How to defeat Ice Climbers

[KirbyKaze]

Ctrl + F'd "Go Peach"

Did not find

Was disappoint

 

[Mew2King]

Btw, you guys are entirely wrong about "ken was good at it and m2k was not"

cuz ur only basing off of what was on youtube (NONE of these ~5 sets were recorded). Ask Wobbles or Chu how good I was in 2007 with marth vs ICs. I 3 stocked chu in that MU about 3 or 4 times that year, and wobbles too (evo east). All 4-5 sets I got at least one 3 stock. What I'm saying about retreating fair, retreating dair, and waveland mixups, is actually true. My execution and marth in general is just a lot worse than i was in 2007 but the stuff i'm saying is still true. I wasn't very great at edge guarding but I was good enough at fighting to make up for it. With Fox the edge guarding with Bair is easy but idk how to fight I just try out random stuff and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

 

[knightpraetor]

it's ok i'll try it out

 

[Mew2King]

just thought of a way to edge guard ICs, jump off stage towards them, then when you get to bair-tipper-range, double jump away from them(towards the stage) with tipper Bair(that hopefully hits, otherwise no big deal), then Fair before landing, and then react to where they are from their forward B if those 2 aerials miss (which already there is a good chance of one of them hitting). Counter could be good too. I just spent like 30 seconds thinking of this but I feel like that might be the best option possibly.

 

[choknater]

just finished making some edits:

• added some notes on projectiles
• added some depth on falco laser notes
• added some depth on the vertical neutral game in the falco laser notes section
• added/fixed some notes on Peach's turnip game
• added a lot of various notes to character specific sections for: peach, link, mario, luigi, samus

i also want to add some stuff later on defending against ic's approaches, and fighting sopo.

The problem players have with SoPo is they ASSUME they can go more aggressive against him because he doesn't have as much coverage/options as Nana, but it really isn't the case. What worked against two characters is going to keep working against only one. Just keep playing safe- It's certainly something Chu does without Nana.

this is exactly right. popo's punishes may no longer be as threatening as with 2 ice climbers, but you have to keep in mind that he actually gets FASTER and MORE MOBILE once nana is gone.

here's why. he has all the same mobility options when there are 2, but he can't use them because they put nana at risk. these include wavelanding around the platforms, and most importantly, dash dancing. spacing with dash dance and landing dash dance grabs a la marth becomes extremely viable. when there are 2 ice climbers, dash dancing desynchs nana and puts her at a huge risk. he gains his dd when she dies.

don't opt for stronger aggression when she dies. my advice is to play very carefully, and even "lame." his punishes are no longer very threatening, but that doesn't mean you should eat free damage to small dd grab combos that you don't have to get hit by.

mahone: from what i've seen, chu is pretty aggressive against puffs and likes to wd toward her while facing away. he likes bairs and fsmashes to trade or beat with her aerials. he doesn't really set up defense the way me or fly do. instead he focuses on timing his wavedashes and spacing. so vs him i'd just say try to cover yourself from very fast and unexpected wavedash approaches, and don't get in range for his uair/dair because those are free damage which puff can't afford to take.

i visualize it this way: ic's movement is a bunch of horizontal lines on the ground, and also vertical lines directly above them with uairs. puff's movement is a bunch of diagonal lines in the air. puff needs timing and angled attacks and solid defense. ic's defense is super tight, and their ground movement is really fast, so you want to try to fight in ways that reduce those advantages.

mew2king: haha okay, i'll take your word for it. as you mentioned, i've never seen those. i only judge from recent stuff where it looks like you're confused lol.

 

[Mahone]

Great advice again choknater, thanks a lot...

I always knew there was some reason sopo's always seemed so different and in some ways better than both, but I never thought about it enough to realize what u said... its so obv. now that you say it like that

 

[strawhats]

Btw, you guys are entirely wrong about "ken was good at it and m2k was not"

cuz ur only basing off of what was on youtube (NONE of these ~5 sets were recorded). Ask Wobbles or Chu how good I was in 2007 with marth vs ICs. I 3 stocked chu in that MU about 3 or 4 times that year, and wobbles too (evo east). All 4-5 sets I got at least one 3 stock. What I'm saying about retreating fair, retreating dair, and waveland mixups, is actually true. My execution and marth in general is just a lot worse than i was in 2007 but the stuff i'm saying is still true. I wasn't very great at edge guarding but I was good enough at fighting to make up for it. With Fox the edge guarding with Bair is easy but idk how to fight I just try out random stuff and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

yeah...from what I saw in your Genesis 2 crews match against Fly Amanita, compared to what i saw from you in your older matches against chu and wobbles (crew battle on YT) I'd say your marth's execution and decision making isn't the same as it was in your marth prime (especially against ICs. Fly had you looking lost out there)

 

[Mew2King]

yea not playing the game does that to u =/ u forget stuff and execute badly

i still think i could regain my old level in a day or so if i found/got a perfect controller tho. i still believe that

edit - btw strawhats, my like, 5 best sets vs ICs weren't recorded, so idk what vids ur referring to.

 

[Prince_Abu]

yea not playing the game does that to u =/ u forget stuff and execute badly

i still think i could regain my old level in a day or so if i found/got a perfect controller tho. i still believe that

edit - btw strawhats, my like, 5 best sets vs ICs weren't recorded, so idk what vids ur referring to.

y dont u just buy a controller online

 

[Mahone]

yea not playing the game does that to u =/ u forget stuff and execute badly

i still think i could regain my old level in a day or so if i found/got a perfect controller tho. i still believe that

edit - btw strawhats, my like, 5 best sets vs ICs weren't recorded, so idk what vids ur referring to.

You at pound 2 wasn't that bad, even though I'm sure u messed up a lot and it wasn't your prime...

Also, you always ignore this question, but why don't u just break in a new controller?

 

[Mew2King]

dude it's not easy to get/find a GOOD one. I have a bunch, just not good ones.

breaking in a new controller is prolly my best option. I just never play unless it's tourney (or friendlies at a tournament obviously). I don't own any game systems it's all in ohio (from like a year and a half ago). I guess that's my fault for being lazy though in that regard.

 

[Strong Badam]

Let's not turn this into another "Everyone tries to encourage M2K as he complains about controller quality" thread and focus on ICs please

 

[hungrybox]

LMAOOOO at Zangief

 

[choknater]

yea nana said "i am red cyclone!"

edit: reddo cycrone*

 

[ShroudedOne]

SoPo *****.

Good guide, Chok. I learned some stuff that I might never need.

 

[kalamazhu]

IC's are a terrible character

 

[Blu]

The ICs punishes, if prepared for correctly, are by nature a zero-to-death. That's implying, however, that the opponent actually makes a mistake.

Aside from punishes, yes, the ICs are pretty terrible.

EDIT:

A better term would be "reaction-based."

 

[choknater]

they dont always have to react lol

 

[Blu]

I've probably given it thirty seconds of thought and the only non-reaction-based approaches I could decipher were when the spacings you mentioned weren't abused properly...

But yeah, I guess I was generalizing. =p

 

[choknater]

it is not so easy to get in that space, haha. i only advised some ways to get in there, but as the ic player i will always try to move around and make the situation better for me.

reacting and punishing is great! but ic's can still force some nice situations.

i love the ice block chaser haha. so strong

 

[Tee ay eye]

i love you andre

 

[TheCrimsonBlur]

For example, if Marth is on the left side of Battlefield and I'm not in a position to be pressuring him, I'll generally camp just below the leftmost side of the right platform; it's hard for Marth to actually get much use out of the platforms in this case.

God I hate that. Completely cuts off all my lines of attack :/

grr i wish wobbles did that in vids so i could see what taj does to beat it

because atm i just try to bully my way in with dtilt. I have moderate success but then I eat a stray blizzard and its gg.

 

[Wobbles]

Taj wins with superior spacing and timing (ground based he uses d-tilt and then rising and retreating f-air to cover an escape), and he smash DI's out of blizzard stuff. That's the most basic element of his anti IC game.

 

[choknater]

yeah, sounds legit. dtilt is so good it's kinda unfair lol.

 

[Kyandid]

World's worst Falco here with a little update. This guide made my friend quit Ice Climbers.

Thanks!

 

[PEEF!]

The other characters owe us one...

 

[choknater]

World's worst Falco here with a little update. This guide made my friend quit Ice Climbers.

Thanks!

HAHAHAHA. oh no! LOL.

ice climbers are legit. if i didn't think they were a great character, i wouldn't use them. i'm sure if he wanted to figure out how to beat other characters, he could ask us in general ice climber chat in the character specific boards since we talk about it all the time.

if he really really quit them... then he doesn't love them enough! hmph!!!

 

[TheCrimsonBlur]

The other characters owe us one...

I'd make a guide on how to beat Marth

But I think everybody already knows

 

[choknater]

ROFL

that's pretty true.

 

[ShroudedOne]

People need to learn how to beat Peach. And Falco. And Puff.

(Peepee, Armada, Hbox, where you at)

 

[choknater]

Haha I'm sure all of them would freely talk about it! Peepee especially, in his thread. The main reason I thought ic's constituted a guide is bc ic mains are few and far between, so the matchup will feel new or strange to most players. They are fairly obscure to most people, especially for being that high on the tier list.

 

[PEEF!]

I think a guide like this should be made for all characters, because everyone has matchups that they are puzzled about.

 

[Signia]

#1 IC Weakness: Mid-range (THEIR BIGGEST WEAKNESS!)

For this matchup I define mid-range as the range outside their grab/fsmash/blizzard range but within their full wavedash length. Imagine where the tip of their blizzard would be... That's the spot! When you're inside this range, you've nerfed their greatest strengths. There is little need to shield pressure them because they can't do anything out of shield besides shield grab anyway. Just being there is already shield pressure. They can choose to walk forward, but some long pokes or projectiles will give you the advantage. They can wd, but since you are inside their full wd range, there will be quite a few frames (like 10~13 frames?) that they can't do anything while sliding. All you have to do is throw out a poke and their wavedash will be stopped.

Basically, when you are in this range you've reduced our options to these:
Retreat: Jump, WD away, Shield
Offense: Ice blocks, Blizzard, Walk up ftilt, dash attack, fair, turn around bair

Most importantly: If you are in this range, we cannot wavedash.

Within their wavedash range and outside their blizzard range? What stops them from WDing back? Or WDing toward you and double jabbing or Dsmashing? You're going to need to commit to stop that, it's too fast to react to.

Maybe I play Fly Amanita too much but even as a Marth player I find this spacing difficult to maintain and not as favorable as you say. IC's ground movement is lightning quick and everything is safe. I can't grab him or I get hit, and I need to space at the tip to do anything until high percents. Full jumping or turning my back to him will get me wrecked. Options seem pretty limited.

Tip range is a double edged sword as well, it's the range your opponent can bait whiffs. ICs can hurt Marth real bad if I whiff. What can I whiff punish ICs with? A poke. SHs make my next move very telegraphed and it's very easy to get in between Marth's spaced attack spam.

The only solution seems to be with SH wavelanding and platform WL/don't WL mindgames and just poke him to death.

 

[choknater]

Within their wavedash range and outside their blizzard range? What stops them from WDing back? Or WDing toward you and double jabbing or Dsmashing? You're going to need to commit to stop that, it's too fast to react to.

There is about 1/5 second of lag when IC's are wavedashing, and this is more than enough time to stop their wd jab if you are marth, as long as you are using a lot of poking moves. and you're right, nothing is stopping them from wd back, but when they do it is still your goal to close space, because Marth loses pretty hard if he is getting camped successfully. if they wd back, move forward.

Maybe I play Fly Amanita too much but even as a Marth player I find this spacing difficult to maintain and not as favorable as you say. IC's ground movement is lightning quick and everything is safe. I can't grab him or I get hit, and I need to space at the tip to do anything until high percents. Full jumping or turning my back to him will get me wrecked. Options seem pretty limited.

Tip range is a double edged sword as well, it's the range your opponent can bait whiffs. ICs can hurt Marth real bad if I whiff. What can I whiff punish ICs with? A poke. SHs make my next move very telegraphed and it's very easy to get in between Marth's spaced attack spam.

The only solution seems to be with SH wavelanding and platform WL/don't WL mindgames and just poke him to death.

yeah, i never said it's easy haha, i just gave general advice. if you do get a grab, fthrow immediately with marth, it's pretty good. but in general yeah grabs can be punished.

"poking to death" is exactly marth's goal vs ic's. you can't really combo or edge guard them extremely well.

also if you're gonna whiff moves, don't use fsmash or ftilt. whiffing jab or dtilt is not so bad because they are really quick. you can fair and nair in their face sometimes and it is pretty difficult for ic's to whiff punish those, because even wavedashing barely fast enough (or not fast enough) to get between late fair->dtilt or late fair-> jab.

fly is really good vs marth. i'd say don't sweat it and keep learning. the matchup is pretty even from my perspective, but the marth really has to know how to keep up the pressure and be aware of all the things they can do with their very quick movement.

 

[Strong Badam]

yeah, wavedash back is a good defensive tool but if you do so and don't get a hit, you've effectively decreased your amount of stage control, and your "box". this is a bad thing against characters like marth that are trying to shrink your box and increase his own. just keep in mind that you don't necessarily have to hit someone to come out on top of a situational interaction.

 

[ZaXXoR]

Much appreciated, thanks for taking the time to write this

 

[choknater]

No prob. Thanks everyone for the feedback

 

[Wolfy!]

Thanks for the help, Chok. =)

 

[TheGoat]

Thanks a lot man, this is a good guide. I hate ice climbers.