Ask Ice Climber Players About Ice Climbers Thread

[SLyFISH]

Why do the ICs suck so bad?

 

[Kyu Puff]

Agreed; sometimes I find it nearly impossible for them to suck, unless playing a Peach of course. You'd have to be godawful to suck with them, I suppose.

 

[Speedsk8er]

You'd have to be godawful to suck with them, I suppose.

Thanks for explaining why I'm so bad at them. D:

 

[kenkowtow]

OK well I've got a few questions...

Me and my friends just started playing "competitively" (WD, l-cancel, etc). Thus we are all kinda fresh out of the oven so to speak. I know my WD, L-canceling, SHing, SHFFL, etc the best of my friends. Now I still loose mainly because my mindgames are "the sucks". I've only had the game for 2 months so I'm still climbing up there (no pun intended!).
Thus keep in mind that me and my friends (more my friends than me) have a tendency to dash attack a lot, forget to l-cancel, etc...

Questions:
1. Is the Nanapult an essential tool that IC players should be able to spit out as easily they WD? (don't think I ever saw Chu use it...)
2. How do you punish dash attacks (particularly Samus, Peach, and Marth)
3. Is the Solo Squall desynch useful? (remember my situation)
4. How do you approach a camp happy Samus (missle spams)

 

[Binx]

OK well I've got a few questions...
Questions:
1. Is the Nanapult an essential tool that IC players should be able to spit out as easily they WD? (don't think I ever saw Chu use it...)
2. How do you punish dash attacks (particularly Samus, Peach, and Marth)
3. Is the Solo Squall desynch useful? (remember my situation)
4. How do you approach a camp happy Samus (missle spams)

First of all, welcome to the IC boards and welcome to the most fun character in the game.

1. The answer is no, it is NOT essential, in fact it's a very risky move that is usually very hard to hit with and should be used sparingly if ever, I use it once in a set so about every three matches, it keeps it very unexpected, it isn't even that good vs noobs.

2. I punish every dash attack the same way, Shield it and grab, if you expect them to wait and try to dash through you you can forward smash and they might run right into it, obviously you have to time this pretty well and they have to not expect it otherwise they get to punish you. Also if they dash through you, you can jump and do a bair, also ICs are fairly difficult to grab successfully so being in your shield is safer than it is with other characters, at least against Peach and Samus, Marth's grab is great if they forward throw fast enough.

3. This move is more or less useless I only use it never in real matches unless I am leagues better than my opponent and just messing around for funsies.

4. This question is covered very clearly in the stickied match up guide (there is a link to it in my sig, its also at the top of the IC boards) but also you should be asking how can I make a campy samus approach me, and here is the trick, time your ice blocks so the first one hits her missile and the second one hits her, eventually she has to attack you because she will take damage and you wont.

 

[Binx]

I have a question, is there a good way to gimp off stage with climbers? kind of how Marth can jump off and fair you then up b back on and keep you off? I want a way to punish sweet spotters while still remaining relatively safe, of course you cant do it all the time.

The first one that comes to mind is dropping and doing a rising dair (thanks Chok/Chu) then edgehogging if you expect a sweet spot and fsmashing if you dont.

Anyone have other good ones?

What are some of your favorite approaches against certain characters? what is your favorite way to manipulate your opponents into grabs? we should all share some of our favorite mindgames and help eachother learn.

 

[Genuine]

the jab and dtilt works wonders on fox, falco, falcon, ganon, and some others. It interupts their recovery and makes them fall straight down and you can punish if they dont sweet spot.

Also if timed right short hopped fairs can work on ppl who try to sweetspot from below.

oh and blizzard screws up a lot of recoveries. If timed right, if your opponet tries the to WD from edge the blizzard will hit them down and theyll air dodge to their death.

and desnych ice blocks where nana jumps and popo stays on the ground work really well. it makes your opponent nervous if they try to avoid them.

This one is hard to pull off but, desynch Fsmash charge but while nana is charging fsmash get on the edge so the opponent may have to take on the fsmash. works with Dsmash

thats all i can think of now

 

[Binx]

the edgehog one with fsmash is fine I guess but the rest aren't really what I was looking for, I want TRUE ways to stop people from sweetspotting, like even if they perfectly sweetspot I dont want to be in lag, desynch blizzard fits that but Nana would still be vulnerable.

 

[choknater]

sometimes i like to wavedash up to him and just jab cancel really fast and eventually they will be open for a grab LOL. it works wonders.

 

[Smasher89]

sometimes i like to wavedash up to him and just jab cancel really fast and eventually they will be open for a grab LOL. it works wonders.

Does that really work against sweetspotting enemies?
like fox/marth?

 

[Speedsk8er]

sometimes i like to wavedash up to him and just jab cancel really fast and eventually they will be open for a grab LOL. it works wonders.

XD I've done that a few times...

 

[billythegoat]

I was wondering what it was that makes peach such an effective counter-pick to use against the Ice climbers? I would also like to here any suggestions you guys have for a secondary character to use when the ics are your main.

As for stopping sweet-spotters I like to fall off the edge and try to back air them, but they usually tech so idk.
My favorite approaches are the desynched ice blocks to wave smash/grab, or a double jab grab.

 

[choknater]

I was wondering what it was that makes peach such an effective counter-pick to use against the Ice climbers? I would also like to here any suggestions you guys have for a secondary character to use when the ics are your main.

Peach's fc aerials and dsmash utterly **** every approach or defense that IC's have. I can't really explain much more than that. It's more than just an uphill battle; sometimes it seems downright impossible.

IC's are a really ground-based character, and Peach's priority (especially with her dsmash) beats out all your approaches. It is also very dangerous to try to punish her dsmash, because if you whiff, you can get dsmashed again. Nana cannot touch peach because her DI is incorrect a lot of the time, plus she doesn't tech. Popo vs Peach is manageable, but once again playing him alone is just like playing a low tier character. You need to be really, really good to be able to win this matchup.

Even then, a really good Peach could still ****.

Try fighting a Peach who does NOTHING but downsmash. Though it sounds like a stupid strategy, it really works wonders against IC's.

For a secondary I would definitely choose Fox, Marth, or Falcon... but it's up to you. Many characters can be good against Peach, such as Pikachu and Young Link. It's all your preference. Just don't use Ice Climbers.

 

[Binx]

I was wondering what it was that makes peach such an effective counter-pick to use against the Ice climbers? I would also like to here any suggestions you guys have for a secondary character to use when the ics are your main.

As for stopping sweet-spotters I like to fall off the edge and try to back air them, but they usually tech so idk.
My favorite approaches are the desynched ice blocks to wave smash/grab, or a double jab grab.

What makes peach so hard is that her downsmash has this insane invisable range and it its your shield super fast then sucks nana in and she get launched to a differnt side of the map where nana gets dsmashed again trying to make it past peach to popo, also her FC aerial game ruins ic climbers shield grab attemps, pushs you back and you really can jab her because her crouch cancel is too good. That causes her to be insanely difficult to grab, and even IF you manage a grab its very difficult to kill with it outside of wobbling or high percent grabs.

your Fair and forward smashes outrange her but they are both have a fairly slow startup and a punishable ammount of lag, also if you dont space perfectly peach has some very effective punishing moves.

As for secondaries

Fox - they are both technically intensive characters and they both have a 4 frame jump, they are both grab based and both quick on the grouynd, I think most IC players are naturally confortable with this furry bastard.

Sheik - Is really easy to use has advantages vs pretty much every character that gives ICs trouble

Marth - Is really good and a lot of his moves are siimilar but with better range than IC's moves.

Falcon - can definitely help you to improve your sopo game by teaching you how to abuse DIs and techs to get every bit of damage out of those single IC grabs.

 

[siresword]

As for secondaries

Fox - they are both technically intensive characters and they both have a 4 frame jump, they are both grab based and both quick on the grouynd, I think most IC players are naturally confortable with this furry bastard.

Marth - Is really good and a lot of his moves are siimilar but with better range than IC's moves.

i lol picked up marth because i had no way to beat him with ic's (but my ic's are also garbage :'( )

random question : edgeguarding basics. i already know how to fsmash the edge
shffl'd bairs or blizzard desynchs? and are the two both very situational ?

 

[Binx]

Here is a basic rundown of edgeguarding, firstly know how your opponent will likely recover, I am going to use Fox as an example because if you predict his angle properly he is almost guaranteed to die. When he is above the stage he has quite a few options, there are quite a few points where he can up b and sweetspot downwards, if you know he wants to do this its as simple as predicting where he will use his up b jumping out and bairing, you have to wait until the last possible second though or they will have time to change their mind, or you can time a forward smash and have it hit them before they sweetspot, if you think he will go strait towards the stage you can run under him and get a grab or you can jump and bair at the last second when its too late for him to change direction and knock him back off, another option is a wavesmash, he can also go up, you can predict this and do a bair but you have to predict whether he will DI left or right once he starts falling. Most characters have basic mix ups like this and this is also assuming he does want to do a short or long illusion a shine to slow himself down or perhaps he still has a double jump and wants to sweetspot the ledge with that. Also he could fire fox under the stage and ride the wall try to make the stage or go strait up and fall to the ledge.

So the steps for edgeguarding are to predict, know your options and choose one, I think a fsmash that would kill or dmsmash that would kill are the most reliable edgeguards against most characters. I sometimes use desynch blizzard against fox if I think he will go strait up with a firefox cause if he doesnt smash DI away fast enough I get a free forward smash and he dies, if he does DI out he still has to up b at easy to edgeguard angles. Otherwise I almost always choose fsmash or edgehogs to kill with.

 

[choknater]

against fox and falco i usually like edgehogging first 100% of the time instead of standing by the edge. very often you can just use normal getup and nana can cover the edge with c-stick anyway.

fox and falco have various choices to recover and sometimes i can't guess all of them correctly. i like to force them to try and up-B and sweetspot by using jumping ice blocks or ledge hop dairs to mess up their sweetspotting first. then after that, it is easy to punish their up-B because their only choice is to go upwards and one of three diagonal angles (or straight up which is silly.)

 

[GnilpaZ]

I have a question, is there a good way to gimp off stage with climbers? kind of how Marth can jump off and fair you then up b back on and keep you off? I want a way to punish sweet spotters while still remaining relatively safe, of course you cant do it all the time.

The first one that comes to mind is dropping and doing a rising dair (thanks Chok/Chu) then edgehogging if you expect a sweet spot and fsmashing if you dont.

Anyone have other good ones?

What are some of your favorite approaches against certain characters? what is your favorite way to manipulate your opponents into grabs? we should all share some of our favorite mindgames and help eachother learn.

Here is a gimp off the stage that I use every now and then; while holding onto the edge, you drop down into a rising bair. If timed right, you can swing below the stage horizon and still finish the animation to land back on the edge.

It is a little risky though. If you wait too long to start the bair, you wont finish the animation in time to recatch the ledge and will most likely fall to your doom. Also, getting hit by anything while you are doing this usually results in a death (unless you are quick to up b)

Also, timing blocks to hit the sweetspot the instant before they get there works too and is much safer.

 

[Binx]

Here is a gimp off the stage that I use every now and then; while holding onto the edge, you drop down into a rising bair. If timed right, you can swing below the stage horizon and still finish the animation to land back on the edge.

It is a little risky though. If you wait too long to start the bair, you wont finish the animation in time to recatch the ledge and will most likely fall to your doom. Also, getting hit by anything while you are doing this usually results in a death (unless you are quick to up b)

Also, timing blocks to hit the sweetspot the instant before they get there works too and is much safer.

I use that sometimes but generally I feel there are better options I would rather go with the dair, safer and it usually sets up an edgeguard, the bair is more situation you can only use it when the are even with the stage.

 

[choknater]

Hmm.... just a general thought.

Guys, don't be afraid to nair sometimes. It works the same way that the dair does on floaties: even though its priority is low, it has a good duration.. and if it hits, it puts enough distance between you and the opponent. It's also a decent move to use out of your shield. A lot of times using random dairs or nairs can help me rack up the damage I need instead of just being scared and shielding all the time and waiting for grabs. Nair is an effective approach, but dangerous.

Another thing... if you guys approach with an aerial, which is not a bad choice at all, be sure to cover yourself if you get shield grabbed. Mashing c-stick to the side or down can get a clutch smash on your opponent with nana while you are getting thrown.

Some throws you should watch out for:
Peach's dthrow - leaves her open when her butt hits the ground, the other climber can dsmash
Fox's dthrow - mash the c-stick down quickly and he will get hit

there are many more... but they are similar to those. pikachu, link, sheik, and many others can be punished if they down throw one of the climbers.

 

[Binx]

Fox and Peach's that know what they are doing should be forward throwing though right?

I was shielding and I got grabbed and I just kept holding L and when I was thrown I hit A after I had passed Nana and she grabbed while I was getting up, this was more effective than teching because it kept both nana and I safe, I wasn't able to follow up on the grab but if Nana had upthrow or thrown towards me I probably could have, he she throws down or away then at least they are off your back and Nana is alive. (this was against Marth) not sure if it works on all characters but it was **** fun, glad the thought occured to me haha.

EDIT: But yeah I agree with the clutch smash in some situations most times they are in the habit of attacking after they grab you and its really easy to smash them.

 

[choknater]

Yeah. A lot of the time the Ice Climbers advice that I give takes into account the heated atmosphere of a tournament match. My decisions are sometimes illogical and risky... but I think being able to play such a way under pressure and taking those risks to pull off good attacks are what make me a good player. However, sometimes my decisions make me ineffective against Falco and Sheik who IC's are good against... Whatever.

Shield grabbing the other person's grab with the IC that wasn't grabbed, even if it's Nana... Nice! I'll try this! Normally I only do this with Popo and it never occured to me that Nana could shield grab too.

It might be confusing to try and DI while shield grabbing though... But yeah, wow. I guess mastering control of both at the same time is the epitome of IC's anyway.

 

[Tyrael64]

Q1: What the heck is a Freeze Glitch?

Q2: What is Wobbling?

 

[GnilpaZ]

A dash attack can hit a little under the stage too, i think.

Is dashing at the edge while they are recovering worth it?

 

[choknater]

Q1: What the heck is a Freeze Glitch?

Q2: What is Wobbling?

what the heck is the search button? what the heck are stickies?

A dash attack can hit a little under the stage too, i think.

Is dashing at the edge while they are recovering worth it?

not really. dash attacks are too laggy and it doesn't last very long. and you might even run off the stage!

 

[Binx]

LOL Chok good answers, also you dont DI the throw at all, and you cant really tech it unless they up throw because you are still holding L, unless you can tech with R then shield grab, dunno havn't tried it, however hitting the ground and just tapping up to stand pretty quickly is fine and you are safe as long as nana gets the grab, which she will because they cant really do anything about it.

 

[Pookiez]

The only annoying part about shield grabbing throws is that you have to know the invincibility frames of every characters throws. or know the proper timing on something like doc's back throw. You get used to it after a while though.

 

[choknater]

you kinda just have to watch it until it's finished. that, IMO, is 'knowing invincibility frames."

 

[Binx]

Yeah what chok says, something like Docs throw might not be punishable because it might push Nana too far, I havn't really done a lot of testing its just a reaction I have when I see that I am going to be thrown into Nana, I know that if I get that grab off that it is safer than teching.

 

[billythegoat]

O.K. sorry to bring this up again but....I don't find the fight against peach that difficult. I am a Utah smasher and I'm ranked as 4th (even though I'm probably closer to like 7th) and thier are 3 peach mains here (none of which are ranked) and I just don't find this to be a difficult fight. This may just be because, as I have pointed out, our best players here don't use peach. I don't think that is why though.
The ice climbers have disjointed hit boxes wich gives you a pretty good advantage in this fight. Secondly, your ice blocks will "block" a turnip(except the death turnip). So you have an advantage at range because if youfire an ice block to block the turnip then one will still get through. Since we have a disjointed hit box and peach doen't then we have an advantage at close quarters as well. Now here is the clincher, and PLEASE correct me if I'm wrong, but peach can be chain grabbed from 0 to death. So in what way does she counter us other then the fact that her down smash will seperate us?

 

[Binx]

O.K. sorry to bring this up again but....I don't find the fight against peach that difficult. I am a Utah smasher and I'm ranked as 4th (even though I'm probably closer to like 7th) and thier are 3 peach mains here (none of which are ranked) and I just don't find this to be a difficult fight. This may just be because, as I have pointed out, our best players here don't use peach. I don't think that is why though.
The ice climbers have disjointed hit boxes wich gives you a pretty good advantage in this fight. Secondly, your ice blocks will "block" a turnip(except the death turnip). So you have an advantage at range because if youfire an ice block to block the turnip then one will still get through. Since we have a disjointed hit box and peach doen't then we have an advantage at close quarters as well. Now here is the clincher, and PLEASE correct me if I'm wrong, but peach can be chain grabbed from 0 to death. So in what way does she counter us other then the fact that her down smash will seperate us?

The peaches you play are horrible for one, here is a short list of reasons Peach ***** ICs.

1) she is difficult/impossible to grab because of several reasons including 4 frame lag from aerial attacks, the ability to float while pressuring with dairs = no shield grabbing, her projectile is better than ours so she can afford to stay away and camp, her downsmash pushes you too far away if you light shield it to grab and if you heavy shield it your shield will go too small and you will be hit.

2) Peach has an amazing pressure game vs Ice Climbers on the ground they can beat her but she can do so many float trixies and really take advantage of you if you shield her, if you don't shield she doesnt take enough lag for you to successfully crouch cancel so the match becomes much more risky for you than for her.

3) She has an amazing recovery downsmashes and forward smashes that would typically kill other characters wont kill Peach.

4) She seperates ICs super easily

5) There in fact is NO 0-Death grab vs Peach, I believe you could do one meteor regrab and maybe a jab tap reset then you could try and wobble but she wouldn't be high enough percent for it to be guaranteed, Peach can jump out of all known grab combos or DI too far away to continue them, also she can counter with dsmash sometimes.

6) Peach edgeguards ICs like it's her job.

7) the whornado is too good, also while its true that ICs have more priority, Peach has more aerial mobility and an amazing crouch cancel and fast dsmash for wavedash approaches, also our moves have more start up lag so to win in a priority war we need to throw out our hitbox early which means we need to predict sooner and correctly more often than peach, peach can approach and backoff over and over and punish every time you miss an attack but ICs dont have that same option.

- If someone has more to say about this match up that can only be good XD I hope I am wrong about some of this haha.

 

[Wobbles]

Iceblocks don't work against Peach's turnips if she jumps when she throws them; the trajectories just don't match up. Failing that, she can just throw then aerial and lo, all problems solved for her. If she pushes you to the edge of the stage, you're boned.

To be fair, you can use an edge chaingrab from zero to death. If you use it and mix in tilts to keep her stuck in it, it's about as effective as an infinite--albeit more difficult. However, you're going to have one hell of a time grabbing her, and it will be a minority of your grabs that catch her near the edge, facing off it, with Nana around.

Truthfully, you have almost no situations where you have an advantage against Peach. She can simply spit out too many safe attacks too quickly to be punished, and you can't just play defense because she eats away shield and room like candy.

That's also why she is fat.

 

[Binx]

What are some of the ways to play safe/solid with ICs?

Also I was watching some Chu matches because they are really entertaining and I notice that people tend to jump a lot when they play him and he uses a ton of up airs, do you guys think that he conditions them to jump or are they just afraid of getting grabbed already?

 

[Pookiez]

I wouldn't think I would have to disagree with you wobbles... but Peach isn't fat >_>

As for the match up, I thought for a while i was getting used to it as in I was getting close to beating and sometimes beating a peach player that I play a lot. well... I don't play him for 2 weeks and I see him again to find out that I now get wrecked by his peach. ><

I've never really had problems with turnips though, I usually just grab them in the air and retreat or go somewhere where she can't punish me.

 

[Pookiez]

Binx, I think it is fear of grabs. I noticed that most of the people I play jump when i approach them. most of the time.

 

[Wobbles]

Are you kidding me Pookiez? Do you see how much space that *** takes up? The only reason you can't see her obesity is because she wears a corset.

Also, Chu uses u-airs because people tend to jump predictably. It works even better when the opponent is near the edge and feels like they've only got one way to escape.

 

[Binx]

Maybe I'm just not good at predicting Jumps, I dunno, most people I play tend to do a lot of sh aerials and I have some trouble with it (Falcon and Marth mostly) other characters I can get inside, Falcon I think is mostly just I don't really know his range that well and don't have much experience against the character in general, Marth is invincible when he does them lol so don't have a lot of choices there.

EDIT: Peach 4 president of Fatz

 

[Pookiez]

Woah woah, the "space" she takes up is just the southern belle type dress she is wearing. Just look at her arms and legs. Those aren't characteristic of a fat person. Or are you going to tell me that Samus is also fat because her suit takes up a lot of space too? Peach has good curves, slim Limbs a nice rack... and do I need to mention her powerful derriere?

I found a picture of peach using a debug menu in SSBM

 

[Binx]

LOL there is no denying that she is cute, she is just fat though. Also the ICs have sworn a vengance against peach, mostly Nana cause she's jealous.

 

[blackanese]

can u explain 2 me y ICs can wavedash so well, yet they wear cleats =)