Rango the Mercenary
The Mercenary
First off, let's look at some of Ike's worst matchups.
Luigi
Sheik
Lucario
Mario
Fox
Luigi can overwhelm you with fireball setups, damage building, Bair, and kill combo at 100% and onward.
Sheik has the Fairs to shut down your aerial game and Needles to gimp you with.
Lucario can quickly match knockback with your own when his aura gets high, and he's much faster. His range is also no joke.
Mario has incredibly fast attacks, as well as FLUDD and Cape to gimp you with,
Fox can punish you from halfway across the screen and shut you down with priority.
All of the characters listed above have very fast attack recovery. They are incredibly hard to punish, which they use to their advantage to do free Smashes.
What we've established is that Ike is simply not perfect. He's not the most viable character in tournaments. You will come across roadblocks where you will be forced to switch out. I can count several recent times where I would have lost a set if I didn't let go of my pride and switch Ike out. Even with over 3,000 overall matches set on my game using Ike, and with as much matchup experience as I have, he will be beaten. These matchups range from 6-4 to 7-3. That said, what do you do then? You find the right character to switch to. And depending on your playstyle, that may vary, but I will start with the ones I use.
Take Link, for example.
What he has in common with Ike:
Blade User - Both have disjointed hitboxes, allowing "freebies" if you attack at max-range and the enemy blocks. If you attack at the right length, you are safe. You also out-prioritize hand-to-hand techniques using proper spacing.
Pivot FTilt - Both characters have a very powerful, ranged FTilt at their disposal. You can use this as a turn-around technique when someone is recovering on the ledge or chasing you with rolls.
Durable - Both survive hits well past 150%.
Nair combos - Both can start combos off of Nair
What he has different from Ike:
Less hitlag - Link can recover from many of his attacks much quicker, leaving him less time to be punished. FTilt is a good example, once again. The attack is also faster, making it a more reliable kill choice.
Projectiles - Link's options include attacking at range and keeping the enemy at bay.
Damage Gain - Thanks to projectiles, he can rack up damage 0-40% in a matter of seconds. Ike has trouble gaining damage quickly, yet has no problem being racked up in damage.
Nair and aerial defense - It becomes habit for an Ike player to airdodge since his aerials are too slow to tell someone to "get off of you" when they start an aerial string. Nair is a great aerial defense tool. It has reach, can start combos into jab, is incredibly safe, AND you can use it to gimp players without worrying too much for your own safety.
Bomb Jump - Link can pluck a Bomb and use the explosion's leverage as a last resort to recover. This is also good to survive KO hits.
Bomb - In addition, the moment your enemy revives from KO, pluck a bomb and roll or shield. If they grab you, they risk being exploded on.
Now, Link doesn't have the same killing opportunities as Ike does (Bair, Fair), nor does he have a safe grab (granted, Ike's grab has terrible reach anyway), or the kill power. Yes, Link's FTilt CAN kill a Rosalina off the ledge at 80%, but overall, many players can survive his strongest hits till 130%, when UTilt becomes an option.
I feel that, against many characters, your campiness becomes your best weapon. Play defense as best as you can, and then you can use what you know as Ike to beat the living daylights out of someone. Pivot FTilt, spaced bladeplay, DTilt, and Uair are still your friends. So you see what the two characters have in common and how similar the playstyles are. This makes transitioning easy because it won't take as long to figure out the playstyle compared to many others in the game. You still have the strength of several kill moves, like FTilt, dash attack, and Uair, the durability close to Ike, and none of the recovery lag. So if you're in a stuck situation and lose Round 1 to an opponent using the aforementioned characters, Link becomes an option.
However, while a strong character, Link isn't your only option here. Fox and Mario have reflecting abilities that can take your projectile game down. There are other characters to consider, whom I will post about in due time. Hopefully, you can make proper use of a secondary if you have a tournament coming up and feel the need to rely on other options.
Luigi
Sheik
Lucario
Mario
Fox
Luigi can overwhelm you with fireball setups, damage building, Bair, and kill combo at 100% and onward.
Sheik has the Fairs to shut down your aerial game and Needles to gimp you with.
Lucario can quickly match knockback with your own when his aura gets high, and he's much faster. His range is also no joke.
Mario has incredibly fast attacks, as well as FLUDD and Cape to gimp you with,
Fox can punish you from halfway across the screen and shut you down with priority.
All of the characters listed above have very fast attack recovery. They are incredibly hard to punish, which they use to their advantage to do free Smashes.
What we've established is that Ike is simply not perfect. He's not the most viable character in tournaments. You will come across roadblocks where you will be forced to switch out. I can count several recent times where I would have lost a set if I didn't let go of my pride and switch Ike out. Even with over 3,000 overall matches set on my game using Ike, and with as much matchup experience as I have, he will be beaten. These matchups range from 6-4 to 7-3. That said, what do you do then? You find the right character to switch to. And depending on your playstyle, that may vary, but I will start with the ones I use.
Take Link, for example.
What he has in common with Ike:
Blade User - Both have disjointed hitboxes, allowing "freebies" if you attack at max-range and the enemy blocks. If you attack at the right length, you are safe. You also out-prioritize hand-to-hand techniques using proper spacing.
Pivot FTilt - Both characters have a very powerful, ranged FTilt at their disposal. You can use this as a turn-around technique when someone is recovering on the ledge or chasing you with rolls.
Durable - Both survive hits well past 150%.
Nair combos - Both can start combos off of Nair
What he has different from Ike:
Less hitlag - Link can recover from many of his attacks much quicker, leaving him less time to be punished. FTilt is a good example, once again. The attack is also faster, making it a more reliable kill choice.
Projectiles - Link's options include attacking at range and keeping the enemy at bay.
Damage Gain - Thanks to projectiles, he can rack up damage 0-40% in a matter of seconds. Ike has trouble gaining damage quickly, yet has no problem being racked up in damage.
Nair and aerial defense - It becomes habit for an Ike player to airdodge since his aerials are too slow to tell someone to "get off of you" when they start an aerial string. Nair is a great aerial defense tool. It has reach, can start combos into jab, is incredibly safe, AND you can use it to gimp players without worrying too much for your own safety.
Bomb Jump - Link can pluck a Bomb and use the explosion's leverage as a last resort to recover. This is also good to survive KO hits.
Bomb - In addition, the moment your enemy revives from KO, pluck a bomb and roll or shield. If they grab you, they risk being exploded on.
Now, Link doesn't have the same killing opportunities as Ike does (Bair, Fair), nor does he have a safe grab (granted, Ike's grab has terrible reach anyway), or the kill power. Yes, Link's FTilt CAN kill a Rosalina off the ledge at 80%, but overall, many players can survive his strongest hits till 130%, when UTilt becomes an option.
I feel that, against many characters, your campiness becomes your best weapon. Play defense as best as you can, and then you can use what you know as Ike to beat the living daylights out of someone. Pivot FTilt, spaced bladeplay, DTilt, and Uair are still your friends. So you see what the two characters have in common and how similar the playstyles are. This makes transitioning easy because it won't take as long to figure out the playstyle compared to many others in the game. You still have the strength of several kill moves, like FTilt, dash attack, and Uair, the durability close to Ike, and none of the recovery lag. So if you're in a stuck situation and lose Round 1 to an opponent using the aforementioned characters, Link becomes an option.
However, while a strong character, Link isn't your only option here. Fox and Mario have reflecting abilities that can take your projectile game down. There are other characters to consider, whom I will post about in due time. Hopefully, you can make proper use of a secondary if you have a tournament coming up and feel the need to rely on other options.
Last edited:
