[Petition To Add Ambush To Sandstorm]

In New World's most recent Community Update, which you can find here, Mikee wrote that Ambush is not planned to be added in 2019. Rather, it's delayed until 2020:

why.PNG

NWI's reasoning for delaying Ambush boils down to the second Community Survey results, with Frontline having a majority vote over Ambush. However, I think this call is pretty poor. Frontline only got the majority by less than a two percent margin, so cutting Ambush completely seems pretty absurd. It makes the most sense to add in either both game modes at once or neither at all. If Frontline had more of a majority, then delaying Ambush would make more sense, but those results are way too close to pick one gamemode over the other.

I also don't really understand why Frontline's being added. Now, I'm biased here, because I never played Frontline and never even knew that was a mode in Day of Infamy until I saw it on the second survey, but NWI's reasoning for picking Frontline doesn't make much sense:

Frontline is, after all, also quite similar to Push, which is our most popular PvP mode in both Insurgency 2014 and Insurgency: Sandstorm. It makes sense to try to build something for that majority of players to enjoy.

So, if Frontline's similar to a gamemode that's already in the game... why bother adding it? Upon further research, Frontline essentially seems like a combo of both Push and Skirmish, which was fine for Day of Infamy because DoI doesn't really have a Skirmish mode like Ins2014. However, it seems pretty unoriginal to add in a gamemode that's extremely similar to gamemodes that already exist in Sandstorm, not to mention the fact that it'll probably confuse the hell out of new players trying to figure out how each gamemode works. Ambush, on the other hand, is completely new and has basically nothing in common with the current gamemodes in Sandstorm, and would provide a breath of fresh air for PvP players tired of Push and Skirmish. But apparently, Ambush is just too much work for NWI to deal with:

Ambush would also require more production for things such as custom character artwork for the VIP that really sticks out from our eclectic and highly customizable faction characters.

I'd like Ambush to be added instead of another gamemode for a few reasons:

  1. I've wanted Ambush in from the start, like a lot of other players. There's a reason we started a petition last year about adding Ambush into Sandstorm. You can find the petition here: https://saveambush.org/

  2. The survey results do say that Ambush is played by a "minority", but what that fails to take into account is that many Ambush players are Ins2014 veterans. I'd argue that most Ambush players are actually vets, and almost all of those signatures on that petition were from veterans, myself included.

  3. Ambush requires the most tactics, teamwork, and coordination of any gamemode in Insurgency: Source. It's one of many reasons why vets flocked to this gamemode, as it's much more interesting than rushing the same objectives and spamming smokes/frags/rockets in a mode like Push. Spawn camping in Ambush is also virtually impossible since it's a one-life gamemode.

I'm a diehard fan of VIP-style gamemodes. I've loved playing them since the modded days of Medal of Honor: Assault Assault - Breakthrough. I've even got the most popular Ambush guide for Insurgency. I've already waited an entire year without any news on Ambush, and now I've been told I have to wait for another year.

If I'm being honest, most, if not all, Insurgency: Source veterans have already left Sandstorm, for one reason or another. Some left because of crappy optimization. Others left because of the lack of lethality. Some left because of the bugs in-game. But quite a lot of Ins2014 vets left because the most tactical gamemode in Ins2014 isn't in Sandstorm. Adding Ambush is a step towards getting those veterans back, along with bug fixing, optimization, and improvements to the gunplay and gameplay mechanics to make Sandstorm really feel like an Insurgency title. Sandstorm could easily be the best first-person shooter this year if NWI just brings the game back to its roots.

Now, I'm still assuming that adding in three gamemodes by the end of this year just isn't plausible. People want to see Frontline added, so I'm not against the mode being added to Sandstorm; I just don't think it should be sacrificed for Ambush. However, what could be sacrificed for Ambush is Outpost. Coming from someone who's only been playing Sandstorm Cooperative modes (the only PvP mode I played in Ins2 was Ambush), the AI is currently broken as hell. I've got quite a few posts talking about it, the main one being one of the most upvoted posts in this forum section. It's been broken for months now, and I'm nearly convinced that NWI doesn't really care about fixing it, so I'd rather just see Outpost scrapped entirely for Ambush instead.

Trust me, I'd rather play Ambush than play Outpost with AI that currently behaves like this:

Youtube Video

Having to deal with this on defense would be a living hell.

last edited by MarksmanMax

This game is desperately lacking in content compared to Insurgency anyway, so I do not think that this game will ever catch up to that game no matter what the developers are working on.

@MarksmanMax AGREE-BUMP-UPVOTE. Well spoken I whole heartedly agree with from what I remember everything you said lol. Just fucking give us AMBUSH! It boggled my mind to think that they thought the smart idea for a already shrinking and divided community was to add another game mode similar to one(s) currently already in the fucking game... Come on guys! I have played quite a bit of frontline. Fun sure but not what this game needs... Goddamn might as well have just added another damn Co-op mode smdh. Sincerely an extremely concerned vet...

last edited by planetcanada

@planetcanada said in [Petition To Add Ambush To Sandstorm]:

Goddamn might as well have just added another damn Co-op mode smdh.

Yeah, add in more Coop modes while the AI is completely unbalanced lmao.

Does anyone else prefer to have Ambush added instead of Outpost/Frontline? I'm kind of curious to see what Coop players think of this whole thing.

Outpost was pretty fun in Insurgency, mostly because the bots weren’t the brightest and would banzai charge the cache. With the current AI, I don’t think it’ll be as fun. If adding Ambush makes people happy, then I’d sacrifice Outpost. If the AI were to be fixed, then why not both.

@cptns said in [Petition To Add Ambush To Sandstorm]:

Outpost was pretty fun in Insurgency, mostly because the bots weren’t the brightest and would banzai charge the cache. With the current AI, I don’t think it’ll be as fun. If adding Ambush makes people happy, then I’d sacrifice Outpost. If the AI were to be fixed, then why not both.

Honestly, the best move here would just be to add all three modes. It's ridiculous that Ambush was the second-most-chosen gamemode in the first survey, and NWI chose to ignore it in favor of the third-most-chosen which is Outpost. Plus, there's already several variations of Checkpoint that are each basically their own gamemodes due to how different the gameplay is.

EDIT: They've also already added two new Coop gamemodes (Hardcore and Frenzy) and only one new PvP mode (TDM), so focusing on two more PvP modes wouldn't cause an imbalance or anything.

last edited by MarksmanMax

@MarksmanMax “EDIT: They've also already added two new Coop gamemodes (Hardcore and Frenzy) and only one new PvP mode (TDM), so focusing on two more PvP modes wouldn't cause an imbalance or anything.”

That’s the part that really confused me...

Hello everyone,

First off, thank you for letting us know your feedback regarding Ambush.

As mentioned in the thread, the team are still committed to developping this PvP mode. However, I'll pass your opinions on to the team, so they can have a better idea about this.

@chaton said in [Petition To Add Ambush To Sandstorm]:

As mentioned in the thread, the team are still committed to developping this PvP mode. However, I'll pass your opinions on to the team, so they can have a better idea about this.

In the recent streams, Mikee went a bit more in-depth on why Ambush is being delayed, and while I'm still not happy about the news, he did at least make the whole decision a bit clearer. Still, I kinda wish it was picked over Outpost lol.

Nobody would care if the VIP was just the base model in a T-shirt and hat.

We could just make game modes modifiable, and let the community do some of the work, which could then be brought into the main game.

The speed of content releases is very low, letting the community help meet some of these needs would solve a lot of complaints about that.

Ambush was my favorite mode in Ins2014. I don't know if adding it now to Sandstorm would unnecessarily split the playerbase further, but it was a great game mode. It'd been cool to play it competitively, but usually the maps weren't quite balanced enough for that.

@tzaeru said in [Petition To Add Ambush To Sandstorm]:

Ambush was my favorite mode in Ins2014. I don't know if adding it now to Sandstorm would unnecessarily split the playerbase further, but it was a great game mode.

I don't think it would split the playerbase at all, really. Ambush already has a dedicated playerbase that hasn't moved to Sandstorm since it's not in-game yet.

Just give us Ambush already! Lol and Versus Hardcore... Hardcore Versus what ever the hell you want to call it.

you know what would fix all of this, mod support.
i'm no game developer or anything but I've dabbled in modding and I know it can't be that complicated to make some new game modes on the existing maps.