MU Chart 3

[Reizilla]

-1:
0:
1:
2:
3:

 

[reslived]

What happened last time? Did marth boards try to drop wario to +1?

 

[Internalyzed]

They probably based the matchup off of Leon's record vs. Glutonny.

 

[Shaya]

A lot of Marth mains who play wario regularly feel it's only a +1, while most of those same wario's think its +2 for us.

 

[C.J.]

It's actually quite interesting. I'm convinced it's because of a disparity in the perception of difficulty of walling Wario out. The Wario players view it as being quite simple and think that getting in on Marth requires a hard read/the Marth player really messing up. Meanwhile, the Marths find that consistently covering all of Wario's options keeping him out is difficult to do consistently and the punish for Wario getting in can often times hurt quite badly.

 

[Lord Chair]

A final panel decided it was +2 because the Warios (read: Chair) were the only ones actually having legit arguments.

Marth players tend to not be technically on point and tend to base matchups off that.

 

[C.J.]

I will have a reply for your arguments if it gets to discussions btw.

In regards to Marth players tending to not be technically on point, the fact that there are so few Marths (none) that are technically on point consistently throughout the match has me lean towards viewing MUs in that regard. I will agree that on paper it is a +2 MU, but since Marths will/do make mistakes from a technical standpoint, in practice the punishes Wario gets and the strings that are started from those punishes, I feel are damaging enough to pull the MU closer to +1 than +2.

/super quick response.

 

[reslived]

so the problem here is an underlying philosophy with how to go about MU charts... should we base MU charts on the best marths/warios that exist or should we base it on philosophy and character's capabilities?

imo Marth should be 2nd or 3rd best character in the game if were going with 'ideal' MU, cuz he just outranges everyone and "perfect" walling would essentially shut down most of the cast. but if we are focusing on pros, then yes dealing with warios is a pain in the *** and requires complete attention and control and very few mistakes.

Since the tier list is based on pros and how they play, i dont see why the MU chart shouldnt be the same.

 

[Shaya]

Marth doesn't outrange anyone.
Bar...
Luigi.

 

[Lord Chair]

The MU chart isn't strictly based on pros and how they play, it's about how a matchup should ideally but humanly should be played and will eventually turn out to evolve given enough time. Pro players aren't gods and don't necessarily play matchups optimally. If all you would have to do is look at win records of pro players there would be no room (or need) for matchup panels and all sorts of silly theorycrafting.

Still, the precision cap is impossible to define and it's not uncommon for people to completely agree with each other on how a matchup will work out only to disagree on the limitations of perfect technical play. You can see that in a lot of Wario matchups but those are by no means the only ones. Even if you take technical errors into account you still can't anticipate on the actual effect they will have on the outcome of a match because you can't know for sure when they're going to happen and what kind of situation they will put you in.

Marth's spacing isn't inherently flawless even in a perfect world. He still needs to sacrifice space and it's perfectly possible to disallow pressure. In fact, in a perfect world DDD would dominate this game simply because you can't powershield grabs.

 

[Ereth]

Is this still open for discussion?

I think
-Diddy to even
-Ice Climbers to -1
-Snake to even
-Ike to even (55-45 marth's favor, hard even for ike)
-Pika to +1

I can explain myself if anyone cares

 

[Player-3]

-1
-0 :everybody:
1

 

[Shaya]

I care about your thoughts on ICs bro

 

[Ereth]

The spacing required to fight ice climbers is so critical that the slightest mispaced fair can result in a grab. The only stage marth has an advantage over IC's is Final Destination because when separated nana will not jump because there is no platforms, you can essentially fair her across the stage. When platforms are involved marth gets put into one of the situations he is the worst in, being above anyone, IC's can just poke with uair and maintain control. Also marth's grabs do not open any hitboxes so even when marth grabs first he is taking a risk, or setting himself up to get hit. I think this MU is based on marth catching the mistakes of the IC's player and capitalizing. When put into a scenario where the IC's player makes no mistakes, marth loses the MU

 

[Shaya]

Full hop fair aiming ICs head (so last frame of fair hitbox) is too good at being hard to miss space and clashes relatively easily with blizzard. One safe hit on any non dash-shield puts ICs in a time lock (it's like a frame trap but its warping your sense of how bad ICs are as a character; <3 delux) that can only be rolled out of. If you power shield uair on a platform, you can platform drop->dolphin slash [this is a 6 frame option] (or platform drop fair/uair). If less precision is required, being near the edges of platforms is also strong (any form of shield-di facing the right direction into a bair [or nair if facing the other direction] is pretty good). IC's nair/bair/uair into iceblock grab trick from platforms shouldn't work very often if you know it exists, so don't be like "I TRIED TO SHIELD THINGS NEAR PLATFORM EDGES AND DIED, THANKS SHAYA YOU ASSHOLE"

IC's can't afford to take hits on their shield from Marth more than once (if tippered) or twice if not tippered (so in other words, you don't want to not hit them with tipper aerials or dtilt) within any 2 second block. Minimal hits on shield follow up into near-guaranteed shield pokes (I have not seen ICs ever consistently not get shield poked by DB in these scenarios).

Rather than taking 50 uairs to the crotch, either use your double jump animation -> fast fall -> footstool (meet my latest dumb 'footstool jumps are stupidly disjointed' gimmick) or if without jump just keep trying to footstool jump out of it.

Seriously though.
Pay attention to the dashes.
Respect the Ice Climbers dashing. If you swing at a dashing ICs out of panic, than you're playing the mu badly. If you always aim to hit non sliding shields (so in the case of them dashing to shield waiting for the momentum to slow) then TIME LOCK.

 

[Ereth]

Interesting points

I thought that if you footstool IC's they can grab you
Platform drop uair da best
Even with all of this, the MU still seems in IC's favor. Its essentially Marth you better not make the slightest mistake or you lose (then again most of marth's MU's are this way -__-)
I'll have to practice this stuff, sadly theres only 1-2 good ice climbers players in florida :/

 

[Shaya]

I mean from them juggling you (as in, you are trying to footstool jump one of them before they hit you while their body is extending upwards pre-hitbox of uair) . Yes if you footstool one while they are both on the ground they can grab you.

I think if ICs make one mistake then Marth can nullify their stock. I don't believe in the slightest that Sopo can raise a hair to Marth (who isn't an idiot) at all (unlike other high/top tiers which don't have it easily against his relatively okay camping / disjointed moveset and chain grabs to bolster over others). And chaining nana is very easy just about everywhere (but being comfortable / being aware of how they deal with being chained and what's the best thing to do in them being split situations etc comes from experience). There are also a few tricks (look them up) on the Ice Climbers part for recovering their ***** / off stage things, if you know them, you see them coming from a mile away and **** them for it. Pseudo ledge priority ala tethers comes into play, certain positions Popo has drop down to for recovering nana, etc etc etc. Ledge guarding is very simple as well [hmm can I handle get up attack or side b on reaction? Tick - Very Simple; Nay - well learn to-], I just think people never try to push them onto ledges for some reason but from them recovering though its pretty swell.

Now Marth can take a lot of damage from the ICs without grabs, usually incurred during players doing nothing but trying to avoid the grab. I don't think people even know you can SHIELD things from Ice Climbers because they're too scared of the grab, especially during the times where neither can grab you. I'd rather shield a desynch [sometimes starting with blizzard ->] ice block -> dash grab than get hit by the blizzard or ice block, and the reasons should be obvious.

 

[-LzR-]

Not counting MK, there is nothing scarier than fighting Marth with Icies. Marth is brutal.

 

[Ereth]

How do you feel about ike as 0? 55-45 marth

 

[smashkng]

55/45 is too generous. It's more like 40/60 at best for Ike. Ike's Bair is really good for countering Marth's wall of Fairs. Without it Marth would be able to wreck Ike really easily in mid range. The problem is how easy it is to gimp Ike with Marth. Marth's Up b is most of the time impossible to intercept as Ike when Marth recovers. Also Marth's Up b ruins a lot of Ike's options out of jab cancel. Ike's jab isn't really safe on Marth's shield at all, I'm pretty sure you can shield grab between hits (or at least Up b if it's perfectly spaced?) if you do it fast enough. Ike's grab range is mediocre as well and has a pretty bad dash grab which doesn't help much. And when I spoke to Leon, he said the MU was +3, while Blubo considered it to be +2 IIRC. Ike has range but Marth can still punish almost everything Ike does on Marth's shield except like a well spaced Nair.

When Ryo played against Mr. R at Apex 2012, he lost pretty solidly against Mr. R. The MU is winnable by Ike but it's still no where close to an even MU IMO.

 

[Ereth]

I want to see you try to gimp Ryos Ike. That **** is nigh impossible. Leon has no experience against top Ikes (ryo or San). Mr r. Won game 1 solidly but game 2 was very close.

I'll go into detail later

 

[smashkng]

Aight. Would be fun to see some more Ryo vs Marth vids. Is there more such vids than Mr R vs Ryo?

 

[Shaya]

Ike can compete with Marth.

I think there's a style of play for Marth that most players aren't accustomed to (a pseudo 08-09ish one) which focuses a lot more on a ground game than aerial game which may have a lot more of a noticeable advantage. However, if how things are going now, and how I see people play against the Ikes of now (the way we play in general) and how well the Ike of now does against that, I would say it's arguably even. But yeah, room for realignment.

Marth has a lot of tools for gimping Ike, but really smart use of Ike's recovery options doesn't make it a walk in the park at all.

 

[Dekillsage]

Take Ikes jump when he's offstage then proceed to countering every single up b he does to try and get back on.

 

[Shaya]

Reverse Up-B.

Suddenly you just let Ike back onto the ledge and are lagging with your counter when shield breaker would've hit Ike.

 

[Dekillsage]

Can't hit him out of that?

 

[Shaya]

It's not like Ike's Up-B has 50 frame start up or anything.

 

[Dekillsage]

Telling me you can't counter reverse up b? Also what is ike gonna do to you when you're in counter while he's on the ledge?

 

[Shaya]

Up B, can get uairs and fairs if done properly without dying.

Yes, you can counter reverse up b. But that's a different position entirely to countering it from the front.

 

[Ereth]

Aight. Would be fun to see some more Ryo vs Marth vids. Is there more such vids than Mr R vs Ryo?

I can send you a replay of me vs Ryo in a MM if you're interested. If so we'll do a new MM so you can see up to date play. There aren't many marth mains in Florida (Wizzrobe, C.J., and me, in that order of skill level) and Wizzrobe normally places 7th at best when 1 of the 2 good regions show up. So Ryo vs a good Marth is hard to come by.

Ike can compete with Marth.

I think there's a style of play for Marth that most players aren't accustomed to (a pseudo 08-09ish one) which focuses a lot more on a ground game than aerial game which may have a lot more of a noticeable advantage. However, if how things are going now, and how I see people play against the Ikes of now (the way we play in general) and how well the Ike of now does against that, I would say it's arguably even. But yeah, room for realignment.

Marth has a lot of tools for gimping Ike, but really smart use of Ike's recovery options doesn't make it a walk in the park at all.

Thank you for being an intelligent person.

Here is my analysis on Ike as a character and the Marth Vs. Ike MU.

But really if a person knows how to play Ike well and can abuse marths flaws the matchup can be quite even. We'll use Ryo as our example. Of course Ike has flaws as well...

When it comes to gimping with counter I find when using it against Ryo he will
-- Be sent away from the stage and be hit by counter twice (maximum) before timing his aether differently and doing one of the following
-1. Bait counter and use Aether early to kill us both
-2. Tech the stage and recover or spike me.
-3. Wait for counter to run out and trade stocks with a fair (when in the lead).
-4. Space aether so counter hits super armor (leaving me in a poor position, usually in a desperate panic to return to the stage). <- usual option

-Where Ike has the advantage
-1. Being under the stage against Ike can be deadly because a well spaced uair on Marths upb to the ledge will usually hit him before invincibility (a risky option that you only see used after a gimp attempt) or a walk off dair after baiting air dodge. Walk off DJ back to stage -> walk off dair usually baits and beats air dodge. Ryo will make you think hes gonna bait the air dodge so you don't air dodge then he comes out swinging a dair, it's like he has a sense for this ****.
-2. When underneath Marth, Ike has a plethora of options for kills and damage racking moves (aether does 22% if you get hit with all of it). Uair can beat air dodge, bair is fast enough to punish air dodge, fair and nair both have long hit boxes so they could possibly hit Marth at the end of air dodge. Marth has almost no landing options except air dodge, dair (super risky), preemptive DS (one of my favorite options, although very punishable if whiffed or sourspotted at low percents), and counter which can be read and punished.
-3. Recovering with Marth against an Ike is very hard due to his range, power, and super armor during eruption. Well spaced Fair beats all of Marth's get up options, including air dodge, it also hits underneath the stage and can stage spike.

-How Ike can get around recovery punishes
Ike's aether can be punished on stage, usually a well timed upB OoS or Fsmash are the best punishes, but this will put Ike high in the air due to Ike's weight and Ryos impeccable DI. Ike has a few decent options for landing back on the stage especially if there are high platforms (quickdraw cancels will Fk you up, never take Ike to battlefield/pokemon stadium/delfino). Also FF nair/non FF dair are good landing moves below death percent because of range and transcendence, they'll trade with most aerials (dair beats some characters usmashes, explicitly olimar)
-Dtilt wrecks reverse upB and so does onstage counter (stage spikes), but a good Ike can tech either of those options or DI in a manner to survive. Ryo knows which options to use in each scenario to keep himself alive I.E. when and where to tech, how and where to DI/SDI, and how to sweetspot recovery/cancel lag.

*Marth mains should take a lesson from that, avoiding being gimped is half of a Marth's set

-Quickdraw/Quickdraw Cancels
-Cancels: Ike is very fast with QuickDraw cancels, he can QuickDraw to a platform turn around and Bair you before you pull out an aerial or have time to input counter (see rar bair **** is stupid fast). Quickdraw cancels also lead to punishes after a trade like walk off dair/bair/uair, which will beat Marths DS unless perfectly space for a ledge snap. Ike can also quickdraw cancel into reverse counter which will, due to his poor traction, make him slide a distance depending on input timing and charge time of quickdraw, making it hard to punish with a smash. I've seen Ike reverse counter after a quickdraw and slide all the way across FD lol. Ike can also quickdraw cancel into attacks. Quickdraw cancel into ftilt is one of the fastest setups Ike has and has serious kill potential. Quickdraw cancel past an aerial Marth into reverse fsmash or usmash has huge rewards/low risks because of the massive range, which can outrange counter, (also puts opponent into a high stress position because the timing of the air dodge/counter is so important and if you jump the gun then you are probably dead) and Marth cannot react fast enough to punish Ike's smashes after avoiding them in the air.
-Recovery: Quickdraw as a recovery move is Ike's only method of horizontal recovery and can be easily punished if the Ike isn't careful. Most players like to jump in front of quickdraw ending it early and leading to Ike's special fall death. Although as easy as that sounds I've never been able to reliably do it to Ryo, his knowledge of character movement and quickdraw charge time relative to distance traveled makes it hard to punish him because he will always pick the best time to avoid hitting you.
-Offense: Quickdraw is a move that will make the opponent approach and allow Ike to wait for the opportune moment to strike, lacking projectiles, Marth has a hard time punishing quickdraw onstage especially FD. It is almost always the best option to wait out the quickdraw charging Ike because even a perfectly-timed, spaced fair will trade with quickdraw. If Ike is not in a dire (recovery/stage hazard/stage change) position while charging quickdraw he is at an advantage against Marth, because he can wait out Marth's shield and counter or release quickdraw and hit Marth before he has time to counter (trying to counter quickdraw once its released is really hard lol). Marth's only reliable move to beat quickdraw (once released) is UpB, but first you have to bait the quickdraw by dashing or running without shielding. If you miss the UpB then you're in for a world of hurt.

-Throws
Ike is also good at pivot grabbing marth out of most aerials and most of his throws will put you in a seriously disadvantaged position:, see: Bthrow -> DA, Bthrow -> Mixup (ie Fair, RAR Bair, Regrab, Ftilt), Dthrow -> Wait for opponent's option, then respond with one of these -> Nair (beats air dodge), fair (beats forward DI), Aether (beats double jump), bait airdodge (at higher %'s) -> Uair (usually kills)
-Dthrow: Puts Marth in one of his most uncomfortable positions above the opponent trying to land, and to top it off, it is within Ike's range. Also kills around 170~ but don't quote me on that.
-Bthrow: Even with DI it'll put you off stage on most small stages like battlefield or smashville, coupled with DA (Cannot DS out of) it puts Marth in the worst position of the MU, trying to regain stage control. Chances are Marth is going to beat Ike onstage, but once put offstage Marth has a very hard time living, let alone getting back onstage.

A fast Ike is capable of keeping marth out with
-1. Jab (Not safe on shield, but Ike can Jab Cancel and bait you into dropping your shield)
-2. Fair spacing: The only way for marth to beat Fair is to hit him before it comes out or punish a miss, but an auto canceled FF Fair will give Ike enough time to shield, Fair outranges marths entire moveset including counter. I can think of another matchup with marth where it is even due to a character outranging
Marth *cough cough anyone??? Fair also hits underneath Ike when it is not FF, so sliding Usmash as a punish will usually not work. The only option Marth really has to punish a non-FF Fair is to shield it and punish with an aerial. Most Ikes will FF their Fairs though, unless there is an input error.
-3. Proper Air Dodge/Spot Dodge Reading: Ike's smashes have enough range and lingering hitboxes to punish any characters spot dodge. A good Ike will charge a smash and wait for the spot dodge or counter before releasing. Ryo is also a master of baiting out spot dodges, air dodges and counters, a skill all Ike mains should have, even top players will spot dodge at times when put under pressure (see ryo vs mr r: fsmash to the face after waiting out spot dodge)
-4. RAR Bair: (RAWR BEAR!) Dash -> Turn around -> Jump -> Bair (except really fast). This move is deceptive, and extremely fast making it hard to avoid or counter. Definitely one of Ike's better options against Marth *see Bair

-Ike is capable of mixing up moves that destroy some of marths options. Some mixup options including mind games and gimmicks are as follows
-1. Dash past shield -> Usmash, Usmash has little cool down lag and is safe if the end hits shield,
-2. Jump Cancel Usmash. For those who don't know is when, during a dash you jump turn around and cancel the jump with an Usmash resulting in the Usmash going in the opposite direction. Good for Ike because the ending has more hitboxes and is safer on shields.
*Super important for Marth because flash is everything, right?
-3. Eruption ledge guarding (dat super armor, also stage spikes)
-4. Aether spikes (Ike can gimp a metaknight with Aether -> ledge grab because Aether clashes with and ends all of MK's recovery moves. I've seen Ryo do this in tournament, most notably to Seibrik. Imagine what it can do to poor Marth)
-5. Empty jump -> FF -> Ftilt (I fall for this all the time)
-6. Jab Cancel Setups: Jab 1 -> Jab 1 -> Shield/Spot dodge, a hasty Marth will DS and miss entirely. If Marth does not DS then Ike can continue Jab or Shield Grab
-7. Other Jab Shenanigans:
-Jab 1 -> Jab 1 -> Bair
-Jab 1 -> Utilt
-Autojab Walk: Sets Marth up at a high point during Ike's jab, Marth's 2 options for getting out are DS and SDI. A hasty Marth will DS and Ike will get a free punish because a smart Ike would only do this at low percents. Done by holding A and slightly letting off at certain times or by pressing down to cancel the jab combo I think. Idk I don't play Ike.
-8. Baiting with movements that look like Ike setups: For example instead of a RAR Bair Ike could Dash -> jump turnaround -> airdodge and it will usually bait an unwary marth to counter and eat a free ftilt

-Aerials
-Uair: Ike's Uair is a frame trap within itself because if timed/spaced right it'll beat falling air dodge. Tons of kill vertical power. Chances are you will already be in the air when an Uair hits, so if Uair does hit its an early death for Marth. FF Uair will hit Marth's tall self at ground level, which is an amazing mixup and kill move that is hard to punish/see coming. If any hurtbox of Marth's is extended to punish Ike while Uair is out then they will trade and Ike will probably be able to follow up. If an Ike is FF Uair'ing then its probably something you didn't see coming like Uair out of air dodge or walk off Uair to punish jump air dodge/UpB. Marth has nothing that can really challenge this move, because a well spaced Uair will clip Marth's feet during counter and still kill him.
-Bair : Sends marth out at a horizontal angle and if hit without a jump marth is usually dead around 40%. Ike's best kill move in this matchup. Trades with all of Marth's aerials and hard to counter due to speed of move (Hitbox is out after 6 frames) *see rar bair. Just to put it out there: Bair beats tornado, ****s scary lol.
-Fair: Well spaced Fair beats any off the ledge option marth has (even hits below the stage if FF correctly, fair is also transcendent and trades with marths aerials, obviously in Ike's favor), and if hit right will send marth out horizontally with DI leading to a free gimp. Can outrange counter and gives Ike a free jab/ftilt/grab on counter whiff. Best move for keeping Marth out and punishing recovery, seriously hard to avoid.

-Punishing DS
-Marth can upB out of certain parts of aether but it usually will normally either sourspot Ike or miss him entirely leading to large damage or death
-A missed DS is a free Fsmash for Ike, death around 45%.
-Ryo will also bait DS with jab cancels and mind game you into not DSing when he goes for a jab -> utilt.

-Attack Transcendence
Ike's moves are transcendent (meaning they don't clash, if you didn't know what that meant) leaving moves like ftilt angled up, and Utilt as amazing anti air moves. Spaced ftilt outranges all of marths aerials and will trade (not in marths favor).

-Ike's character/mechanic advantages over Marth
Weight: Ike kills marth about 50-60% sooner than marth can kill Ike.
Trades: A lot of trades are going to happen in this MU and chances are Ike is going to win because of superior range/weight/power.
Spot Dodge: Ike's spot dodge is really good and hard to punish for Marth (no lingering hitboxes besides DB Green). Ike can spot dodge in between parts of DB with relative ease and safely punish with Jab or Grab.
Jab: Regular non-canceled Jab does 16%, lets say Marth dies around 110-120 from Ike. It only takes 6-8 non-canceled Jab combos to put Marth in the kill zone.

In the end this matchup is in marths favor because of superior speed, air mobility, options, and...
Gimmicks:
-At 0%
-1. Fthrow -> Dair, which has never netted me a kill on ryo but usually works well on most ikes
-2. Fthrow -> Fsmash
-3. Fthrow -> (buffered) SHFF Nair -> Mixup or continue with (buffered) SHFF Nair -> Utilt or continue with jab 1 -> DB
Not sure if the Nair needs to be buffered against Ike because he has no fast enough moves to stop Marth, but just to be safe.
*Different options are better against different characters. For Ike I would say forcing him into recovering is your best bet so Fthrow -> SHFF Nair -> SHFF Nair -> Jab 1 -> DB Red -> Edge Guard
"Can be SDI'd but it's a good option when the opponent isn't expecting it" -C.J.
-Other Gimmicky Stuff
-1. I like to call it "Melee Tactics": Fair Ike multiple times off stage until he is out of jumps and forced to recover with Aether. Make sure he is far enough away that DI will not land him on the stage, then when hes coming down from Aether, UpB to the ledge and you will have enough invincibility to ledgehog.
*Doesn't really work against good Ikes unless in a bad scenario and out of options
-2. UpB OoS:
-Between Jab 2 and 3 you can UpB
-Punishing Aether recovery while on stage
-Punishing quickdraw recovery
-On a mispaced Fair, or a Nair

Marth has the ability to keep Ike out (fast aerial pressure) and force poor recovery options by abusing Ike's terrible second jump, leading to a gimp (if the Ike player doesn't know how to recover or is put in a bad situation)

Really there is just a lack of good Ike players. San doesn't play anymore and the Ike boards members take breaks for weeks at a time, albeit there are good Ike players in Europe see golden psycho/Blubolouis but they don't have the tournament results (Mr R. is really good against Ike) to back up Ike's true potential. The only players pushing the envelope and winning with Ike are Ryo, the retired old school Ikes RedX and San (San recently came out of retirement? Can someone confirm?). People just assumed from the start that Ike was bad and people who play competitively (for money) automatically overlook him for a better character with a chance of winning when Ike was capable all along, he just has a big learning curve. My whole point of this post is to say Ike is better than people give him credit for, and deserves a MU chart that shows it. Slight Ryo training bias, but regardless of how I do as Marth against Ryo's Ike I think the MU can be argued to be almost even.

The main problem with Ike is that it takes a lot of skill, dedication, commitment, a degree of intelligence, ability to read people, accuracy, and precision to play him at a top level. At least more so than his top tiered counterparts. I don't think we've seen everything Ike can do yet.

Also please do not listen to Leon about Ike being a +3 for marth, he hasnt played any good ikes (unless I'm missing out on some info) and the 2 matches he played against Ryo, (Ryos first matches of the day, leon wouldnt let him warm up because he was in a rush) he won decisively game 1 (due to an sd I believe) and it was close game 2, then he refused to play any more matches and went on about how Ike was so easy to beat. Didnt mean to call out Leon, just wanted to say his opinion is a bit skewed and Ike is not a +3 MU.

Sorry about the randomness of this, just wrote stuff down as it came to mind. Edit: Not random anymore, now ordered and convenient for your viewing pleasure.

 

[Ereth]

Dear lord, I'm so sorry to whoever is going to read that o.O

Why am I always online when everyone else is not...? I get hyped for responses but no one is online lol.

Aight. Would be fun to see some more Ryo vs Marth vids. Is there more such vids than Mr R vs Ryo?

Found a vid of Ryo vs Spade from a year ago. I consider Spade to be a pretty good Marth.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hyHOIwN7T-I

The second match is poorly recorded but you can see some of the stuff I was talking about. From the first stock you can see how Marth has a hard time approaching because of nair/fair/jab/grabs. Also note how early Spade died from a fair even with decent DI (tip of the fair sends you straight out). Spade's second stock shows a lot more dominance and he finds out where Marth does better, mid-range, on stage. Spade has a perfect OoS UpB on Ryo's nair but it doesn't kill even though he's at 140. You kinda get the gist of what I'm saying. Both have their strong points.

 

[Blubolouis]

That's a lot of information !

For starters, I'll just say that from what Leon told me, he's played Ryo more than a couple of matches, and won all of them. He did so, partly thanks to having edgeguarded him numerous times.
Also, while it is true that Ryo is both a better player and better Ike than me (and I didn't even know Ryo being good was up to debate for some people) , I'd just like to point out that I did take tournament matches off of both Mr.r and Leon.

There are some points that you make that aren't reliable or just unusable. For example, Ike cannot pivot grab Marth out of his aerials if they are correctly spaced. He can't even punish a well spaced aerial with a jab. Also, Ike's spotdodge is average, and isn't particularly good in this match-up. It loses to nair and dancing blade, two tools that, all in all, give a really hard time to Ike.
Bair and RAR Bair are indeed incredible, Fair does outrange Marth entire moveset, even Nair can be used to outrange Marth and allow Ike to zone, but they all require a LOT of room to work, and enough time for Ike to space himself and start Fair/nair/the dash of the RAR. Marth doesn't allow Ike to have these, his aerial pressure is enough to pin Ike to the ground, at a safe range.
Also, Ike's ground pressure game vs Marth isn't good. If, at any point, Ike commits to a jab2/unspaced jab1, he can get UpB'd. If he miss-spaces a retreating aerial, or doesn't hit marth's shield with a retreating Fair (which will happen, because the only way to counter marth's aerials with Ike's fair is to read them, and if you read wrong, you just hit air and not marth nor his shield), Ike will get punished by sideB.

Ftilt kind of outranges Marth's fair, but it takes ages, and Ike's hurtbox extends before his hitbox, leading to, sometimes, getting randomly hit by the fair the marth is waving.

Last but not least, Marth is a floaty with fast aerials with low landing lag, and an invincible upB. Jab cancels suck vs him, UpB is a trump card, but as you said it can be baited for a big punish. However, an upward SDI to a falling Uair/nair are very hard to deal with.

All in all, I think Ike kind of handles his own onstage, but he needs to constantly reset the spacing because he can't deal with Marth's own confort zone. When he's offstage, he's basically as good as dead. This is only a slight exageration. Marth doesn't even need counter. All of his aerials, UpB, Fsmash, Dtilt, SideB offstage... destroy Ike there. When Marth is offstage, he'll always make it back; Ike can pressure him with Fair/bair/Dair but will rarely ever kill. UpB is a very risky bet, which can be SDI'd out of.
Marth kills Ike at random %, gimps can happen at any time, he can have a hard time to land the killing blow (in which cases Ike lives till like 160%+), or can force Ike into a terrible situation when recovering, and killing him way too early at like 120% (tipper fsmash, tipper bair...). Ike kills Marth at around 120% most of the time, sometimes sooner when the Bair is fresh.

I never agreed with Leon's opinion of the mu being a -3, but I do think it's a -2.

 

[Ereth]

I can agree with most of this. Some of my information may have been lacking, since I don't really play Ike.

In the case of gimping, it can go either way. Marth is just as easily gimped as Ike, maybe easier if the Ike is very good with recovery options.

It does take a bit of finesse and intelligence for Ike to win this MU. Spacing is pretty important. But miss-spaces for Marth are a bit more punishing because Ike's jab combo (you can't UpB out of jab unless you have GODLIKE sdi from the first hit) does more damage than DB and Marth dies sooner. Marth does make up for this with aerial pressure, juggling, and ledge guarding. Ike's pressure game is based on reads so it makes things much harder for him to continue. I think it comes down to if the Ike player can keep space on the Marth, if so then he has a good chance of winning, if not then he's going to have a tough time.

You also have to take into account the lack of skilled marth players in the United States. Leon might have a greater knowledge of the Ike MU than Ryo of the Marth MU.

I think we both have a bit of bias haha
Do you get to play Leon and Mr. R very often?

I appreciate the response btw

 

[Blubolouis]

You're welcome for the response. I play Leon very often, every month at worst. Mr.R I only played once, and only one set.

 

[smashkng]

You make a lot of very good points Ereth. But it's really hard if not impossible to gimp Marth with Ike. Ike's aerials are too slow and last too short (except Dair) to gimp Marth's fast recovery if the Marth is smart with his recovery. It's too risky to jump offstage and try with Marth with an aerial offstage. Ike can't ledge drop aerials to edge guard, his aerials have too much aerial ending lag for him to grab regrab the ledge even with the most vertical gaining recovery possible unless he's frame perfect with ledge drop to either Dair or Bair (I'm not counting ledge drop to DJ, but even in that case it doesn't really do anything to Marth's recovery except when Marth lands onstage). In general Ike risks way too much jumping offstage against Marth, so he should be staying onstage unless he sees the Marth make a large mistake offstage. Ike sure can punish Marth's get up options really really well, but gimp? No way. Back when I mained Ike I hardly ever gimped good Marths. Marth's recovery is simply too fast for Ike. Ike's only good at edge guarding really slow recoveries like Luigi's or Dedede's. BTW have you tried grabbing the ledge and then using the ledge invincibility hitting out of his Aether after the super armor frames? His super armor frames stop existing as soon as he starts rising (and even before the apex of his jump he has no super armor frames anymore). Depending on his position during his up b. You can either stage spike him with Up b (in case he techs, you get the ledge before he can punish you), or depending on stage gimp him by putting him below the stage with the weak up b in untechable %s, Bair him (Izaw used to gimp my Ike a lot with his Sheik with Bair immediately after the end of super armor frames after ledge drops), or Fair stage spike. Ike's Up b's first hitbox (and super armor at the same times) comes out on frame 18. Super armor frames last from frame 18-38. Sometimes it's easy to hit him with an aerial before the super armor frames come out.

 

[Ereth]

I'm considering ledge hogging Marth to be a gimp. Just knock Marth far enough away and steal the ledge = dead Marth. Ike going off stage against most of the cast is a deathwish lol.

In most cases Ike has options against the things you listed, like reverse UpB, teching, and proper DI

 

[Shaya]

Considering how bad most Marth main's are at their recovery habits, Ike gimping Marth with a well timed fair is pretty cinch and hence at most levels is very very doable.

 

[smashkng]

Ike shouldn't be able to put you in such positions. He has no low angle moves. As long as you save your double jump, ledge hogging won't do anything to your recovery. A lot of the times when he's not fast falling (and 3 of our specials cancel fast falling), we can still either stall out the ledge invincibility by Up bing low or Up b as soon as we see the opponent trying to grab the ledge. It's nice that our Up b almost if not impossible to gimp by using solely ledge get up invincibility thanks to that stall at the apex of DS. Make sure to aerial or DB if you somehow get that annoying DS like air speed (any aerial or DB cancels removes it immediately) and then as long as you have good DI he should never be able to put you into a gimp position. Marth can everything Ike can when recovering, just better. Our recovery goes further horizontally than Ike's and should be harder to edge guard in almost every way if we know how to recover well. He can intercept our recovery into the ledge by using Eruption if he has really good timing, but it's 31 frames slow at minimum and is easy to make it almost impossible for him to predict when we're going to Up b most of the time,

 

[Shaya]

you've never been back thrown into dash attack, have you?

 

[smashkng]

Yes I have, but the angle isn't that low. Don't think it's enough to gimp unless we somehow waste our jump right before the dash attack hits. We're not Ganon, who can lose stocks that way. We have a good horizontal recovery. Also at some %s we can DS before the dash attack hitbox comes out IIRC. I think it depends on whether hitstun is removed before we land on the ground or not. But as I said, although we can't be gimped by Ike, he can still punish our get up options really well. So getting offstage still is not good.