Sunken Scoop 20: AMA Answers and Ambulocetus Progress!

[ashgcy]

Welcome back sunken survivors!

There was a lot of quizzical activity in the past two weeks, literally! The TSW AMA was full of some amazing questions, and we thoroughly enjoyed answering everything you asked us! We've organised all the questions and answers we gave into this scoop, so you can (maybe) find out something new you didn't know about the project. In addition, NISIS is back casting his magic spells on Ambulocetus, and we've got an amazing WIP of its saddle design to show off! Keep reading to find out more!

If this is your first time diving into the deep end, we are a dedicated team of individuals who are looking to spruce up the ocean biome in the same way that Scorched Earth offered a unique, biome specific challenge to survival. New creatures, resources, structures, items and more, all set on a huge custom map, we're looking to give ARK's oceans the TLC they deserve! The main goal is to bridge that huge gap between early and late game ocean exploration, and make it much more viable and more fun to live a life beneath the waves! This is unofficial content and is only related to our mod. It is in no way related with the official game and its content releases.

Let's dive into the scoop!

---

AMBULOCETUS TLC PROGRESS

That water puppy is looking very well dressed! NISIS has started work on Ambulocetus' saddle design, and it's well and truly shaping up to be something magnificent! We decided early on (as you can tell from the concept art) that this saddle should have a bit more life to it than your average vanilla saddle. The days of plain brown leather straps and seats are gone, say hello to the new hotness!

---

ANSWERS FROM THE AMA

 

After 2 weeks of time, and 22 questions worth of answers, it seems there's a lot of things that you want to know about TSW! Below you can find all the answers to your burning questions, organised neatly into related topic sections!

Protoceratops! What does it do, where does it spawn, etc.

Our loveable little ceratopsian will most likely be spawning on Scorched Earth/maps with deserts until the TSW map drops. Protoceratops' main niche on the TSW map will be gathering fruit from trees (these fruits provide Aberration mushroom style buffs when eaten). They're also excellent at using their animalistic instincts to predict the weather! However, to give them functionality off of their native map, they'll function like truffle pigs, gathering increased amounts of rare flowers and rare mushrooms.

We also got a few questions about combat ability on the little guys. Protoceratops is intended to be an early game mount, so expect more early game damage output and tankiness. While it's still very early in development, it will most likely be like a more agile, less tanky Trike!

 

What went into creating the TSW Team? How do you decide who gets into the team? How would I make a modding team myself?

This was a fun question! For the most part, a lot of the people in the TSW team got in thanks to "right place, right time", including me! However, when it comes to adding more team members, that tends to stem from what the project needs most. As we've said many a time, we desperately need some animators and devkit coders, so right now that's what we're looking for. 

When it comes to making your own team, it's important to consider what you can do yourself, then get someone to help fill in the gaps! For example, if you can do art and 3D modelling, you'd want someone who can animate and code. It's less about team size and more about diversity of skills, though we do have quite a large team to make sure we're covering all our bases when it comes to modding for ARK!

However, the most important part of making a team is to make sure everyone gets along! In the TSW team, everyone hates each other! Seriously though, behind the scenes we're basically like a big weird family. All of us are super passionate about the project and just generally really enjoy each other's company, and that makes creating this mod even more enjoyable

 

What creatures are next? How do you decide what's coming next?

As mentioned previously, our current plans are to port over the fish from ASE, then start work on Proto. In addition, we have Ambulocetus' TLC coming up too! When it comes to deciding what creatures we add next, it's down to "mysterious brain goblins". Unironically though, we do have a more loosey goosey approach to what comes out next. Since snappin is our one man army when it comes to coding, the most important thing for us to consider is to avoid burnout for him and the rest of the team. It's also why we don't say too many release dates in regards to updates and new content. At the end of the day, we're just a dedicated team of ARK fans, so we try to keep things more fun and casual so we don't stress ourselves out.

While we can't make any promises for what's coming next, expect creatures from ASE to be more likely than entirely new ones. As we've been saying half to death, our need for animators is a massive bottleneck, so we really need those before we can start work on the new creatures coming to ASA.

 

How will <insert upcoming creature here> work? What're its stats, abilities and so on?

With the way we design creatures, we don't tend to know exact stats until later in the development process. We also don't want to make promises on super specific mechanics in case we are unable to code them in due to limitations in the devkit. However, we tend to base power levels around similarly strong vanilla creatures, tuned up or down depending on their niches.

However, all of our upcoming creatures will be tameable! We always found that being unable to tame some creatures in vanilla was really sad. Everything on the roster will function like a proper pet/mount/war-beast!

 

What's the map going to be like on ASA? Will there be ruins? How will building work? Etc etc.

First off, how big is it going to be? Simple question, simple answer. Most likely, it'll be a bit larger than The Island. In ASE, the map was comparable in size to a deeper version of The Center. The ocean won't just be a border to the map, it'll be an interconnected habitat full of life, far more interesting than the 100,000 Megalodons of most other maps! Another change from the ASE branch will be redesigning how Scurvy works. We may even end up removing it.

Another exciting part of TSW for us is sharing the story behind the map! We are working on this behind the scenes, and can't wait to use ruined structures, like the Sunken City, to do a bit of environmental storytelling! In most cases, much like vanilla ARK, these ruins be able to be built and lived in, allowing for some fun RP opportunities. We aren't ready to show anything involving this story, as it's still heavy in development, but we're very excited to see you uncover the mysteries of TSW!

In terms of building, it'd be dumb to have you guys wait all the way until vacuum compartments before you can live under the waves. Henodus is an excellent early game option, but for a more permanent residence Coral tier structures are going to be your go to! These living buildings will be oxygenated by our native Plant Species O, a giant alien kelp that produces fruits filled with air. Again, we're not entirely sure how the mechanics will work in game, but we are planning to have a singular Species O function like an oxygen generator for your whole base. We may end up having to make it more of an AOE like the Henodus though. We want Plant Species O to spawn in the wild like Z does. You'll be able to collect seeds from them to grow your own, or even build directly on top of a wild one for a quick and dirty home in the deep blue!

There's also a bit of pressure to your way of aquatic life thanks to... uhh... the pressure! As you go deeper, the crushing darkness of the deep sea can kill! These zones will function like the radiation zones on Aberration, meaning you'll need to be well equipped to explore them, but you won't be punished for starting to dip your toes into the depths. Also, just like Ab, some creatures will be immune to the effects of these areas. Originally, we wanted pressure to be a slowly increasing debuff that restricted creatures to mostly their native depth levels, but decided against it. Realism is great and all, but when it gets in the way of a fun experience exploring a map, that's not worth it!

Finally, no map would be complete without bosses! We've got <redacted>, <redacted> and <redacted> planned as our big bosses! Sorry folks, the bosses are going to be staying secret for now. We're still deciding on if they'll be world or arena bosses, but we do know that we want players to be able to bring almost anything to fight them! A lot of the team agrees, it really sucks breeding up a cool creature, only to be barred from using it in a boss fight because the game said so.

 

What about ASE?

We've said this one before, and we'll say it again. We'd love to keep both versions of the mod updated, but with snappin as our only coder that's just not possible. We're focusing our efforts purely on the ASA branch, as that's a lot more promising for modding.

 

What about the future of TSW? Any new creatures planned? ARK 2? Other projects?

As it stands, there will be no more unique creature additions to the creature roster. Our project is super ambitious already, so we can't fit more creatures in the pipeline.

In terms of other projects similar to TSW, there's nothing planned at the moment, but that's not to say that it isn't out of the question. Same goes for ARK 2, we'd much prefer to finish everything we need to get done for TSW in ASA than jump ship another time, especially since we know so little about it.

---

COMMUNITY CORNER

We should start calling this the community chasm, because most of the time it's a big hole with nothing in it! Only joking around of course, but if you do have anything you'd like to share, please feel free to send over some screenshots, artwork/fanart, videos or anything in between! There's a submssions channel in our Discord, or you can tag us @ARKSunken or with the hashtag #sunkenscoop on Twitter!

---

That's all for this edition of the Sunken Scoop, thanks for tuning in! Hope you're excited to see more of Ambulocetus, and thank you for submitting so many questions to the AMA! Come vibe in our discord if you want to see more TSW! Have a wonderful timezone!

If this is your first time seeing TSW, check out the links below to find out more! Please note that if you want to play our mod, you need both the map and creature mod active.
Discord: https://discord.gg/BAkvgc7
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ArkSunken
Map Mod (ASE): https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2182740759
Creature Mod (ASE): https://steamcommunity.com/workshop/filedetails/?id=2182770728
Creature Mod (ASA): https://legacy.curseforge.com/ark-survival-ascended/mods/the-sunken-world-additions