.885 Bore Diplomacy

[M.c.P]

So I've heard noise that, with the bug fixes for the Ambassador and all, no one seems to know what the Ambassador is good for anymore. And its true, if you look at the numbers, it looks like the regular revolver is the far superior weapon. More damage, quicker shots, and I'm sure many of you were extremely unimpressed with the "mini-crits" of the supposed Hand Cannon. So, you write it off as underpowered, and shove it back into your backpack with the 2 others you've received.

We'll, I'm going to prove you wrong, and explain why I'm never going back to the revolver.

There are two things the Ambassador gets for its reduced Damage per Second. Perfect accuracy, and mini-crits. A headshot with the Ambassador will do 46 damage, from any range. Basically, any class with 125 hit points will die in 3 shots to the head.

"So what?" you ask. "Who needs an underpowered sniper rifle?" Well, here's the thing. Snipers can hardly turn invisible, wear disguises, and fake their deaths, can they? It's not just an underpowered sniper rifle. It's an underpowered sniper rifle that can be fired from ANY place on the map, at ANY time.

A practical example. Imagine cp_well. You're team has the middle point, but the enemy is pushing back and there is an enemy sentry nest behind one of the railcars. It's got lots of people chatting by the dispenser, and the engineer is paranoid. What do you do? With the Ambassador, you can head to the enemy sniper balcony, find a good spot outside the sentry range (after murdering any resident snipers, of course), and start plugging away at the engineer.

The engineer has to do several things at this point.
1. Figure out where you're shooting him from before you kill him
2. Get someone to find you before you kill him
3. Failing that, go look for you himself, leaving his sentry nest unattended.

This works even better when the sentry is under attack, as the engineer has to remain in place, making your sniping work all the easier. Just don't forget to move after you finish your attack! Falling into habit kills more spies than any Pyro. Excluding GTO.

There are a few things the Ambassador can't do that the revolver can.
1. It is not quite as effective against buildings. I haven't thoroughly tested it, but it appears to do far less damage to buildings than the damage reduction would suggest. Which is fine, as you're better off shooting the engineer with your consistent long range damage.

2. Does less damage at close range. A sacrifice I'm willing to make. It still kills light classes in 3 (slightly slower) shots, and if you really need more damage than that at any given time, you're probably already dead. Put away the gun and focus on escaping!

Heck, I've found the Ambassador makes a good retreat weapon, especially if you can get your pursuer to at least medium distance. Perfect accuracy is nothing to sneeze at, and you'll be putting bullets into bodies regularly at ranges outside where most classes can really do damage. It's hardly foolproof, but neither was the revolver.

The tl;dr version:

Ambassador shines at long range. Aim for the head!
Use the spy's abilities to get to novel sniping positions
When you get caught, the Ambassador still does respectable damage

Now, if you'll excuse me, me and my Hand Cannon have to facilitate negotiations with a Pipeline. I'll be seeing you!

 

[Mystery Penguin]

EDIT:
PROS
everything

 

[s3rv0]

A practical example. Imagine cp_well. You're team has the middle point, but the enemy is pushing back and there is an enemy sentry nest behind one of the railcars. It's got lots of people chatting by the dispenser, and the engineer is paranoid. What do you do? With the Ambassador, you can head to the enemy sniper balcony, find a good spot outside the sentry range (after murdering any resident snipers, of course), and start plugging away at the engineer.

The engineer has to do several things at this point.
1. Figure out where you're shooting him from before you kill him
2. Get someone to find you before you kill him
3. Failing that, go look for you himself, leaving his sentry nest unattended.

4. Hide behind his gear so you can't hit him, smart engis place gear so they are shields as well as just buildings.
5. Get healed by his level 3 dispenser so you lack the DPS to kill him, because you can't realistically assume you'll get all headshots. The first shot, maybe, but after that you either wait for accuracy to return, time which the engi uses to heal, or shoot wildly inaccurate shots and hope for the best.


Thought I'd fix that for ya.


Edit: Told you it was underpowered. Valve just pushed it to full crits on headshot, thank GOD. Now it really is a handcannon, not a peashooter. Snipers with Razorback beware, a two-shot kill is heading your way.

 

[OSVG]

Yeah... I've never seen the Ambassador do more than 2 shots in the exact same place when chaining; w/o chaining the revolver isn't very effective since it is easy to run and heal while the Ambassador cools down. I just can't see using after the fanfare has died down.

-----

EDIT: as of the new update w/ full crits let's see

 

[WaterSnake]

Just a new update about 4 seconds ago, the Ambassador does full fledged crits now on headshots instead of mini-crits.

 

[Xzero]

Yep, full crits for the Ambassador now.

Updates to Team Fortress 2 have been released. The updates will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The specific changes include:


Team Fortress 2:

• The Ambassador now does full critical hits on headshots, instead of mini crits
• The Cloak & Dagger now fully drains the cloak meter, even if the Spy leaves cloak early
• Fixed Spy disguise menu not being visible in HUD minimal mode

Server log improvements:

• Added "player_extinguish" event for servers to log when a Pyro extinguishes flame with the airburst
• Fixed kill descriptions for Force-A-Nature & Sandman, so server logs can distinguish them
• Identified feign deaths in the events sent to server logs
• Fixed server crash related to the Jarate

 

[M.c.P]

4. Hide behind his gear so you can't hit him, smart engis place gear so they are shields as well as just buildings.
5. Get healed by his level 3 dispenser so you lack the DPS to kill him, because you can't realistically assume you'll get all headshots. The first shot, maybe, but after that you either wait for accuracy to return, time which the engi uses to heal, or shoot wildly inaccurate shots and hope for the best.

See, the point of the spy positioning is to find a location where the engineer CAN'T hide behind his buildings. Or find an elevated position where you can still get headshots on him while he cowers behind his buildings.

And the accuracy "cooldown" is quicker than you'd think, and certainly does more damage per second than a level 3 dispenser. I've killed engineers who thought they could outheal the Ambassador damage. As for consistent headshots, well... practice makes perfect

it does less to the SAME damage as the revolver regular shot on a headshot mini-crit

Close. It does the same to less damage as a revolver at POINT BLANK range. at which point you ought to be stabbing them. Or running.

Edit: I thought that was a joke post Xzero. Now I almost think the Ambassador is overpowered again. I mean, what if I can land consistent headshots at any range? Ah well. My points stand. Except with even more emphasis.

 

[Mystery Penguin]

never mind, ambassador now does Full-fledged crit damage, might be usefull again

 

[Mystery Penguin]

OMG the ambassador is so awesome now!!!!!!!!!!

 

[jshotzz]

still waiting to get one =(

 

[s3rv0]

I would have welcomed you to try to snipe me sitting in an engi nest with level 3 gun and dispenser, but now that we have this buff to the Ambassador, guess we can't do that. I'm confident you wouldn't have been able to three shot me, not even close. A little bit of moving around is all it takes to stay alive against that thing, unless you're confident you would get 100% headshots at range, with no zoom, and an accuracy cooldown, against a moving target. Even just running circles and crouch/jumping around a dispenser would make someone damned hard to hit.

Your situation posted above is one of those "great in theory" things, that I highly doubt would ever be able to consistently work in game. It just requires that perfect storm of no interference, perfect aim, perfect location, etc. that just never quite happens.

Though I do look at this buff as proof of one thing: Valve obviously agreed with those of us who said Ambassador was underpowered.

 

[Carmine]

All your points are well and good for someone who can shoot straight but for me who can only get headshots with the ambassador at point blank range I think I will stick with the regular revolver...

 

[Vandall]

Gonna have to agree with Carmine on this one. This weapon brings skill into the picture, other unlockables really didn't do that. If you can headshot with it use it all you like! If not, well then better stick with the regular revolver.

 

[DRaGZ]

Aw man, the Ambassador is so sexy now.

 

[M.c.P]

Okay, you guys make some good points. And I'll admit, using the Ambassador against sentry nests requires the right kind of room and situation. I play a lot of Valve maps, which often feature some fairly open areas and long sightlines, so I may be spoiled in that regard.

Here's the thing though. Outside of destroying the occasional unattended building, I can't think of a singles situation I could be in which I would think, "Boy, I wish I had the regular revolver right now." It may help with that little bit of damage to kill that guy 1 shot quicker, but should I really be counting on that as a spy? It's not like I was shooting pyros to death before the update came out on a regular basis.

 

[Doomcat]

Here's the thing though. Outside of destroying the occasional unattended building, I can't think of a singles situation I could be in which I would think, "Boy, I wish I had the regular revolver right now." It may help with that little bit of damage to kill that guy 1 shot quicker, but should I really be counting on that as a spy? It's not like I was shooting pyros to death before the update came out on a regular basis.

now, im still waiting on my ambassador but i agree with you, if i get mine i think i'll be useing it with the nice accuracy all the time and you ask why? one word: scouts, those annoying little buggers are frigging HARD TO HIT with the regular revolver because of the bullet spread, hopefully with the ambassador i'll actually be able to HIT them instead of just getting scattergunned at close range after unloading my whole revolver clip...and not hitting a single shot :cursing: :facewall:

also, why the debuff on the Dead Ringer? its not like that thing needed it...