I don’t want to side with the developers, who are currently making a terrible impression in front of the players, showing a huge degree of immaturity, incompetence, and inability to learn from past mistakes. Nor do I wish to fuel the endless argument between those who prefer PvP and those who prefer PvE.
However, in the official pre-launch statements, when DICE referred to the fact that verified experiences would keep regular XP progression similar to standard multiplayer, there was no explicit mention of the “no bots” or “fill with bots” issue. That aspect simply wasn’t addressed.
Was that intentional? I don’t know. But it’s easy to imagine it was. The developers are certainly clever — by leaving that ambiguity, they gave themselves room to later remove, with ease, the ability to earn XP progression in verified Portal servers, where I, for example, used to play alone against bots.
As has already been pointed out somewhere on this forum: in verified Portal experiences, the only current way to get full XP is to set “no bots.” You’ll see that your verified experience will appear among the others and will have the “full XP” label. The problem is, if no real players join that server, you’ll never actually get to play.
I want to hope this is just a temporary situation and that the developers will find better solutions than the current one.
In short: do verified experiences grant full XP? Yes — but only if you set “no bots.”
For me, the game as it stands is already dead.
I send my best wishes to everyone who loves and will enjoy PvP — may you have many fantastic years of fun — and at the same time, I wish EA great profits with this wonderful game.
I'd counter argue that while they didn't explicitly mention "fill with bots" that since the game launched in that state players had a reasonable expectation that the "bot backfill" setting would have normal progression for the life of the game, for normal experiences anyway that weren't something like bots get 1 HP and only have knives while players get triple HP. This is why I purchased the game, because I saw a screenshot of the options available in portal and that a normal experience with bot backfill and even with some restricted gadgets and such granted full progression.
I don't think EA intentionally did this just to screw over players. But I'm assuming more players ended up using portal mode than they anticipated, which is why they are now trying to discourage portal usage rather than add more servers. They should be adding more servers, because they stated that everyone who purchased the game was entitled to hosting one persistent server. It's not the players' fault that EA/DICE underestimated the interest in using portal, and it's not our fault that EA/DICE is taking a half measure that ruins portal instead of actually investing in the servers/bandwidth to fix the problem.
They should have anticipated this, and they could have avoided it. A good portion of the people who play portal do so because they want persistent lobbies and the ability to see map rotations through a server browser. This is something that countless people kept asking for in regular multiplayer as well as in portal up until release. Another good portion of people play portal because the unlock system is so grindy. Maxxing out a gun required 510 kills in BF4, it requires the XP equivalent of 3000 kills in BF6. Of course people are going to want to play against bots to get attachments, 3000 kills is ridiculous even in normal backfill lobbies, let alone against all humans.
Making the XP equivalent of 500 kills the requirement to max out guns is what they should have done. On top of that, a server browser for regular multiplayer should have been implemented. For those who want custom rotations and restrictions, they could have used the traditional rent a server system from BF3/BF4/BF1. Could even have bot backfill as an option here so servers don't feel empty with less players on them. For those who want to play PVE and don't want to/can't afford to rent a server, let them play solo against bots like 2042 had. It would be a player hosted thing that they can invite friends to as well. The 1 free portal server thing could have been reserved for people who are creating maps and custom game modes.
I completely agree. I also bought the game after seeing screenshots that showed that possibility… same path, and probably the same preferences when it comes to game modes. I too really hoped that having verified experiences with full XP + bots would guarantee years of peaceful gameplay, just like I had in Battlefield 2042 — maybe with fewer restrictions like “moderate XP,” etc.
Probably, in the best-case scenario, for players like me who enjoy playing solo vs bots while still earning XP and progression, the goal will be to regain exactly the same features as the previous game.
Actually, I’d also like to add a few requests:
1. Have the maximum number of bots for both teams (not 24, but 32!) in every game mode.
2. Make the AI controlling the bots slightly smarter (movement, tactics, etc.) and less passive (I’m not saying aim-bot level!).
Maybe it’s just a dream, huh…
Probably, in the best-case scenario, for players like me who enjoy playing solo vs bots while still earning XP and progression, the goal will be to regain exactly the same features as the previous game.
Actually, I’d also like to add a few requests:
1. Have the maximum number of bots for both teams (not 24, but 32!) in every game mode.
2. Make the AI controlling the bots slightly smarter (movement, tactics, etc.) and less passive (I’m not saying aim-bot level!).
Fully Agreed! Full XP and fix the bot fill! I would not be surprised if the bots only filling up to 24 is a bug. Official Matchmaking not populating small modes with AI to start the round | EA Forums - 12808994
I'd counter argue that while they didn't explicitly mention "fill with bots" that since the game launched in that state players had a reasonable expectation that the "bot backfill" setting would have normal progression for the life of the game, for normal experiences anyway that weren't something like bots get 1 HP and only have knives while players get triple HP. This is why I purchased the game, because I saw a screenshot of the options available in portal and that a normal experience with bot backfill and even with some restricted gadgets and such granted full progression.
I don't think EA intentionally did this just to screw over players. But I'm assuming more players ended up using portal mode than they anticipated, which is why they are now trying to discourage portal usage rather than add more servers. They should be adding more servers, because they stated that everyone who purchased the game was entitled to hosting one persistent server. It's not the players' fault that EA/DICE underestimated the interest in using portal, and it's not our fault that EA/DICE is taking a half measure that ruins portal instead of actually investing in the servers/bandwidth to fix the problem.
They should have anticipated this, and they could have avoided it. A good portion of the people who play portal do so because they want persistent lobbies and the ability to see map rotations through a server browser. This is something that countless people kept asking for in regular multiplayer as well as in portal up until release. Another good portion of people play portal because the unlock system is so grindy. Maxxing out a gun required 510 kills in BF4, it requires the XP equivalent of 3000 kills in BF6. Of course people are going to want to play against bots to get attachments, 3000 kills is ridiculous even in normal backfill lobbies, let alone against all humans.
Making the XP equivalent of 500 kills the requirement to max out guns is what they should have done. On top of that, a server browser for regular multiplayer should have been implemented. For those who want custom rotations and restrictions, they could have used the traditional rent a server system from BF3/BF4/BF1. Could even have bot backfill as an option here so servers don't feel empty with less players on them. For those who want to play PVE and don't want to/can't afford to rent a server, let them play solo against bots like 2042 had. It would be a player hosted thing that they can invite friends to as well. The 1 free portal server thing could have been reserved for people who are creating maps and custom game modes.
They had the entire precedent of 2042 to know what would happen and 4 years to find an elegant solution that discriminates between farming servers and normal servers that still need bots to start and full progression to be worth joining
If they did not repeat this to screw with us then they are dunces who cannot learn lessons from the past.
I hope that the new owners will start cleaning up the weak links in the chain of command sooner than later
