The Latest Casual Playlist Ignites Heated Discussions Over AI Players, Experience Points, and Queue Times

Recently, Battlefield Studios introduced a new playlist called Relaxed Breakthrough. To put it simply, this mode resembles the standard Breakthrough setup but includes several key adjustments:

  • Every squad has only 8 real players, with the remaining filled by 32 bots.
  • Activities done by real players award complete experience points, while AI activities offer lower rewards.
  • Only two locations are available: Siege of Cairo and Empire State.
  • Features like Player tags, accolades, and career stat updates are disabled.

So essentially, the playlist delivers on its name: it's a casual take of Breakthrough. At face value, you might think there's nothing wrong, as it provides more options for gamers looking for different ways to have fun with the game. But, if video games has shown one thing, it is that not everyone will be happy. In other words, many Battlefield 6 fans are mad.

Community Reactions: From Fury to Support

"People want real players. Avoid making the mistakes of your rivals," reads one reply to the official announcement. "Absolutely shocking idea," comments a different user. Meanwhile, on the Battlefield subreddit, a player notes, "I have no idea where we are headed with this title," and someone else details everything they believe to be broken in the game: "Fix bugs, address drone issues, correct rocket mechanics, fix [the] bloom after sprinting bug, fix awful hit registration. We don't need this bot mode."

However, for every complaint, some gamers sharing how much they're enjoying the new mode. "It's very fun to warm up, human participants keep it from being a total farmfest but it's quite laid-back," says a forum post. "This subreddit doesn't understand that there are gamers who have lives and don't play this game 24/7. Allow them to find a middle ground," adds another. One reply on Twitter clarifies that as they're "a parent gamer with limited time, this is great for me," and another applauds the mode for "avoiding intense competition."

Valid Concerns and Player Feedback

Despite the support, there are valid points to complain about the new mode. A few folks have pointed out that it will make queue times even longer for other modes due to the large amount of playlists currently available. Similarly, certain regions already encounter AI-filled matches in the existing playlists. Additionally, it appears somewhat counterintuitive that the mode does not begin without a minimum number of human gamers, even though it primarily centers on combat against bots.

Finally, a major grievances is that a previous feature was promised to provide complete rewards, including AI matches, but that got canned when they attempted to eliminate bot farms from the system. Thus Casual Breakthrough seems like the community compromising in the middle, as per a Reddit comment. Another labels this mode as the developers "dropping the ball so hard, I had great enjoyment in the initial release, why did they feel the need to adjust it?"

Future Prospects: Will Changes Occur?

If Battlefield Studios has proven anything so far with the latest installment, it's that they're listening and responding to feedback. Assignments that were overly hard were adjusted very quickly, just like the required Redsec challenges. Chances are that, should analytics shows this recent mode isn't performing to their expectations, they will not hesitate to change it again.

Russell King
Russell King

A digital strategist and tech writer with over a decade of experience in software development and emerging technologies.