Official forums for BZFlag.org

Hi,

I've seen bots mentioned a few time, but in my BZFlag, I can't find an option to play with bots anywhere? I thought that'd be really great to practice. A few enemy drones on auto-pilot for me to learn to dodge, dip, duck, dive and dodge as they're robotically spraying me with shells.

How do I start a game with a bunch of bots?

From the command line, run BZFlag with the switch

-solo x

Where X is the number of bots. This is only recommended for local servers (many public ones will frown upon you bringing bots). The solo bots are pretty stupid, and in general quite boring to play against.

The Roger bot (autopilot) is more intelligent. You could join more than one client to a game and make some Roger bots.

From the command line, run BZFlag with the switch

-solo x

How do i run BZFlag from what command line where?

A Better Badger wrote:How do i run BZFlag from what command line where?

If you use windows:

start menu->accessoires->command prompt

I searched for an easy solution (not my way of accomplishing it):

cd "C:\Program Files\BZFlag2.0.10" (and press ENTER-key)

Then type for example: Linux:
Start the shell, then type (should work on Mac,too)

If it doesn't work, then tell us your operating system.

Also be careful that you DO NOT start bots on public servers, unless you get permission from the owner first. It is usually a bannable offense.

> (should work on Mac,too)

Only if you have BZFlag in your $PATH (which you probably don't). To get it to work in OS X, you have to do something like... ...which isn't too fun.

Also, from experience, playing with bots is kinda boring. It could be useful for gaining experience in the basics, but it kinda takes away from the fun of the game.

OR if you are using a mac

/Applications/BZFlag-2.0.10.app/Contents/MacOS/bzflag -solo 2

But be carefully like donny baker said you can get kick/banned for using bots.

how do you join clients

termhn wrote:how do you join clients

You are wondering how to get several roger-bots in clients?
Start several bz-clients and join with each of these clients the map you planned to play. Now press "9" in each client, to activate the roger-bot.

termhn wrote:how do you join clients

I'm guessing you're asking about how to get one client to play with another client. The short answer is: "You don't". Clients aren't designed to share with each other, just with whatever map server you're playing on. If you want multiple clients to be playing together on a locally-run map, then you'll have to load up the map through the bzfs server software (which is NOT a minor task - you WILL have to read up on how to run a bzflag server on a local network) and have the clients connect to that.

If you're just asking about how to get your client to connect to somebody else's map, then from the main menu scroll to "Join Game" and press the Enter key.

If it's a public map then scroll down to "Find Server" and hit the Enter key. Scroll through the list that comes up until you get to the map you want to play on and hit the Enter key. When you're back at the "Join Game" menu, scroll down to "Callsign" and enter your username, then scroll down to "Password" and enter your password, then scroll up to "Connect" and hit the Enter key. Voila, you're playing on a public server.

If the map is private, then scroll down to "Server" and enter the domain name or IP address of the server, then scroll down to "Port" and enter the port number that the map will be listening on, then enter your callsign and password just as with a public map (if necessary for the private server), then scroll up to "Connect" and hit the Enter key. Voila, you're playing on a private map.

Or, alternatively, you can just read the BZFlag wiki pages.