BOTS & Humans League every Tuesday 7-8:30PM CET started

Lichess recently rolled out a new feature that allows tournament organizers of Arenas & Team Battles to allow bots in their tournaments, if the button is turned on:

Inspired by a 12h Blitz with BOTs Arena by Lichess user DarkOnCrack, I felt like it was time to try out this new possibility with a League system, just like for the Lichess Bundesliga or Rapid League.

Qualifier Team Battle

Therefore yesterday a Qualifier event took part including 30 BOT accounts and 250 human accounts to identify which teams should start in which league. The first 10 teams were placed into the new first league, teams 11-20 into the second league and so on (see future links below).

Congratulations to the Engine Testers team, a Chess Engine Community that claims "We're tired of Stockfish bots ruining our games, so we're creating a private group to run tournaments between our own chess engines."

Since it's impossible for Lichess to identify if a participating BOT is run by Stockfish or not, currently no rule can be enforced to only allow a certain amount of Stockfish accounts in each Team battle. An ongoing discussion about which BOTS should be allowed or not is currently taking place in the Info team forums.

Upcoming BOTS & Human League on Tuesday, February 25th

Therefore everyone is welcome to join the new league! Humans might be paired with BOTS, Humans with Humans and BOTS with other BOTS as well. Time controls in the BOTS & Humans League that will take place every Tuesday will vary between 1+1 (Bullet), 3+1 (Blitz) and 8+0 (Rapid), time controls might still change pending on feedback. Upcoming BOTS & Humans League:

How can I create a BOT on Lichess?

Check out Thibault's guide on How to create a Lichess bot or also check out the following tutorial video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-6tdy7RmwrA

How can I play against BOT accounts on Lichess?

Try it out now via the Online Bots page.

What are your thoughts on the new BOTS & Humans League? Which BOT is your favorite BOT? Which engines should be allowed or not, which limitations or maximum ratings should be allowed? If you would like to add your team to the league as well, feel free to answer in the blog comments or by private message.