Deathbot:

This is a work done by Kester Maddock, who has gone off to college & will be
unavailable to support this bot. Please do not bug him, or the rest of the
DosDoom team, for support on this bot. The only exception is me, Captain
Mellow, who is of course more than happy to promote the cause of bot dm, &
will do my best to help you to run this bot.

Your first source of info for the Deathbot should be this text or my pages at
www.doomworld.com/mellow, & you should go there first before attempting to
email me at capt.mellow@bigfoot.com.
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USAGE:
Back up your old DosDoom setup if you want to keep it. Otherwise, you can always 
reinstall the old version later.
Unzip this archive into your dosdoom directory, overwriting all files. Run
ddbot.exe -deathmatch -altdeath -nomonsters -file wadname.wad 
& you should be ready to go.
You can run the bot in single player mode with the command line of 
ddbot.exe -reborn
but the bot does not play co-op. You may also want item respawning on.

To spawn a bot, type the cheat code "idbot". The bots will not fight each other, but 
there is a way to fix that. To make the bots fight each other, go into the 
things.ddf file with a text editor like edit.exe & do a search for the death_bot 
section. Look for the line that begins with "special=", & add ",disloyal" to the 
end of that line before the ; . MAKE SURE TO END THE LINE WITH ";" The line 
should look exactly like this when you're finished:
SPECIAL=SOLID,SHOOTABLE,DROPOFF,NO_RESPAWN,NO_RESURRECT,DISLOYAL;
**NOTE: I went ahead & made that change to enable bot infighting. You will have to remove
the disloyal parameter if you want the bots to gang up on you.

That's about it. You should not have too many problems. A known bug is that
some sectors in some maps (Bothered map01, gothic2 map30) will be pitch dark.
Too bad, eh? The bot will die if it runs into lava or slime, unlike other bots
currently out. You can jump from map to map without crashing (unlike the
Doombot). You can try to modify the bot by editing the things.ddf file, though
I cannot guarantee that all changes made will work. I would be very interested
to hear of any tricks that you are able to do with editing the ddf for the bot.

The bots can operate switches, as I have been jumped to map08 when the bot hit
the exit switch in the center of map07. They can also trigger doors in a flawed
manner, as I saw one trying to open the second to last door in e1m1, but it
was trying to trigger the door in rapid-fire manner. The door wound up just
twitching rapidly up & down instead of opening. They can trigger plats, but 
they don't ride them.

Also, the bot's roaming isn't the best. Just spawn more bots, or switch to a more
bot-friendly map.

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The following are some writings of the Deathbot's author, Kester:

Feb 17, 1999
Alright, here it is, my DOSDoom death bot.

Unlike most other deathbots around, this one is similar to the player.
It starts with a pistol and fist, and picks up items.  This means it
will also use ddf weapons lying around.

I have just zipped an exe and things.ddf and default.ldf.  You will need

the rest of the dosdoom distribution to play.

The cheat code 'idbot' spawns a bot.  Currently bots are not carried
across levels.  The cmd line parameter -reborn will make the player
reborn instead of reloading the level.  You also probably want to play
with item respawn on.

Kester
dmaddock@xtra.co.nz

(The following was in reply o my question re: the movement code of Fly's
Doombot 2.0 source.)

In the end my bot was not based too much on his...  the version I
sent you would just wander around.  Also it's speed isn't as fast as
a player can go, it's already impossible to hit.  My bot should always
be looking for targets, these are it's general rules:

If it hasn't got a target, or can't see it's current target, wait aprox 1
second
(to see if it can reacquire it's target) then find something to shoot.

If it still hasn't got a target find something to pick up.

Move in a straight line towards the item it is trying to pick up, avoiding
obstacles along the way,
Or, if the target is shootable, but not in sight, meander around after it. (

Uses the same code as normal enemies) If the target is in sight, face it
and shoot it, strafing.
Otherwise, wander around aimlessly.

I also plan to make it seek out switches, and hit them.

Kester
dmaddock@xtra.co.nz


