CordBase vs MEE6, Arcane and other leveling bots
Written by the CordBase team. Competitor prices and features checked against their own sites; see sources below.
The short answer
If you want members to earn XP just by chatting, with level-up roles, use a leveling bot. MEE6, Arcane, Lurkr, Tatsu and AmariBot all do this and CordBase doesn't. If your points come from things that happen outside chat (raid attendance, event wins, contributions, tournament results) or you need more than one number per member, CordBase is built for that. Plenty of servers run both.
| What you need | CordBase | Leveling bots (MEE6, Arcane, Lurkr...) |
|---|---|---|
| XP for sending messages | No | Yes, automatically |
| XP for voice activity | No | Some (Arcane Premium, AmariBot) |
| Level-up roles | No | Yes |
| Points awarded by staff | Yes: /xp update with Increment or Decrement | Usually one manual XP command, e.g. MEE6 /give-xp |
| Several stats per member (wins, losses, attendance) | Yes, up to 25 columns per table (query and update expose the first 24 or 23) | Usually a single XP number (some add weekly or monthly XP) |
| Several leaderboards | Yes, one per number column, across as many tables as your plan allows | One XP leaderboard (some add weekly/monthly views) |
| Public web leaderboard page | No | Yes (MEE6, Lurkr, others) |
| Price to start | Free: 2 tables, 100 rows each | Free tiers vary; Lurkr is free |
What leveling bots do well
Leveling bots watch chat and hand out XP. MEE6 gives a random 15 to 25 XP per message, at most once a minute, with level-up announcements, role rewards and a web leaderboard (MEE6 docs). Arcane's free plan covers message and reaction XP and up to 15 role rewards; voice XP and custom XP rates are in Premium at $7/month (Arcane). Lurkr says all of its features are free, with up to 50 reward roles and a 100-member web leaderboard (Lurkr). Tatsu adds server scores, a role store and up to 10 leveled roles for free (Tatsu).
If "reward the people who show up and talk" is the whole goal, any of these will do it with less setup than CordBase, because CordBase can't see chat at all. It only responds to slash commands and doesn't request Discord's Message Content intent.
Where they stop
A leveling bot usually tracks one number per member: XP, earned from activity. That breaks down when:
- Points come from something the bot can't observe, like who attended Tuesday's raid or who won the scrim.
- You want several stats side by side: wins, losses, kills, event attendance, a rank.
- You want more than one board: a season leaderboard and an all-time one, or separate boards per game.
- You want to see the history of why someone has those points.
You can fake some of this with manual XP commands, but you're bending a chat-activity system into a scorekeeping one.
How CordBase handles it
In CordBase you design a table on the web. A points table might have name (text), member, points and wins columns. Put the text name column first: the bot uses it to label leaderboard entries and to find rows when you start typing in the row option. The bot turns the table into commands:
/points add name:Kai member:@Kai points:10adds a row./points update row:Kai points:5 _mode:Incrementadds 5 to Kai's current points. Increment and Decrement are applied atomically, so two moderators awarding points at once both count./points leaderboard column:pointsranks the top 10 (up to 25), highest first. Change the column to rank by wins instead.
Role permissions decide who can award points (write) and who can only look (read). There's a ready-made Server Leaderboard template (player, score, wins, losses, rank, last game) and a DKP Tracker template for raid guilds.
What you give up: points don't accrue on their own, nobody gets a role at level 10, and there's no public leaderboard web page. Someone has to run a command.
Prices (checked October 2026)
- MEE6 Premium is per server. The list price is $11.99/month, $49.99/year or $89.99 lifetime, and MEE6 often runs first-period discounts (MEE6). Which parts of leveling are free has changed over time; check the current plan page.
- Arcane Premium: $7/month or $75/year (Arcane).
- Lurkr: free, with optional $1 and $5/month tiers (Lurkr).
- Tatsu server plans: $4.99 and $8.99/month (Tatsu).
- CordBase: free for 2 tables and 100 rows per table; Pro is $8/month for unlimited tables and 10,000 rows per table (pricing).
Choose Leveling bots if
- You want XP to build up automatically from messages or voice.
- You want level-up roles and announcements.
- You want a public leaderboard web page members can share.
Choose CordBase if
- Points come from events, raids, matches or staff decisions, not chat volume.
- You need several stats per member or several leaderboards.
- You want an inventory, signup list or roster in the same bot as your scores.
Questions
Can CordBase replace MEE6?
Only if you don't need automatic chat XP or level roles. CordBase doesn't read messages, so it can't award XP for activity. Many servers keep a leveling bot for chat XP and use CordBase for event points and other records.
Is there a free XP bot without a paywall?
Lurkr says all its features are free, and Arcane's free plan covers message XP and 15 role rewards. CordBase is free for 2 tables, but it's a points tracker, not an automatic XP bot.
Can I make a leaderboard for wins or kills instead of XP?
Yes. Create a table with a number column for each stat, then run /<table> leaderboard column:wins. Every number column can be ranked.
Sources
Product names belong to their owners. CordBase isn’t affiliated with any of them. Spot something out of date? Email support@cordbase.gg and we’ll fix it.
Try CordBase on your server. Free for 2 tables, no card needed.