Bot Developer Agent Skill

Bot Developer

Expert in building production-grade bots with proper architecture, state management, and scalability.

Quick Start

User: "Build a Discord moderation bot with auto-mod"

Bot Developer:
1. Set up event-driven architecture (message broker + service layer)
2. Implement state machine for multi-turn mod flows
3. Add distributed rate limiting (Redis)
4. Create point-based moderation with decay
5. Configure auto-mod rules (spam, caps, links, words)
6. Deploy with proper logging and error handling

Key principle: Production bots need rate limiting, state management, and graceful degradation—not just command handlers.

Core Capabilities

1. Platform Expertise

| Platform | Connection | Best For |

|----------|------------|----------|

| Discord | Gateway (WebSocket) | Gaming communities, large servers |

| Telegram | Webhook (production) | International, groups/channels |

| Slack | Socket Mode/Webhook | Workplace, integrations |

2. Production Architecture

• Event-driven design with message broker (Redis Streams / RabbitMQ)
• Service layer separation (User, Moderation, Economy, Integration)
• PostgreSQL + Redis + S3 data layer
• Cog-based modular structure

3. State Management

• Finite state machines for multi-turn conversations
• Timeout handling (auto-reset after inactivity)
• Race condition prevention
• Context preservation across turns

4. Rate Limiting

• Distributed limiter with Redis backend
• Adaptive limiter responding to API headers
• Per-user, per-guild, and global buckets
• Graceful degradation with retry-after info

5. Moderation System

• Point-based escalation (configurable thresholds)
• Automatic decay over time
• Auto-mod rules (spam, caps, links, banned words)
• Fuzzy matching to catch bypass attempts (l33t speak)
• Audit logging for compliance

Escalation Thresholds

| Points | Action |

|--------|--------|

| 0-2 | No action |

| 3-5 | Mute |

| 6-9 | Kick |

| 10-14 | Temp Ban |

| 15+ | Permanent Ban |

Auto-Mod Rules

| Rule | Detection Method |

|------|-----------------|

| Spam | Message frequency per sliding window |

| Caps | Character ratio (>70% uppercase) |

| Links | URL regex + domain whitelist |

| Words | Dictionary + Levenshtein (85% threshold) |

| Mentions | @mention counting with variants |

| Invites | Discord invite regex + URL expansion |

When to Use

Use for:

• Discord/Telegram/Slack bot development
• Moderation and auto-mod systems
• Multi-turn conversational flows
• Economy/XP/leveling systems
• Integration with external APIs

Do NOT use for:

• Web APIs without chat interface (use backend-architect)
• General automation scripts (use python-pro)
• Frontend chat widgets (use frontend-developer)
• AI/ML model integration alone (use ai-engineer)

Anti-Patterns

Anti-Pattern: Polling in Production

What it looks like: Using bot.polling() or long-polling for Telegram

Why wrong: Wastes resources, slower response, can't scale

Instead: Use webhooks with proper verification

Anti-Pattern: No Rate Limiting

What it looks like: Sending API requests without throttling

Why wrong: Gets bot banned, triggers 429s, poor UX

Instead: Implement adaptive rate limiter respecting API headers

Anti-Pattern: In-Memory State Only

What it looks like: Storing conversation state in Python dict

Why wrong: Lost on restart, can't scale to multiple instances

Instead: Redis for state, PostgreSQL for persistence

Anti-Pattern: Blocking Event Handlers

What it looks like: Long-running operations in on_message

Why wrong: Blocks all other events, causes timeouts

Instead: Async tasks, message queue for heavy work

Security Checklist

TOKEN SECURITY
├── Never commit tokens to git
├── Use environment variables or secret manager
├── Rotate tokens if exposed
└── Separate tokens for dev/staging/prod

PERMISSION CHECKS
├── Verify user permissions before action
├── Use platform's permission system
├── Check bot's permissions before attempting
└── Fail safely if permissions missing

INPUT VALIDATION
├── Sanitize all user input
├── Validate command arguments
├── Parameterized queries (no SQL injection)
└── Rate limit user-triggered actions

Reference Files

• references/architecture-patterns.md - Event-driven architecture, state machines
• references/rate-limiting.md - Distributed and adaptive rate limiting
• references/moderation-system.md - Point-based moderation, auto-mod
• references/platform-templates.md - Discord.py, Telegram webhook templates, security

Core insight: Production bots fail from rate limiting and state bugs, not from bad command logic. Build infrastructure first.

Use with: ai-engineer (LLM integration) | backend-architect (API design) | deployment-engineer (hosting)