Gentle Readers,

You have entrusted me to report on things of interest to the public, and so it is that I share my observations on the following subject matter. Some call it disagreeable or distasteful, but if we cannot discuss it in a civilizized manner, what will become of civilization?

I speak, of course, of the very natural phenomenon of Botting. You do it, I do it, even the immortals do it from time to time. Why is there such an uproar over something that everyone does? I seek to put in plain words this taboo so that it may become a worthwhile discussion out of the seedy saloons and less desirable place and out into the open.

Follow me, if you will, on to a journey of technology, ennui, and the classic struggle of man versus computer.

1. The Stay Connected Bot

2. The Spellup Bot

3. The Self Amusement Bot

4. The GQ Bot

5. The I-Swear-It-Was-My-First-Time Bot

6. The "I'm so lazy I developed an entire artificial intelligence program to MUD for me" Bot

First, the Stay Connected bot. This is a very common variety seen at all levels of play. Perhaps you want to quest sit while you do other things, or just need to go take a bathroom break after 7 doubles in a row. This bot can easily be implement by triggering off of the autosave which happens every 15 minutes or the self AFK message as you are about to zone out. This type of botting is completely legal! No one should be ashamed of this one.

Up next is the specialized kind of botting that is spelled out (pun intended) in the rules. People using this are trying to get their proficiency in spells up by casting it over and over on themselves. While this is barely needed on the first mort or two, it becomes nearly essential later on, unless you want to continually lose concentration. Whether you choose to do them all at once or one at a time, there's plenty to gain from spellup bots.

Then or even worse, given the title of Helper and forced to answer newbie questions about what donation rooms look like on a map or how to get the darn dog to shut up.we have the bot setup done purely for fun. You might have triggers on certain situations that bring more liveliness into your playstyle, like a certain message that you send out when you get a vorpal. I've heard tell of a chatbot that responds to social messages. It is not the belief of the author that these amusement bots will get you into any trouble, but you should probably be careful not to offend. For example, if you respond to every tell with "That's not what your mother said last night!" you might find yourself on the nasty end of an ignore list.

And now, Dear Reader, we get into the messiness of bots. The following 3 bots could get you censured, nuked, or even worse, given the title of Helper and forced to answer newbie questions about what donation rooms look like on a map or how to get the darn dog to shut up.

The first of these is one that is often accused but rarely instantiated. You can't understand how a global quest has just started and that dude only has 1 mob left while you're still trying to pick your target. A ha! He must be using a GQ bot! Supposedly, these people have ways of getting to the areas faster than you. Personally, this author believes that this type of bot is purely mythological, and that the accused are simply more knowledgeable and besides, they are really good at hiding their bottiness.

Well, the less said about this one the better, but you know who you are.

Finally, and this should sum up my remarks in a conclusionary way, it seems that the more people work at creating the perfect bot, they could have easily made it to T9 doing it the normal way. Some people cannot learn the usual way, they must be taught in a more permanent way. Sadly, most do not get the opportunity to apply what they have learned as they have been banished to outer telnet for their sins.