Notable Former Residents
Diablo, Fathom, Grax, PEARTMAN, kufyit, urge
Retired Residents
Doplgngr, SoniC, Voyager
| NYSA is a small level that is a nightmare for players unfamiliar with its layout. This is where knowledge of the level's structure plays an extremely important role. Traps abound, but it is very challenging and enjoyable against an opponent equal in familiarity. |
| Nysa "The first two times I played Dop in Nysa was on Kali, and the connect was not the best, so I promised him a rematch at the Nov 97 Dfest in NY. We both have P90s so homers are not that big of a threat, generally speaking; but playing Dop on LAN was a frightening experience in his home level. No one has EVER hit me with that many homing missiles. It was truly incredible. He did a fine job." |
-Sirian
| D2 Nysa "It was a late Friday night while playing Doplgngr, and, well, I guess most would think, that the connections late at night are the best. We were wrong. We ended up playing and the lag was bad, but he wanted to continue, and so did I. Whenever he would kill me, my ship would disappear and not even spew anything! This is when I got mad (He didn't mind) but I didn't like the unfair-ness of the match this way. So, switching servers (Even though this shouldn't change anything) it changed quite a bit. We finally saw each other's spew, and then that's when we got at it. The score was 11-9, me leading, and when that lag disappeared, wow, I've never seen such playing before in my life. He was happy and I was happy. Me, having a Pentium 233 and a 3DFX card, really hated the homing missles... The smarts are the easiest to escape. I've noticed one thing.. Never cross Doplgngr+Homers. The match was a great match, mostly ratting down by the reactor, and shooting mercs with a long shot-of-faith towards the end of the ramp hall. Eventually, the score was 20-18, and I was astonished! I was 1-3 (I think) on my LT record, and I beat Doplgngr, and got to rank 56, I was so happy." |
-Skyler
| D2 Nysa "I was somewhat surprised when Dop msgd me in chat for a game. I was only #6 on LT. He had a friendly attitude though, and we soon agreed to play D2 Nysa. I knew that was his home level, and I really wanted to take him on in his own turf. Furthermore we decided to leave out the homers. Well the game started and it came out he went to get the gauss, where as I went for mercs. He started to play tricks with me, camping and ambushing in various places, but I soon showed him I knew them, and he wouldn't get any cheap kills that way. It soon became evident that the connection wasn't the best, which turned Dop into a very skilled hit and run player. I was caught several times with fast gauss. At 2 - 1 my favor I was alone for the first time and with the single gauss in my possession. At this point I made a decision. I wanted to surprise him by taking away the gauss early in the game, so I started to empty it. I had gotten down to 2000 when he caught me in my act and killed me. Then we were head to head until he killed me twice in a row to get 5 - 3. He was just skilled with the gauss really, and caught me nice a couple of times. Now it's never nice to be down by two. The sense of "slipping" is close at hand if you don't cool it. In a fight though, Dop commited suicide, which gave me control of the gauss at 3 - 4. I managed to kill him with it for 4 - 4 but then it was empty. I realized the gauss was the key to the game, so I started to use the "ammo-control" trick. It soon showed that Dop wanted to play with the gauss, so he picked it up almost every time, and when I managed to kill him, I got some nice gauss rounds for myself. We were side by side, getting kills, and dying at the same rate, for a long time. This was the true peek-a-boo game, and with the connect we had, it just took a long time to get a kill that way, so this was a first class mind game. We more or less abandoned all dogfighting in the big room, and instead we tried the spray-n-pray tactic up and down the ramp, as well as the occasional attack down to the little room at the foot of the ramp. The mercs slowly disappeared and we had only flashes, concs and smarts to play with. Only the smarts to worry for right? Yeah right! The flash missiles are incredibly annoying, and lethal if placed right. At one time, up by the caged ES Dop managed to completely blind me. I was spraying plasma like a maniac and I knew I had to make a choice: go right along the fence or in towards the door and the lil room behind it. I took the right, and I thought he had backed towards the door and was now behind me. For some reason he had turned right too, and instead of easily killing me, I managed to hurt him plenty with my plasma, as I trichorded past him. You gotta be lucky in this game as well. At 11 - 11 Dop was killed by the reactor, and shortly thereafter I killed him, putting me up 12 - 10. I had figured him out by this time, and I felt that I was in control. Suddenly, at what should have been a routine dodge of some smart bomblets, I got stuck in the wall and died, humiliated and disgraced. We got one fast kill each after this, and then AGAIN at 14 - 13, the SAME thing! I died of a smart that you just can't allow yourself to die on! With those humiliating deaths in my mind, I got one too many thoughts as to what was going on. I got shaky, and lost my nerve. This was when Dop made this BEAUTIFUL kill on me. He engaged me at the ramp, where we exchanged green blob morse messages for while, when he lured me into running away in the tunnel past the reactor. At this time I was really low on shields, so I backed away from the ramp-door, shooting to keep him away.. BAM! Right into his nice previously laid prox-bombs. Such a control kill is just very nice, but there is no time to think about how good your opponent is while playing a game. I showed to myself I was a good PTMC pilot, by just cleaning my mind, forgetting about mistakes and starting to FOCUS on my opponent and his game. So I turned a bit more aggressive on him, after having played a more careful hit-and-run, trying to disturb him in his game. This succeeded and I got back into the game and shortly there after it was 16 - 16. I managed to find an even higher level of play, where controlled his hit-and-run I with aggressive play. I managed to kill him three times in a row before I died, making it 19 - 17. By then I felt I would win, and continued my aggressive style. The game ended in a perfect Mexican stand off where we killed each other. When it was all over I couldn't really find words. "Great game" didn't seem to be the right term really. This game had it all. The great kills, the mind gaming, the suicides, the errors, the traps, the ambush, hit and run, the camping, the brutal face-to-face combat, everything. It was simply the best game I ever played in Nysa." |
-VaiN
| Nysa "I was eager to play some of the best, and Jediluke happened to be in chat, so I challenged him. We named some levels that we liked and agreed on Nysa. Once in the game, I told him that "One of us will be walking out of here with an award." I managed to grab an early lead. I kept getting him in the corners, and held on for a while with low shields. He could really hurt me in the distance. I had great difficulty dodging things that he threw from far away, as dumb as that may sound. He always seemed to know exactly where I was going, so I really had to mix-up my game. And every time I got a lead going, he would mount a comeback. I'd get a couple kills in a row and then he would get just as many or more, and I would get frustrated. It was difficult not to lose confidence. I had the lead at 19 15 and thought I had this match in the bag...but I was quick to judge. Jedi killed me 3 times in a row at the bottom of the main ramp! I told myself that unless I got the next kill, it would go into overtime. So I grabbed all the homers I could and got my butt up to da dogfighting room. He wasn't there, but I spotted him in the room with the caged mega...I went up the ramp and fired two homers. One of them killed him and that was it: 20 to 18. "When it ended, he complained loudly about the connect and said some things that weren't very nice. I saw the opposite of what he claimed: we both had no loss and under 300 pings to the server. I had the time of my life. It was a TOUGH match. I'm sorry that he felt differently." |
-SoniC
| Nysa "I played Jediluke his very first IDL match, and I played it in his best level, Nysa. He had come over from Cases, where he was ranked #1 at the time in D1, and I am fairly sure he was a bit surprised to actually lose, even tho it was 20 18 and hardly a blowout. He preferred to camp down at the bottom of the ramp, and he was difficult to flush out. This match took me two and a half hours to complete and is partly responsible for my general disaffection with Nysa. It is not as bad as Minerva for coping with runners, but it is close. I had to work pretty hard for this win." |
-Sirian
| Nysa "I knew Jediluke knew I had a fast cpu, and from what I had been hearing on the forum and from people who played him, he likes to horde the homers. I knew I wouldn't be able to fight out in the open lest I get pegged by missiles, so I decided to take to the tunnels and wait for him. My strategy was simple: stay patient, don't get too aggressive like I normally do. I stayed close to the respawn area by the reactor most of the game, staying far away from Jediluke until I had the majority of homing missiles, my patience made him impatient and he began charging recklessly at me. I'd fade and hit and he would score very few shots on me, and the final score was 20-14. Good game Jedi." |
-Troop
| D2 Nysa "He ate peas :) I ate smarts :( The dead on hits, man I hate them. You see it coming but you can't do a thing about it. Like your locked up or something, like a deer in headlights. It's like, "EEK! What do I do?" Then I'm dead. We used a lot of omega, too. He was running a lot, cuz I would make him eat peas when he didn't." :-D |
-IM_GOOD
| Nysa "You can't hit SoniC with homers, because he has a slow CPU. He is good with the plasma. I got some fusion kills. We had a spread truce: we agreed not to use spreadfire, and I now know that was a mistake for me. The connect was good, the match was fun. I think I would do better in Nysa NH, tho, or in a more open level." |
-B4
| Nysa "My vendetta with SoniC didn't turn out well for me. We played his home first: Nysa... the original with all the homers. SoniC was a missile boat in that one. He would fire his homers and would be outta sight. He won that one. So on to game 2... I shouldn't have played him in Minerva. We played the LH, and I was up 13-6 or 7, and he tells me his bro was buggin him bad... and that he was crying now. So that threw me all off. I asked if he wanted to stop and finish another time, but he said no. Anyways, he sat in the corner an awful lot, and I couldn't get near him. When I tried, he'd fire his homers. The LH has about 6 homers, I think, and he always seemed to have some. I wish I had gotten him to play a level with a couple less homers in it. He won the vendetta, and basically I got my revenge in game 3... in D-Day. He didn't mind to play with dark ships, because I had agreed to play two of the three games in D1. So, I played him and was able to keep him to 5. Because of that D-Day game... I actually outscored him for the three games total, but that is not how vendettas are decided." :) |
-Chipmunk
| Nysa "SoniC has wanted to do a vendetta with me for a long time. He started off on IDL as green as grass, and with a whole lot to learn about what it means to be not just a good player, but a classy player as well. He is still a kid and has a lot of room to grow, but he has come a long way and, overall, he's a good guy. Well, he lives in the metropolitan Washington DC area, where I grew up and where my Dad is from. So I told him we'd do the vendetta by local modem calls the next time I visited my father's home. So that's what we did. :) We agreed on the levels beforehand: one game, his pick, one mine, and one agreed on. We played his pick first: his home, Nysa, with all the homers. And me on my new P2 300, going up against a player who gets 15 fps and can shake a homer lock with half a sneeze. Well I knew this was suicide for me. SoniC will boat to no end in his home, and every homer he fires at me will hit, unless I can duck behind a wall. So I had to stick to the tunnels, and I had to hoard the homers, and I had to control the respawn areas as much as humanly possible. So this was my game plan. I stayed in the tunnels and almost never came out. It started out badly for me. He got up 3 to 1. The small room at the top of the ramp that goes past the reactor, is where I made camp. And I stayed there. I made it quite clear that I was NOT going to dogfight at all while he had any homers. He got his game, and his cheap missiles, so I was going to counter with the cheapest possible runner tactics in my ENTIRE arsenal, and play passive to the utmost, and the burden of engagement was almost entirely on him, in light of his big advantage with the missiles. Well I managed to pull even. But my running eventually led to me being trapped down in the lower room with the exit. And SoniC displayed a great deal of patience at this point. And he pulled back ahead by a score of 8 5. Well I realized that, overall, that room was a losing proposition for me. No way to come out and harass him. Plus he was getting free missiles from the reactor area. THAT was the area I needed to control. So I managed to get back there, and I got some ratty kills, and a really groovy natural fusion smackage, and pulled even again. And kept within a point or so all the way to 12 11. And then I got hot. I snuck out to the main room without him seeing me do it, and I got behind him and took him down in a satisfying ambush. TOTAL surprise. And it shook him up. I got several kills in a row and he starts saying stuff like, "I've lost now." And cursing and moping a bit. Score got to 17 13, and I really thought I had him. But I got careless, and that was my downfall. I gave up three straight "easy" kills, and I never recovered. SoniC made all the right moves, and he got a few really sweet kills. His last kill of the game was the most impressive of them all. He trichorded down the ramp and capitalized on a pattern move I had used all game, and smashed me with quad 4 even though I had the fusion, vulcan, and all the missiles. He would not have won that game if it was NH, but it wasn't. I used every trick in my rat bag, and it just wasn't enough to overcome the combo of his skills and the disparity of our relative homer locks. I'm actually proud of how close I came to beating him with a handicap, on his best level. And I got to play the other two matches of the vendetta in levels that had no homers, so that was cool. In Kiln's Fusion Farm, I got my revenge! 8 or 9 one-shot kills, most of them natural. Every kill involved the fusion. The only other gun I used was the vulcan. SoniC got an early lead in Game 3 and held on to it until I passed him some time around 7 points or so. I got a laser 1 kill and shortly after, a fusion kill, and he kinda lost his composure. It was a closer game then the score showed. SoniC got his big win in his home, and he ended my record 22 game UT winning streak. But I defended my #1 rank and my honor, and I had a good time." |
-Sirian
| Nysa "My Pyro turned into a flying vacuum cleaner, and there were lots of homers and lasers to be cleaned up. I did the job well." |
-tubby
| Nysa "Kufyit and I have a kind of Nysa grudge. He says he'll kill me in Nysa, and I say it's my level, nobody elses. A few days ago, I won in Nysa-lh. This time we did normal Nysa, which I was happy about. The game started off with me in the lead, 2-0. The first kill I found him suddenly and he ate quads. After he died, I was sitting in his spew, and I just launched a smart for the hell of it. BANG! Dead. Had no clue where he was. He never took the lead from me, but he came close many a time. With the exception of 2-1, he got within 2 kills of me. But I hung on. I was changing guns a lot, as was he. He could stick me with the fusion, so I hung on to it for as long as I could. I camped a bit at the bottom of the famous ramp. I'd take bits and pieces off of him as he flushed me out. He scared the hell outta me in the dogfighting room, he seemed to fly 3 times faster than I could, even when I was tri-chording. When the score was 12-7, I was sure I had the match, although he did catch up to 18-16. I'm proud to have won this one, and I look forward to our next match. I'M THE NYSA KING, KUFYIT!!! AHAHA!!!" |
-SoniC
| Nysa LH "Voy is one of those players who is equally tough on almost any ground. For some unfathomable reason, Nysa is the only level he likes well enough to call home, so home it is. Unless you can take control of the game away from him, forget earning a win on him in THIS level." |
-Sirian
| Nysa LH "As Voyager and I have a normal father-son relationship I REALLY had to beat him on this one." :) |
-scream
| Nysa LH "When I saw that Grax had become #1, I was feelin kinda suicidal and decided to take a crack at him. I looked over his profile and saw that his D1 home was Nysa LH, so I figured I'd give it a go. I challenged him and he accepted...when he found out that LH had 4 homers, he asked me if he could make a Nysa-3H (3 homers), and count that as his home, so I said fine. Since my home is regular Nysa, I knew the level formation extremely well. I knew a lotta tricks and stuff....I just lacked my homeys =) I liked to sit at the bottom of the ramp some...I shot him when he came down it, shot a homer up it, then I'd run through the reactor room tunnel. These tactics worked well on him...and TOO well...cause after a while, he TOTALLY COPIED THEM! So I had to deal with what I had just done to him...a taste of my own medicine. Then about 3/4 into the game, with the score pretty close, me ahead by a few...he sat in the room with the Exit, and he would SIT there...I'd wait forever and he wouldn't come out. So the first time, after a while, I took him by surprise and went down there, and killed him. Then he was smarter...he wouldn't let me kill him when I went down there. The next 2 or 3 times I went down there I died. So finally I said SCREW it...I just refused to go down there anymore. So he would come out after a long time and we'd have SOMEWHAT a normal game. And soon enough it was 20-17. After that score was reached...I did a backflip out of my chair, for I had received the IDLs greatest honor...the Cross Maxius!" |
-SoniC
| Nysa NH "I have never ever liked Nysa, but I agreed to play Xciter there as he wanted a rematch in his home. I didn't know about the fusion trick, or the place to hide with a fully charged fusion (up against the ceiling). He got me 3 times I think before I knew better than to go down there. I just don't like that ramp. I think thats my main reason for hating that level. Its tricky to get down there when someone is shooting at you. I hate long distance plasma or laser fights. I think I'm ready for a rematch in there, tho. Maybe at the March fest." |
-Chipmunk
| Nysa NH "Xciter in Nysa NH? It's hopeless. I don't think I'll ever beat him in there." |
-Chipmunk
| Nysa OW "A whole game of dogfighting to the death! WOOHOO! Great fun." :) |
-Sirian
| D2 Nysa "Merl and I have always been buds. He was one of my firsts matches, and I still remember our Athena game. This match, he was convinced, he would win. He still thinks he can take me in D2. ;) He jumped out with a 7-3 lead early on, and I was honestly scared! I had eaten way to many smarts, and missed much too often with gauss. Merl is a very tricky player, and can surprise you with how smart he is. I stopped for a second after one death, and told myself I needed to switch up strategies. He seemed to be eating up mine, and was very comfortable in the level. I decided to camp around the spots in the level where I could remember being most successful in d1, i.e. the small room outside the tunnel, on the opposite of the famous ramp. I picked up a few kills garbage style, chucking random smarts and streams of plasma. If a match is close against Merl, he probably has the advantage because of some of the tricks he can pull off. He basically owned "the ramp", and I decided to avoid that all together. The best way to fluster Merl is to get a string of kills in a row- 4 or more should do the trick. As soon as Merl can survive such streaks with composure, he'll beat me. I staged one of those strings, and he sort of fell apart and let his guard down, and I went up something like 16-11. From then on, he was breathing down my neck, busting out the plasma. I barely pulled this one off, and if Merl had kept on going early on, he never would have looked back, and would have chalked up a win against me. Oh yeah, and I somehow convinced him to take out his precious omega." =) |
-Birdseye
Nysa NH
"After the big May 2 '99 promotion fest, I went looking for one of the new UTs
to play a match with. I actually asked d0ggY first, but kufyit had already snatched
him up, so I asked Dreamer. We had done D2 our last match, so it was D1 time, and
when he asked what level, I boldly suggested his home level, Nysa NH. I thought why
not, let's set an example of boldness for the new guy. I was ranked #1 and ready to
show why or go down in flames. So he starts the match (I think a player should
always start matches in his home level) and he whips out the spreadfire and gets
the first kill. Spread is about all I saw the first couple of points. We reach a
3-3 tie and he comes down the upper ramp into the main room, and fires a smart at
the floor. It's rarer than a blue moon for me to dodge a smart and believe I have
cleared it and still get hit, but that's what happened here. I gave up a cheap kill,
with nearly full shield. I respawned nearby, went back for my guns, and he pulls a
"newbie" move launching his smarts one after another in a straight line. I wasn't
expecting that and I plowed into one. Doink! Two freebies in a row! He killed me
again and led 6 3. And I'm thinking, "Uh oh, Underestimation City." I quit thinking
of Dreamer as "the new guy" and redefined him in my mind as a UT I needed to open up
a can of whoopass on, and fast. So I stopped rushing back to dogfight him in the
main room, and played it passive for a few kills. Let him think I'm running scared
now, or regrouping, or something to that effect, while I watched my ass and made
sure not to give up any more freebies. Started inching my way back into the game,
and I got within one. Then he kills me, and I respawn below the main ramp. No guns
down there any more, as all the fighting's been up top, but there was a smart. I was
sure he heard me spawn, so I tried a "newbie" move, launching my smart up the ramp
not to the outside, where everyone flies, but to the inside. He ran smack into it,
and that was my cue. The best time to press someone is right after they make a
mistake. So I pressed him HARD. Finally he runs into the reactor area, and he's
playing cat n mouse back there, to confuse my timing. But that's the same thing he
had done the last two times, so I was counting on him to be clever again. I had a
fusion shot meet him at the door as he came out into the room with the mega missile
cage. That tied it up, and I hit my dinner macro. :) I continued to press him hard,
and he pressed back. He got the next kill, but now he's running on pure adrenalin,
and he's making the same moves time and again. So I had a fusion shot waitin for
him on one of those moves, then another, then another. And I got a do-or-die chase
kill on respawn after that, just would not get off his ass until I killed him. I ate
at least 55 damage but I got the kill and I completely controlled the game from there
on. Got the last three kills in a row. Whew. Was a tough match. Knowing when to pull
back, when to stand your ground, and when to press the opponent with all you've got,
is the fine art of tempo control, and that's what got me this busdriver. Welcome to
the UT, bud." :)
|
-Sirian
| Nysa is full of traps, places where it is easy to go in but hard to get out, yet none of these traps are especially lethal, as there are two exits from each trap and no way to easily dispatch trapped players. Nysa games can proceed at a very rapid clip if either side plays aggressively, but even modest lag in such close quarters can make for slippery escapes and dead aggressors. And dealing with runners, campers or missile boaters can be difficult, even frustrating. |  |
| The layout is reminiscent of a small house built on a hillside, with five "floors" at different elevations, connected by ramps that resemble stairways. Spaz seems to think of everything, including wheelchair-accessibility. :) The Nysa ramps give this level a unique flavor, and a great deal of fighting often occurs at the main ramp, which connects the dogfight room and the primary energy bay to the lower floors. Skilled missile use tends to dominate most games here. Still, this is a classic layout of grand design. Overall Rating: 8 |  |
-Ratings-
| Level Name | DF | TR | TM | TP | EB | GM | 3D | WF | CR | LV | ST | Overall | Special |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nysa | 6 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 4 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 6 |
| Nysa LH | 6 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 8 | 7 | 9 | 4 |
| Nysa NH | 6 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 9 | 6 | 8 | 7 | 8 | 5 |
| D2 Nysa | 6 | 8 | 8 | 5 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 6 | 6 | 8 | x |
| Nysa OW | 6 | 8 | 7 | 6 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | JK |
| Back to the IDL War Journal |
