A LEVEL BY
modifications by Sirian and Voyager
| F.R.P. is a beefed-up version of Descent First Strike level 20, with plenty of weapons to go around. Competing on this level requires tremendous concentration and situational awareness. Hide-and-seek and quick draws is the name of the game here. |
| "Good ol' D1 lvl 20. Us oldtimer rats used to play that back in the good (?) old days. I thought "What the hell? I can take him on that one...." But noooooo, Sirian just has to be a mean Master Splinter and teach me some lessons in that lvl. :) Sometimes I wandered around the tunnels looking for Sirian and thought I saw Voyager's blue orbs still floating through the level. :P Well, if you ever play Sirian on that lvl, pleaaase, look out for my blue orbs...lost some of them in there." |
-scream
| "FRP = rat hunt with shotguns. You need nerves of steel, because at any moment you could turn a corner and BLAM! get both barrels in the face. I still have nightmares about Sirian kicking my ass with fusion. I see myself in the game, and then Sirian is in front of me speaking in German: "Guten Tag, Herr Wallboy. Ich bin eine Rat Bastid. =)" And his rat whiskers are twitching with glee, and I see the double barrels of his shotgun light up with that eerie purple glow, and I know I am going to die again. And again. And again. And that he also dreams of it, because to rats like him, this IS paradise." :) |
-Voyager
| "I died, I died, I was dead for good." :) |
-IM_GOOD
| "Sirian is a sneaky rat bastid. He plays an awesome mind game (regardless of level) and can read his opponents very well. Man, I wish it wasn't true, but that really sums it up. He has the ability to scare the sh*t outta me in this level. Not as much now as the first match, but still badly. When I first played it... It is such a dark level... and those mazes are really confusing. When I looked around the level, I did not even find any doors. He asked to play on level 2 because he likes the midi there, instead of the same old level 1 midi all the time... he says that's why he put two copies of the level in the hog file. So I dial him up for the game and the first thing I see is a door! I was sure that he was pulling one over on me with this level 2 thing, but turns out I just didn't look around well enough. Those halls are so tight... and it is very easy to fire your missiles into a wall by mistake when you are confused and trying to do anything to hit him and you know he is close enough to hear you breathing in your cockpit but you can't see him. He makes noise in one area then just teleports to somewhere else and BOOM! He kills you from behind or above or even right in your face! Or worse, you suicide! And not a second later he is flying through the spew, picking up yet another shield and whatever missiles you never had a chance to fire. I had four suicides in that match. My score never got higher than one point. ONE POINT! And then it was 16 0... 17 0... 18 0... and he had reduced me from the ambition of earning myself another busdriver to a point of fighting for my life to avoid the first ever UT shutout. I was one scared Pyro at the end of that game. No one beats me like that! I don't care who it is or what level or whatever... but it happened. 20 to 1. FRP is a really fun level once you get into it, though. I played it with Nirvana in our vendetta, and Sirian helped us both practice a bit in modem games for fun. He still held me to single digits, but I got a lot more than ONE POINT in all those later games." :) |
-Chipmunk
| "The equation FRP + S = Death, discovered by Professor Chipmunk, is definately NO lie. Sirian will move around you and hit you with fusion as if there wasn't a tomorrow. While fearfully flying those silent halls anticipating, no, hoping that I would find myself facing his back, I usually found myself in quite the opposite situation. Suddenly you hear a fusion power up... and you wonder - where is it coming from??? At times you stop in your tracks... BAD mistake, other times you try to get out of the way, usually to no avail. He is always quick on the draw, and if you see each other at the same time, you will likely be maimed without damaging your seemingly invulnerable prize. It's quite simple really: don't mess in Sirian's kitchen." ;) |
-Nirvana
| "Bewildered and Confused. I was praying for him to kill me quickly before I forgot where that damn blue door was..." |
-ENDER
| "I died, then I died, then died." |
-Buddha
| [INSERT EXPLETIVES HERE] |
-LordDeath
| "Sirian is a BEAST in this level! I tried to set some ambushes, but he didn't bother with that. He just flew around destroying shit. DO NOT PLAY SIRIAN HERE!" |
-Karash
| "Chip and I have played FRP a ton. As many times as we have played it for IDL matches, we've played twice as many just for practice or for fun, mostly via direct modem. He finally decided to call it his home, since he enjoys the level and is almost surely stronger in it relative to his strength vs opponents in other levels -- unless he's playing me. He's one of only two players to give me thorough scare here at any point (scream took me into OT once). Chip usually gets about half my score here, sometimes more, sometimes less. So we finally got to play one with it as his home, and early on he got a rare sweet kill on me: pumping me up the wazoo with, of all things, the spreadfire. I had 100 shield at the time, too. Oh well. Score got to 4 3 me and he was going strong, then I got him and reeled off a couple respawn kills. I've learned some of his tendencies over time, and one is that he likes that dark corner to the right of where you come through the blue door. So I made a point of attacking him there more than usual, and this worked really well. I think it may have perhaps even rattled him a wee bit, as he seemed to be a scared Pyro the last third of the game. I have said many times that any form of camping makes you vulnerable in this level, because it's way too easy to strike a known location and be gone with the immobile player having no hope of retaliation. I think he got a little too cozy in that area and this let me get the drop on him in a way I hadn't managed the last three or four times we played here. Arrgh, but that spreadfire kill... arrrrrgh. Hated that one." :) |
-Sirian
 | FRP is a modification of D1 First Strike Level 20. The layout of the mine remains unaltered. Extra guns have been added to make the game playable in anarchy for up to four players. After a lopsided game in level 20 between Sirian and Voyager, they decided to make a version with added weapons because the original has only one of each gun type. FRP has 4 fusions, 2 plasmas, 1 spread, 1 vulcan, and enough quads and lasers for two sets of quad 4. The quads are tucked into a secret compartment in the ceiling, just as the quad is on level 20. A second smart missile is hidden in a different ceiling compartment. Except for the added primaries, this level is otherwise unmodified from the original, and visibility ranges from good to adequate to poor, depending on the area, in traditional Parallax style. |
| This level has only ONE room of appreciable size, yet it is too dark to allow dogfighting and is also located at the far end of the mine, away from the energy bay. As a result, dogfighting plays NO ROLE in games here. This level is 100% tunnel fight, in three main sections of small, interconnected tunnels that are a peekaboo-hater's worst nightmare. These sections are separated by doors. Ambushes from above are quite common, however, as there are nests that hold weapons and powerups perched all about the level. |  |
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Because the only energy bay and half the respawn sites are in the middle section, that is where almost all the fighting takes place. Two more respawn sites are just outside the doors leading into the center section. The other two start points are at opposite ends of the mine. For a tunnel level, FRP has remarkably few traps. Almost every location has two or more ways out, and unless a standoff is established at the doors leading in to the center area, with opponents on opposite sides, the game proceeds at a remarkably rapid pace. |
| Stealth and prediction are the most important aspects of playing this level well. You also need a good dose of calculated aggression and the ability to react quickly to sudden danger. This is not a camper's paradise: ANY pattern you form, in terms of behavior, movement, tactics or timing, can be turned against you by a seasoned Fusion Rat. You will need all of your tunnel fighting skills to prevail. |
| This is the ultimate tunnel rat level, with no design flaws and almost no way for campers and runners to drag out the game, and as such it has an Overall rating of 9. |
| Level Name | DF | TR | TM | TP | EB | GM | 3D | WF | CR | LV | ST | Overall |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fusion Rat's Paradise | 0 | 10 | 8 | 4 | 5 | 3 | 3 | 9 | 7 | 5 | 9 | 9 |
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