Ike Video Thread (Critiques Welcome!)

[GhostUrsa]

Heya, I've always wanted to share some of my previous replays but I wasn't sure whether buying a capture device or not. Now that we can record our own replays with the 1.1.0 update there's no need to. Here's a video of me playing as Ike (I've got some more but this is the best I can get for now).

Edit: Try to reduce how often you use Eruption in the neutral. Since you are immobile, your only hope is for your opponent to challenge your attack and for you to beat him out. But he has many thing he can do to get around it, (since you can't hold it forever) which makes this an extremely hard read that most opponents will not walk into. It's ideal to pull out Eruption when their only choice IS to challenge your attack, which is why it's mostly used as an edge guarding tool. They have to either challenge you for the snap, or kiss the blastzone.

Don't forget to mix in more grabs. You had a lot of opportunities where you went for a smash attack (which you did a solid read on, by the way) but a grab would have given you better damage overall. They weren't high enough % for the smash to KO, but a grab would allow you to pummel a little and then end with a d-throw or up-throw into an aerial for far more % racking (or b-throw offstage to keep the pressure up. Makes them nervous, which means more mistakes.). Ike's got an impressive grab range when pulled out of a pivot or turn, which would have made it harder for Marth to get away from you. This is why later in the match you had a harder time synching the KO, as your opponent caught on to your habit of hard read turnaround smashes and started either baiting them out or out-smashing them (Some of Marth's smashes are faster than ours.).

I'll watch some of the other matches in a bit and see what I find there. That should be enough to get your started.

 

[Verteidiger]

You're link is dead. Get it fixed up, and I'll be able to give you some pointers.

Damn, I'm going to fix it right now. It will be up in like 30 minutes here: http://youtu.be/isOpnbLqins (blame my ****ty DSL connection in Spain). I'm uploading all the matches that I've recorded for now. I think I've given my best Ike in the last match from the video -- it starts at 7:09.

edit: I'm so ********.

 

[cwjakesteel]

Yeah, smash attacks have the slightest of lag when using it over attack iirc.

That sucks, so it adds frame to start up animation or ending animation or what?

 

[Quickhero]

That sucks, so it adds frame to start up animation or ending animation or what?

It just kind of delays the move...not necessarily lags. It delays at the start up btw.

 

[Hark17ball]

Here's some more @-Stark- gameplay
Ike vs Ness: The reads
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAMzIGUyUJs
Ike vs Luigi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciHnoO_aBoQ
Ike vs Mario: This one left me on the edge of my seat biting my nails
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4ghkBj5Tzo

Holy cow...those matches were awesome. The one against Mario was so good. Fantastic set!

 

[Flukey]

Super Smash Bros. 4 Wii U - Roy (Muru) vs Ike (Baselarde)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=balwHJ0tr7I

Not sure if anyone has seen it yet, these are really fun matches to watch.

Also i would like to invite Ike players to discuss this matchup in this thread: http://smashboards.com/threads/set-...ik-7-26-15-8-6-15.406195/page-5#post-19862681.

We have little activity on Roy's forums and i would like to read about everyones opinion about the MU

 

[Verteidiger]

Edit: Try to reduce how often you use Eruption in the neutral. Since you are immobile, your only hope is for your opponent to challenge your attack and for you to beat him out. But he has many thing he can do to get around it, (since you can't hold it forever) which makes this an extremely hard read that most opponents will not walk into. It's ideal to pull out Eruption when their only choice IS to challenge your attack, which is why it's mostly used as an edge guarding tool. They have to either challenge you for the snap, or kiss the blastzone.

Don't forget to mix in more grabs. You had a lot of opportunities where you went for a smash attack (which you did a solid read on, by the way) but a grab would have given you better damage overall. They weren't high enough % for the smash to KO, but a grab would allow you to pummel a little and then end with a d-throw or up-throw into an aerial for far more % racking (or b-throw offstage to keep the pressure up. Makes them nervous, which means more mistakes.). Ike's got an impressive grab range when pulled out of a pivot or turn, which would have made it harder for Marth to get away from you. This is why later in the match you had a harder time synching the KO, as your opponent caught on to your habit of hard read turnaround smashes and started either baiting them out or out-smashing them (Some of Marth's smashes are faster than ours.).

I'll watch some of the other matches in a bit and see what I find there. That should be enough to get your started.

Thanks for the heads up! I'm going now for more grabs and pressuring with tilts. I've mapped my C-stick to Attack and I think it's helping me to play better. It forces me not to do a Smash attack as soon as I panic. Now I need to practise my spikes...

 

[XDaDePsak]

How to make Ness ragequit

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

Fought a Meta Knight. What am I missing? That dash attack and those air combos drove me crazy.

 

[GhostUrsa]

Fought a Meta Knight. What am I missing? That dash attack and those air combos drove me crazy.

My MetaKnight knowledge is a little rusty, but I'll help where I can. MetaKnight's dash attack has a lot of lag on shield, so make sure you grab and punish when he attempts it. MetaKnight's multiple jumps grant him great combo potential in the air, which has me avoid stages where he can jump through the base platform due to him being able to pressure Ike to give up stage control. This combined with MetaKnight's Shuttle Loop makes edge guarding dangerous. I've had shield to d-tilt work depending on their spacing when attempting to shark the stage, and find that a well timed Counter scares them into reducing how often they attempt these options.

This MetaKnight likes to use Dimensional Cape like we do QD. This can be extremely punishable, since the distance he does is has a static max range and he loved to use it to get away from you (at said range). He became pretty predictable about where he was going to us it, which he used much in the first match and you started capitalizing on in the second. Good job on picking that up.

I'm out of time to help out more. Hope it's useful.

 

[goose32]

Fought a Meta Knight. What am I missing? That dash attack and those air combos drove me crazy.

You had a few missed opportunities to punish Meta Knight when he was sitting there charging his fsmash; most of your attacks can easily outrange it, so make the most of those situations. If he is charging into you, don't be afraid to throw out some pivot tilts/grabs.

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

His endlag is almost non-existent on FSmash, so I didn't want to challenge it and get punished.

 

[GhostUrsa]

His endlag is almost non-existent on FSmash, so I didn't want to challenge it and get punished.

True, but if I remember correctly our tilts and smashes outrange this so you should be able to stand just out of range and hit him without waiting for the ending lag. Worst case scenario, you clank and nothing happens in this case. Best case, you pummel through him. In either case, you'll scare him out of being so defensive and read heavy and more likely pressure him into the offensive where Ike prefers him anyway.

 

[Trunks159]

Ugh, the MK matchup is like, one of Ike's worse matchups.

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

Major problems with Captain Falcon. One of them is trying to escape the dreaded Dair spike. He can read an airdodge into it or can even set it up with a combo that takes you offstage.

I'm saving this match from Lylat Cruise because I feel I need the most critique in this match. I may use this stage to counterpick Fatality, but I don't want to fall for any gimmicks.

As always, if I missed a combo or anything I should have done, please critique. I appreciate all feedback!

 

[Banjobeast158]

Major problems with Captain Falcon. One of them is trying to escape the dreaded Dair spike. He can read an airdodge into it or can even set it up with a combo that takes you offstage.

I'm saving this match from Lylat Cruise because I feel I need the most critique in this match. I may use this stage to counterpick Fatality, but I don't want to fall for any gimmicks.

As always, if I missed a combo or anything I should have done, please critique. I appreciate all feedback!

The end of tat last match was intense, nice Bair i was not expecting it!

 

[Arrei]

I've faced a Falcon that loved to bait an airdodge offstage and punish with Dair before. The main thing you really need to do is just be patient whenever you get sent offstage. Don't be too hasty to get back right away if he's buzzing around the airspace between you and the stage, it's much more important to watch and try to identify what edgeguard option he's attempting to pull out because Falcon's just got amazing aerials. It got you kneed in the second video, and that just shows off how you don't want to just try and sail through Falcon-filled skies.

Keep in mind though, that the challenge becomes patiently avoiding his edgeguard tactics while trying to stay unpredictable. If the patient route forces you to use Aether to recover, he could switch to trying to hit you out of the jump.

 

[GhostUrsa]

As always, if I missed a combo or anything I should have done, please critique. I appreciate all feedback!

The biggest thing that hit you hard in this one was that you got predictable with your recoveries near the last half of the match (at about the 2:40 mark onward). Once you snapped to the ledge, you always just got up from the edge. No rising attacks, no attempt to roll past, no drop-Aether onto the stage. He caught onto this, and pretty much spammed jab to knock you back off stage. I know that trying to jump past wouldn't have worked (our jump flight path would be right into that Jab), but he started getting greedy with those jabs and was right at the edge. Releasing your grip and using Aether would have knocked that right out, smacked him away and granted you the safety to return. You might have also been able to perform a rising F-air, though I've never been able to get that to work and not slip under the stage to my doom.

You did a good job reading him up till that point. A small thing I noticed that would get you caught was that if you tech'd the landing on a platform you always rolled away, which Capt used to hit you with his U-smash a couple of times. This Cap seem to like to play off of momentum based combos, so you ended up rolling right where you needed to be for his follow-up. Spicing it up by rolling forward would have thrown him off. (I know there wouldn't be a lot of room either way, but where his attacks were coming from it should have been enough to help.)

I liked how you shut down his dash dancing on multiple occasions. That Cap liked to dance around, but it got fairly easy to read after a while. (That last b-air to capitalize on his turnaround was great!)

 

[Petersheikah]

Beginner here. Any tip is welcome.
VS Ganondorf https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=B9P1wSdfI9Q
Was doing so well, 'til my little brother distracted me near the end.


VS Marth https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4hz4Gv3xGn0


VS Pikachu https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZNTej-fvq8

 

[04r]

Beginner here. Any tip is welcome.
VS Ganondorf https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=B9P1wSdfI9Q
Was doing so well, 'til my little brother distracted me near the end.


VS Marth https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4hz4Gv3xGn0


VS Pikachu https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZNTej-fvq8

Vs Ganondorf: If you're not familiar with spacing - http://www.ssbwiki.com/Spacing
It's important to use this technique when facing any opponent but Ganon is especially important. Ike hits pretty hard but Ganon wrecks shi*. Use your big sword as a wall of hitbox to try and keep out of his beefy attacks.

Offstage is very scary vs. Ganon. He's an adept edgeguarder so watch yourself when going for gimps if he's high above the edge. Going deep and miss-spcaing a Fair can result in a getting UpB'd which is death for Ike if you don't tech/don't have a jump.

Watch the sideB use; to approach or recover with it is very punishable.

Smash 4 Ike loves grabs like Brawl Ike loves jab. You used it, but it's Ike's jam, so, ... use it more.

More later...

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

Beginner here. Any tip is welcome.
VS Ganondorf https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=B9P1wSdfI9Q
Was doing so well, 'til my little brother distracted me near the end.


VS Marth https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4hz4Gv3xGn0


VS Pikachu https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7ZNTej-fvq8

Vs. Ganondorf

>Don't FSmash so much. Ganondorf will punish you
>Instead of dash attacks, approach with Fair
>Don't be afraid to edgeguard and walk-off Fair Ganondorf. Just be mindful that you don't get hit with Flame Choke
>Don't bother with Counter unless you see him charge a Smash or Warlock Punch
>Hit confirm your jabs. If he blocked the first or second hits, dash grab or get out of the way.
>Instead of throwing Fair out randomly, wait for him to be in range, and then hit
>Use more grabs.
>Instead of attacking and approaching as much as possible, wait and punish first.

Ike's strongest asset isn't his smashes. It's his aerials and his DThrow/Uthrow into Fair/Nair combos.

 

[Petersheikah]

Vs Ganondorf: If you're not familiar with spacing - http://www.ssbwiki.com/Spacing
It's important to use this technique when facing any opponent but Ganon is especially important. Ike hits pretty hard but Ganon wrecks shi*. Use your big sword as a wall of hitbox to try and keep out of his beefy attacks.

Offstage is very scary vs. Ganon. He's an adept edgeguarder so watch yourself when going for gimps if he's high above the edge. Going deep and miss-spcaing a Fair can result in a getting UpB'd which is death for Ike if you don't tech/don't have a jump.

Watch the sideB use; to approach or recover with it is very punishable.

Smash 4 Ike loves grabs like Brawl Ike loves jab. You used it, but it's Ike's jam, so, ... use it more.

More later...

Vs. Ganondorf

>Don't FSmash so much. Ganondorf will punish you
>Instead of dash attacks, approach with Fair
>Don't be afraid to edgeguard and walk-off Fair Ganondorf. Just be mindful that you don't get hit with Flame Choke
>Don't bother with Counter unless you see him charge a Smash or Warlock Punch
>Hit confirm your jabs. If he blocked the first or second hits, dash grab or get out of the way.
>Instead of throwing Fair out randomly, wait for him to be in range, and then hit
>Use more grabs.
>Instead of attacking and approaching as much as possible, wait and punish first.

Ike's strongest asset isn't his smashes. It's his aerials and his DThrow/Uthrow into Fair/Nair combos.

Thanks for the tips, guys. I'll definetely keep them in mind. Right now I'm having some problems with shorthops (I usee Wiimote+Nunchucks) and I often jump too high while fighting.

 

[04r]

Just trying this out.

 

[Deleted member 269706]

This isn't me playing (obviously), it's Ryo and StaticManny, but I thought some of you would appreciate seeing some more really high level play:

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

This isn't me playing (obviously), it's Ryo and StaticManny, but I thought some of you would appreciate seeing some more really high level play:

Man that was a damn good match to watch.

 

[Deleted member 269706]

Man that was a damn good match to watch.

For sure! Ryo and StaticManny tend to eat each other in Grand Finals a lot during those Smash Conferences, so I'd definitely recommend going to that channel and watching more of the videos. Manny's got one hell of a Sonic too (he placed 9th at both CEO and EVO iirc), so it's definitely worth the watch! Not to mention all of the other people he plays against.

 

[04r]

For sure! Ryo and StaticManny tend to eat each other in Grand Finals a lot during those Smash Conferences, so I'd definitely recommend going to that channel and watching more of the videos. Manny's got one hell of a Sonic too (he placed 9th at both CEO and EVO iirc), so it's definitely worth the watch! Not to mention all of the other people he plays against.

And Ryo's Ike sensational to watch. The man has reads.

 

[4MyFriends]

Here's me with Ike playing against a pretty decent Falcon. Any critiques would be appreciated. o:

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

Had some major, major trouble with Wrath the Sonic player. I know I missed some serious punish opportunities, but he was so fast that I didn't know what to do. Same for his ridiculous gimping game.

 

[04r]

Had some major, major trouble with Wrath the Sonic player. I know I missed some serious punish opportunities, but he was so fast that I didn't know what to do. Same for his ridiculous gimping game.

I've played Wrath before. We went about even, with him maybe taking a few more.

Vid 1: I'm about 1 minute in and what I see is Wrath approaching the same exact way each time: spin dash to Uair. This could have been punished with SH fading fairs or SH nairs because Wrath wasn't even changing his timing. If you can't manage to punish him, don't challenge him in the air, only Ike's bair comes out fast enough to challenge Sonic.

Be more patient with your approaches and your recovery. I noticed you trying to recover into Sonic. Let him do what he does offstage and airdoge accordingly.

Pick your spacing better and play more defensive. Watch the hard read attempts as good players don't often make the obvious mistake.

On the positive side, you had great follow ups, great grabs and kept it close.

Vid 2: Around 40 seconds: Wall of hitbox doesn't work against Sonic, he's gonna spindash punish every aerial you miss.

Baiting is your friend. Empty hops, run up shielding and, sometimes, just doing nothing vs. Sonic can do wonders. Great job not committing to missed jabs.

If you can't land, try a Counter once in a while. It's a ****ty option but can work occasionally.

1:36 - great usmash.

Vid 3: 43 seconds - really great start here. Perfect spacing on your nairs and great grabs. ... even though he has the lead(Sonic's stupid).

Really nice comeback on the second stock.

Rolls really got you in trouble in this game. I assume you felt pretty lost on what to do.

Overall: It can be hard dealing with Sonic because the B button lets him get in on us effortlessly, which is really bad, and just as easily gets him out if he messes up.

 

[Rango the Mercenary]

I'll keep that in mind. I feel like I let him get away from too many Spin Dash followup jumps. He was safe on those and sometimes his followup evasion from Spring to Dair.

 

[Xelion]

There was a post a saw awhile back, it had a rating thing that I think we should utilize, it was like this.

/10 on my spacing
/10 on my punishing or how consistant I punish
/10 on my off stage offensive game
/10 on my defensive game ( getting on the ledge without getting spiked,well timed dodges)

I think we should have a universal rating system for our videos like this.
-/10 Offense
-/10 Deffense
-/10 Spacing
-/10 Punishes

We could add more categories such as, Mixups/Mindgames, but that could fit under offense.

Just a recommendation, but if you guys would like to see how well it goes, I personally think it wod help us a lot. Here is a video of a random game of For Glory to help test it out. Please feel free to critique it in whatever way you want.

I

 

[04r]

There was a post a saw awhile back, it had a rating thing that I think we should utilize, it was like this.

/10 on my spacing
/10 on my punishing or how consistant I punish
/10 on my off stage offensive game
/10 on my defensive game ( getting on the ledge without getting spiked,well timed dodges)

I think we should have a universal rating system for our videos like this.
-/10 Offense
-/10 Deffense
-/10 Spacing
-/10 Punishes

We could add more categories such as, Mixups/Mindgames, but that could fit under offense.

Just a recommendation, but if you guys would like to see how well it goes, I personally think it wod help us a lot. Here is a video of a random game of For Glory to help test it out. Please feel free to critique it in whatever way you want.

I

Not a bad idea but what's the ceiling on those numbers? Is it based on skill level of the player? If Ryo and San are mostly 8-10's, are lower level players always 5-7's? This and new players would probably benefit the least from it. Getting all 2's and 3's will probably influence them to just change characters rather than actually help them.

 

[Xelion]

Not a bad idea but what's the ceiling on those numbers? Is it based on skill level of the player? If Ryo and San are mostly 8-10's, are lower level players always 5-7's? This and new players would probably benefit the least from it. Getting all 2's and 3's will probably influence them to just change characters rather than actually help them.

Thats a good question, we could probably discuss it and change what we need to, we could increase the scores to out of 100 to make it more exact. But it think it's based off the performance of the match, and maybe add a comment to the end recomending what they need to improve and a way to improve it, here's an example.

65/100 Spacing
Your spacing varied through the match, one moment you were hitting them with the edge of the sword and keeping them out, then you would run up and get right up in their face. I would recommend you go into training mode and look and see the arc and range of the moves and work to memorize that and use that to your advantage.

I'm not sure that's something I just thought up real quick, we can work it to be a good thing.

 

[goose32]

Here's me with Ike playing against a pretty decent Falcon. Any critiques would be appreciated. o:

There were a few missed punishes or places where you could have punished harder, mainly when he used his side b on your shield, and when he tried to go for a mega read with falcon punch.

If down throw isn't going to combo or kill (stops working as a combo throw well before up throw, kills ~150%, depends on character), I'd recommend using a different one. If you have falcon near the ledge, he's very susceptible to getting blasted by eruption, just like what you did with his first stock. A simple forward throw can be effective against him if he's near the edge, or up throw to fair if his % isn't too high.

Nice spike at the end, by the way

 

[4MyFriends]

There were a few missed punishes or places where you could have punished harder, mainly when he used his side b on your shield, and when he tried to go for a mega read with falcon punch.

If down throw isn't going to combo or kill (stops working as a combo throw well before up throw, kills ~150%, depends on character), I'd recommend using a different one. If you have falcon near the ledge, he's very susceptible to getting blasted by eruption, just like what you did with his first stock. A simple forward throw can be effective against him if he's near the edge, or up throw to fair if his % isn't too high.

Nice spike at the end, by the way

Thanks for the input. I know I definitely have a lot of room for improvement, but I'll keep trying to be more consistent with my punishes. I have a bad habit with his down throw thinking it's gonna kill at high percentages. I need to stop that lol.

And thanks again. It definitely felt good to spike since I don't get many opportunities to spike with Ike (hehe that rhymed 8D).

 

[Casval]

So I was FGing against this guy who picked plenty of top-tier characters who could beat me quite often with most of my picks, but I had a few successes. Most notably, my Samus beat his Diddy, but that replay was too long to save and upload to youtube.

I played Ike against his Pac Man, though, and I was quite proud of how it turned out:

I still think I have quite a lot of room for improvement, because I lack consistency overall. I'd appreciate any feedback. Although keep in mind that my gratuitous use of smash attacks are almost always accidental, they're often missed dash attacks/tilts due to lag on FG (I don't c-stick as often on FG since lag will eat those inputs often)

 

[4MyFriends]

Was on For Glory not too long ago and faced against a guy named HERO. He had a really good Link and Roy and we both had our share of wins and losses. Most of our matches lasted too long for me to upload except for this one. I accidentally threw out a couple forward smashes when I wanted to do forward tilts and I got punished pretty bad for it. XD

Also any input on how I could have done better would be appreciated. I'm always looking to improve with my Ike. o:

 

[GhostUrsa]

I still think I have quite a lot of room for improvement, because I lack consistency overall. I'd appreciate any feedback. Although keep in mind that my gratuitous use of smash attacks are almost always accidental, they're often missed dash attacks/tilts due to lag on FG (I don't c-stick as often on FG since lag will eat those inputs often)

Try not to use QD on the ground unless you are chasing your target from a roll and you know it will connect. Otherwise a good opponent will capitalize on your ending lag. Dash grabs and dash attacks tend to be more healthy. Using Quick Draw as a mixup is nice, but your QD didn't have any chance of connecting when you fired it. The read was pretty hard, but luckily your opponent didn't catch on to capitalize with a FFing b-air.

Other than that, don't forget to use your d-tilt. It comes out fast, has almost the same range as f-tilt and sets up into lovely combos until higher %. F-tilt can be dangerous to use due to its startup frames (it's faster than it used to be, but still isn't as foolproof as d-tilt), so I recommend keeping f-tilt for soft reads and attacks at max spacing.

And you'll want to practice using that c-stick more. I know you say you prefer to avoid it, but it makes it much easier to get accurate tilt results. There was a point where you spammed f-tilt and u-tilt when your opponent wasn't near you, which I'm guessing it was you were having a hard time getting the character to turn around (whether it was due to controls or lag.) F-tilt is very easy to control it's direction without accidentally performing a dash attack with just basic attack c-stick configuration, and a turn around grab/u-tilt/d-tilt can be performed with tap-jump off by using the the high diagonals on the control stick. (Aim for about 10 or 2 o' clock on the stick respectively for a good range.) Learning the upper angles can help even if you don't use the c-stick, since it will allow you to perform turnaround u-tilt (or d-tilt if you aim for 7 and 5 o clock respectively). That has helped me in the past.

Was on For Glory not too long ago and faced against a guy named HERO. He had a really good Link and Roy and we both had our share of wins and losses. Most of our matches lasted too long for me to upload except for this one. I accidentally threw out a couple forward smashes when I wanted to do forward tilts and I got punished pretty bad for it. XD

Also any input on how I could have done better would be appreciated. I'm always looking to improve with my Ike. o:

You have a similar bad habit I do, which is using rolls way too much for positioning. It's not excessive, but you end up finding yourself in the same position you were in when you initiated the roll since your opponent did the same thing. A few retreating short hops would have allowed you to either b-air or n-air your opponent while they are helpless. Practice working in more retreating short hops into your game, as rolling like that can be really detrimental against opponents that have great dash options. (It's a habit you don't want when fighting speedsters like Cap or Sonic.)

All the FE characters share a similar weakness with their recoveries, and that is their sharking. It normally is a good thing, but Ike's Counter works wonders in most situations with this as only the deepest of recoveries are prevented from our wrath. If the angle is off to use Counter, then walk-off aerials can work for you.(or if you have the guts, a d-air spike! That walk off Counter at the end was a good call.) Don't forget to work some grabs in. Your opponent was catching on to your jab tactics, and one good grab would have helped reduce the number of counters used on you.

 

[4MyFriends]

You have a similar bad habit I do, which is using rolls way too much for positioning. It's not excessive, but you end up finding yourself in the same position you were in when you initiated the roll since your opponent did the same thing. A few retreating short hops would have allowed you to either b-air or n-air your opponent while they are helpless. Practice working in more retreating short hops into your game, as rolling like that can be really detrimental against opponents that have great dash options. (It's a habit you don't want when fighting speedsters like Cap or Sonic.)

All the FE characters share a similar weakness with their recoveries, and that is their sharking. It normally is a good thing, but Ike's Counter works wonders in most situations with this as only the deepest of recoveries are prevented from our wrath. If the angle is off to use Counter, then walk-off aerials can work for you.(or if you have the guts, a d-air spike! That walk off Counter at the end was a good call.) Don't forget to work some grabs in. Your opponent was catching on to your jab tactics, and one good grab would have helped reduce the number of counters used on you.

Yeah I have a pretty bad habit of rolling against quick characters or really good players. All that rolling is actually a sign of me being nervous, and as you said, trying to position myself. I'm still trying to break the habit, but it's pretty hard.

I should have used grabs more often. Those counters were painful, especially when he countered my unintended forward smash, but that's what I get for being jumpy against a decent opponent lol.

I try to avoid d-air spikes in general since they almost never work for me. D-air definitely isn't as good as it was in Brawl.