation, balance, or based on further feedback and testing. Please consider these as directions I'm actively exploring, not firm promises with fixed ETAs. I always reserve the right to adjust plans to best serve the game's overall health.

Live now (effective June 1)

Daily energy exchange growth reduced from 10% to 5%

• Based on a lot of feedback from the May experiment, the daily energy exchange increase has been reduced from 10% to 5% per day. The spreadsheet I'd shared before has been updated to reflect this.
• Reasoning: While the 10% scaling aimed to keep the end-of-month competitive, many of you felt it was a bit too extreme, potentially devaluing early month effort more than intended and raising valid concerns about the rapid drain of system-wide "loose energy." Although the math showed the first half of the month still carried significant weight (~1/3 of total impact), perception and feel are very important. The new 5% daily increase will still provide a significant end-of-month multiplier (around 2.5x the base rate on the final day), aiming to keep things interesting and comebacks feasible, but in a way that should feel more balanced throughout the entire month.
• Regarding "total energy inflation" caused by scaling - I'm less concerned about this for the "total energy" stat itself in the long run, as I plan to re-evaluate its meaning and how we track long-term achievement (more on that below).

Ranking clan member cap remains at 10

• The reduction from 20 to 10 members for clan ranking and end-of-month clan trophies will remain in place for June.
• Reasoning: The primary goal here was to lower the barrier to entry for more clans to compete effectively. While May's race still saw a significant lead at the very top (often a reflection of concentrated resources or exceptional individual performance, as some of you noted, rather than just raw numbers of scorers), the top 10 change is a step I believe is in the right direction. I'll continue to monitor its impact on clan formation and competitive dynamics, and I'm mindful of balancing this with the experience of players in larger clans (like high-level training bots) and their opportunities for recognition.

Targeting later in June

Visible global buff for daily energy scaling

• To make the daily energy exchange scaling more transparent and easier for everyone to track, I'll be working to display it as a visible global buff that clearly shows the current day's energy exchange multiplier. This will remove any guesswork.

Fight list page revamp

• A significant quality-of-life improvement I'm aiming to get out later this month is a revamp of the fight list page. The goal is to drastically improve the process for identifying viable targets. My tentative plan is to move towards a single, paginated table (as opposed to level-specific tables/pages) that is sortable by various columns (like level, energy, ratio) and also filterable. I'm also looking to add new information/features, such as how recently you've attacked a bot and the ability to apply custom labels or notes to bots (e.g. "favorite", "easy", "hard", etc.).

Targeting July or later (requires more design and development)

"All bots gain energy" (conceptual exploration)

• There's clearly a lot of community interest in making energy more broadly accessible. I'm strongly considering and actively exploring concepts where a wider base of bots (i.e. unclanned) generate some baseline EPH.
• Reasoning: This could create a more ambient level of energy, provide more targets, and further lower the barrier to entry for new players and clans, while still ensuring that focused strategy and investment (like well-built dumpers or active clanned play) remain valuable.
• Key considerations would be limiting this to recently-active bots, providing an opt-out mechanism, and setting the EPH rate lower than dedicated clanned bots. This is a complex change with many potential effects, so tuning details are very much TBD and will require careful thought.

Ranked clan qualification

• To make the clan rankings better reflect active, competitive entities, I'm exploring ideas for qualification.
• Reasoning: The goal is to reduce the number of "fluff" or placeholder clans in the rankings. One tentative idea is requiring a clan to have a minimum energy ratio (say, x2) to be formally "ranked". Unranked clans would still be listed, though likely in a separate, collapsed-by-default section.

Differentiated rewards for clan ranks 2-10

• To further incentivize the fight for every spot in the top 10, I plan to introduce more differentiated rewards.
• Reasoning: The current drop-off in reward value after 1st place is significant. I'm tentatively looking at using the F1 scoring system already used elsewhere in the game to scale the value of rewards for ranks 2 through 10. This would give more meaning to finishing 2nd vs. 3rd, 3rd vs. 4th, etc.

"Total energy" rethink

• The "total energy kept when leaving clans" feature is still a high priority. However, as many of you observed, and as the May scaling experiment highlighted, dramatic month-to-month variations in energy generation can make a single, cumulative "total energy" number less meaningful for comparing achievements across different months/mechanics.
• Reasoning: My goal is to reward longevity and a bot's historical achievements without being anchored to a single stat that might become inflated or less comparable over time. This gives us more freedom to experiment with core race mechanics. I'm exploring alternatives, possibly using a system that scores or ranks historical monthly performances (again, F1-style points for past monthly energy results could be one avenue) rather than a simple sum. More details on this once the path is clearer.

Maybe sometime in the future (speculative ideas)

Energy from trainers (PvE)

• Further down the line, I'm open to exploring how PvE activity, like battling trainers, could contribute some energy. It would need very careful tuning to ensure it's less efficient than dedicated PvP or energy-focused strategies but could offer a first step towards a more fleshed-out PvE mode. One idea is to have dynamic scaling for energy received based on attacker level vs. lowest level to beat that trainer in past X hours.

New clan-based game mode

• I'm also in the very early conceptual stages for an entirely new clan-based game mode. This would be designed to complement (definitely not replace!) the core battle loop and clan race, offering a different avenue for clans to work together on shared objectives and progression, adding another dimension to clan identity and teamwork. This is still extremely early thinking and I'm being intentionally vague about details, but it's a direction I'm interested in.

The May experiment was very informative. Please continue to share your constructive thoughts and suggestions - your feedback is invaluable as we work together to make the game more engaging for everyone!