it says this in the netbots components (botnetop.tcl*) doc:
Note that botnetop.tcl regularly clears and/or overwrites the need settings (need-op, need-invite, etc.) at intervals to prevent errors when upgrading or switching to botnetop.tcl from another script. If you require need settings for another purpose you should use need 'binds' (eggdrop 1.6 only) instead.
it does indeed remove my need-*'s set in the conf. I need the bots to be able to ask chanserv for ops, while also asking other bots for ops. what good is this if all of the bots are deopped?
Refer to tcl-commands.doc (do a find for "bind need") for the full documentation, but here is an example of config file entries assuming your proc is named "chanserv_op":