Bots? In my 7447?

My attention was diverted to a mahjong thread the other day, and something among the posts caught my eye, a welcome change from the usual jaw-dropping, eye-bleeding, rage-inducing tenhou screenshots. There was a certain amount of conjecture regarding the quality of play as well as the amount of bots, or automatic mahjong-playing programs, infesting lobby 7447 and tenhou as a whole.

As someone in possession of the facts, I wouldn’t mind clearing up this minor issue for you players out there who are concerned about the humanity of their opponents.

There are no bots on 7447.

Well, no mahjong-playing bots.

Anyone who has been on the channel will have seen the IRC tenhou bot in action. It provides various useful services such as scoring and hand wait calculations, 7447 queue status, and notification of starting games and ending scores.

Most importantly, it functions as an anonymous outlet with which to harangue players in the lobby chat with various diatribes, which can be immature,

[02:52] <%tenhou> #CHAT ashen123(GUEST): hello~!
[02:53] <%tenhou> #CHAT Dashiva: haro
[02:53] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] dicks

rude,

[02:11] <%tenhou> #CHAT phoz: well im off.
[02:12] <%tenhou> #CHAT Flonne: good
[02:12] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] choke on a bouquet of cocks

or when used in combination with the chatbot, downright bizarre:

[19:18] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] go for a day lol.
[19:18] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] you have a friend are thinking of opening up #comiket.
[19:18] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] go for a while.
[19:18] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: #komiket
[19:18] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: ff
[19:19] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] you have to type a smiley or not, but i dont like to me.
[19:19] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: whatt&
[19:19] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] you have xd.
[19:19] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: wat arrr urrrr spiiiik aboooout?
[19:19] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] you have a keyboard.
[19:19] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: yep
[19:20] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] you have a total of 4,510 lolis.
[19:20] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: i have a keyboard
[19:20] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: lolis?
[19:20] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] choke on a cell phone.
[19:20] <%tenhou> #CHAT Hrfag: go play akadora
[19:20] <%tenhou> #CHAT 7447bot: [HQ] go for a white guy <3

Mahjong-playing bots do exist. However access and ownership of the programs is limited to a handful of people, who have no interest in setting them loose on our private lobby. It’s a mahjong server, not a pokemon safari park. If you ever played against one, you would have noticed a very obvious and straightforward way of identifying them. As for the individuals who claim to have played against bots, perhaps the truth may be even more surprising – some people really are that bad.

End of public service announcement. Thank you for flying 7447.