Fortnite Battle Royale is adding bots

The unstoppable juggernaut that is Fortnite Battle Royale will be making some changes to its matchmaking to make life less tedious for beginners and less-devoted players. I'm sure the internet will react calmly and proportionally.

The headline change, though, is probably given away by the, uh, headline. There will be bots.

An impressively purple news post on Epic's site outlines the general idea - after the coming v10.40 update, players will be matched with others who are judged as similarly skilled by the all-knowing algorithms. After two years of constant play the most terrifying players will thus find fewer hopeless newborns to prey on, who in turn can frolic and gambol in the hills without fear. Well, not as much fear. It'll still be a murderfest, obviously. It's pretty clear the goal is to give players a better shot at improving their skills and sharing in the joy and glory of an occasional victory, without being repeatedly smeared into paste by people they've no hope of defeating.

Bots will be coming to complement the matchmaking changes in update v10.40, too. The Epic post stresses that "They will behave similarly to normal players and will help provide a better path for players to grow in skill. Bots will work in conjunction with the new matchmaking system, and as your skill improves, you’ll face fewer Bots. Bots will not be present in Competitive playlists."