Let's discuss how to play the sleeper hit of Ultimate: the Icies! This discussion is going to focus on general gameplay and only bring up desyncs in service of gameplay or as a way to build on top of good fundamentals. There are several guides that focus on desyncs or specific combos, and this is not one of those!
The Chilly Winds of Change
The overal net-net here is that the ice climbers have lost the wobbling and chain grabbing of the past, and now have faster movement, better specials, better aerials, and a buffer system that improves the reliability of desyncs. In short, they traded all the stuff banned in Melee for an overall better kit. And desyncs, well, I don't think the developers even know what that system allows for, and every week something new is posted to twitter or discord that looks just broken.
The Ice Climbers still have glaring weaknesses that are easier for new players to fall prey to, making them one of the least accessible characters.
What Separates the Nanas from the Popos
There are a number of weaknesses that need to be either mitigated or avoided for the Ice Climbers. Coming to terms that your dash attack is sort of crap is something that players either do early, or they don't main the Ice Climbers. Here are the i
Cooperating with Your Secondary
The hardest part of playing the ice climbers is learning how to cooperate with your secondary climber. I don't mean how to work around your stupid secondary climber, I literally mean cooperate with them. When your secondary climber is separated from your primary climber, you will often find yourself getting killed by their actions- your secondary climber will not act in an intuitive way to a player unfamiliar with their goals.
However, nonintuitive doesn't mean nondeterministic. All those stocks Nana takes from you are, unfortunately, your fault. Your secondary climber will act in an almost entirely deterministic and predictable way- dependent on their constraints and goals. This means you need to keep track of your secondary's constraints, like if they've used their double jump. This can be determine by watching them like a hawk, and also looking for the tell-tale stink lines that mean the double jump is expended.
However, this is great news! This means once you learn how your secondary operates, you can learn to cooperate with their actions reliably. You can also get the benefit of knowing how Nana acts, which most opponents will not have any guess about.
Your Secondary's Goals
Your secondary climber has two goals when separated from your primary. The first is to match the X and Y position of your primary climber, in that order. If you ever see Nana running back and forth on a stage instead of running to the edge to go around it, this is why- X position matters more. The way to deal with this is to drift beyond the ledge if Nana is still on stage, and then stall while she catches up.
The second goal is to prioritize getting back to stage if the secondary climber is off stage, and if the ledge is closer than the primary ice climber. This will look like Nana abandoning you 9 times out of ten and lose you stocks and games. However, if you expect this behavior, you'll know that you can recover high and your secondary will catch up by going to the ledge, or you can go low and stall long enough for your secondary to catch up and help you belay. This second goal is new in version 2.0.0.
Working With Nana in Action
Knowing this, you can get Nana to come save you if you use all your tools to delay an inevitable seeming death:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfjerT0ZlfM
Let's break that down:
1. Nana tries to match Popo's X coordinate and runs left.
2. Nana she catches the ledge, because it is close and she can't help herself.
3. Nana, having satisfied both the X coordinate and affixed to the close by ledge, then drifts down to catch up to Popo's Y coordinate.
4. Catching up to Popo enough to be part of his animations, Nana then teleports the final distance to be part of a belay.
(meanwhile, Popo uses all of his tools to stall his fall, specifically an ice block first and then his double jump second).
Some of Their Kit Ain't the Best (and some is Just Bad)
Ice Climbers have the worst grab distance in the game, a very slow grab overall, and no kill throws except at very high percents. They also have a very slow and highly telegraphed dash attack. Their movement speed is good but still too slow to punish a wide variety of attacks that cover a lot of ground (I'm looking at you, Yoshi's down-special). Their smash attacks, while very powerful and fast, are still outpaced by many other characters' smashes and short range. Landing kills can be a challenge, and Ice Climbers have only a few options to close out stocks when opponents are at kill percents- however their ability to rack up damage quickly expands the number of kill moves in their arsenal.
Overall, these weak areas in their kit need to be worked around and avoided.
Specials
Ice Shot
A relatively weak projectile as it will reflect when hit by almost any move, and after X amount (4?) are on the field no more will come out until the existing ice shots are off the stage or destroyed. It will go under most arrows and several other projectiles, and will for some reason beat out any charged shot (Samus', Lucario's, etc).
Does more damage the less distance the ice shot has traveled when it hits.
The first aerial ice shot will include a little hop, making it a great movement mixup delaying a high recovery to stage (and throwing out a projectile to the opponent waiting for you down below), as well as a great under-stage fall delay tool to allow your secondary climber an extra couple of beats to catch up to you.
Squall Hammer
A very fast burst and damage option, which is highly controllable horizontally and partially vertically depending on how much you mash the special button to generate lift. The move also increases the Ice Climbers horizontal speed, making them considerably faster horizontally, and when performed in the air without any lift will fall considerably faster than fast falling.
Only one frame out of every three allow for lift, so the overall lift of squall hammer is meaningful but somewhat anemic (frame perfect execution still won't reach the platforms in battlefield). This move is safe on shield when spaced correctly. This includes moving the squall hammer to max distance, and performing one press of special at the end while pulling back- making considerable distance between the opponent and the Ice Climbers by the time the animation finishes and shield stun lag is complete.
Squall hammer has relatively good end lag when grounded and downright awful landing lag when the animation is completed in the air. When the move is performed in the air, the Ice Climbers will go into free fall until they touch ground or catch a ledge. Unfortunately, squall hammer off the edge of the stage is a very common way to SD, even at high level play.
It also does stupid damage, and the final move on hit will knock the opponent upward, often leading to utilt or at mid percents uair combos.
As a solo move, the squall hammer is easier to use lsi and di to get out of, particularly by getting knocked up and out of the path of additional hits. This also makes some desync combos less consistent, as good DI/LSI can help players avoid the very common solo squall hammer > grab combo.
Belay
Amazing vertical height, very gimpable, acts as a tether when performed within the same zip code as a ledge, and overall the biggest mixed blessing of the ice climbers. Leaves the primary ice climber in free fall after performing, and will whiff and only boost the height of a solo ice climber a little bit if done in the air without a secondary to belay.
The secondary ice climber is thrown up first, and acts as a projectile which will kill at kill percents and often will kill at high percents (as the hitbox connects by necessity above ground level)
Aerials
Uair
One of the best in the game, there it doesn't outprioritize dairs in many cases it will outrange it horizontally, giving safe options for juggling in almost all matchups. It also does stupid amounts of damage, and at low-mid percents will combo into itself, and on stages with low platforms can easily juggle into itself 3 times making for 4x upairs with both upairs connecting a true combo (short hop upair, double jump upair to platform, short hop upair off platform, double jump upair), which brings an insane amount of damage.
Nair
Excellent tool for the neutral, nair has good frame data, technically two separate hitboxes in front and behind, and knocks opponents sideways or up depending on the hitbox that connects.
Bair
One of the Ice Climbers primary kill moves, bair has good frame data and even has a hitbox starting in the middle of the ice climber extending all the way to the tip of the mallet.
Fair
Another kill move, however much slower and very hard to time correctly as a landing short hop aerial (needs to be performed later than as a buffered short hop aerial, but significantly before the peak of the short hop). Good use of landing short hop fair is menacing, as the move does plenty of damage and knockback. Notably, the secondary climber has a spike hitbox on her fair at the head of the mallet, in the range of about 30 degrees above level to level, which will only spike if hit after the primary ice climber hits a fair or if the primary ice climber doesn't land a fair at all.
Out of Shield Options
The best out of shield option the Ice Climbers have is an out of shield jab desync, which leads to combos, hard punishes, and the possibility of breaking a shield if not correctly managed. Outside of jab desync, the ICs rely primarily on buffered short hop aerials like nair, and also the option of the technically challenging but highly rewarding buffered jump > squall hammer, which has relatively good frame data and all the benefits of squall hammer like increased mobility, a multi-hit attack, lots of damage, and the ability to sync your climbers when they are close enough to teleport Nana.
A Quick Note on Desyncs
The easiest and most important desyncs to learn for ice climbers are alternating special attacks, which in addition to being performed due to natural separation and rejoining of the Ice Climbers, can be performed on demand via the aerial landing lag method [Smesty - Beginner Ice Climber Desync Tutorial! Aerial Landing Lag Desync].
The easiest thing to do when first learning desyncs is to just to alternate performing the same special move over and over to get a feel for it.
Desynced Ice Shot
Desynced Ice Shot is the easiest desync to maintain and one of the most effective grief and most effective low recovery gimping tools in the game. Alternating ice shots come out in very quick succession, creating a stream of ice shots off the stage, making any attempt to drift to a position to perform a low recovery extremely dangerous and likely fatal.
Desynced Squall Hammer
Alternating squall hammers create a flurry of hitboxes that are very challenging to deal with, as solo squall hammer effectively combos into solo squall hammer. This is a very powerful approach option, and will almost always guarantee getting your opponent off stage if you land a hit to get the combo started, and is a true combo on big bodies at lower percents.
Super fun fact: desynced squall hammer sort of, technically, beats out most projectiles, as you can just take the hit and the other climber can just keep going. This is situationally effective against characters like Wolf, whose projectile can hit one climber, but even at high percents won't knock them off the stage.
Desynced Blizzard
This is an excellent tool for ledge guarding, as blizzard extends below the ledge, as well as an important component of many desynced combos. Desynced blizzard does an insane amount of damage and shield damage, as well as freezes even at low percents leading to utilt based combos.
The Jab Interrupt Desync
I'm not going to pretend to be able to summarize this well in two sentences, but it is an incredibly versatile desync and worth practicing, as it adds an incredible amount of utility to the Ice Climbers' kit. The short description is it's not knuckle-breakingly hard to time, and it gives ICs their best whif punish tool and out of shield punish tool when performed correctly [GimR - POPO'S JAB DESYNC IS THE FUTURE].
The Tools of The Ice Climbers
The Ice Climbers are a glass cannon that have several great options for addressing the different parts of a game, including great approach options, punish options, options for edge guarding, and options for ledge trapping. The next section is broken down into specific areas describing the options the ice climbers have to address different situations in normal game play.
Approaches
Squall hammer, short hop landing nair and fair, dash tilts, desynced squall hammer, and dash jab interrupt desyncs. Someone please write this section so I can learn from it.
Whiff Punishes
The strongest whiff punish the Ice Climbers have is the dash based jab desync, which has exceptional range and hard punish options. However, excluding the desync, climbers' have whiff punishes of squall hammer, dtilt, ftilt, nair, and jab, ordered in both increasingly fast frame data and decreasing hitbox distance.
Getting off the Ledge
Drop / doublejump / squall hammer is fast, safe on shield, and is very hard to catch unless you have great reflexes and a very disjointed smash attack.
Drop / doublejump / uair, and land on stage with backair is their only 2 aerial option from ledge.
Kill Confirms
At normal kill percents (averaging ~120% depending on weight), synced utilt leads to a true combo double upair against all characters and against all DI [Smesty - Uptilt Upair Kill Confirm with Ice Climbers! Smash Ultimate Guide & FAQ]. A great setup for this is blizzard, as it gives you the time to get in position for a utilt / uair which is a kill confirm until ~160-180.
At 160%+, blizzard can kill confirm into synced charged upsmash, as the first hit will often break the ice if the opponent is mashing and the second hit will connect, and send them skyward. (Thank you Kowai Ookami-Chan for the info!)
Upthrow starts killing around 180% off the top of most stages, depending on weight.
At 200%+, ice shot will semi reliably start freezing opponents on hit, making it a great setup for double upsmash.
Edge Guarding
On Stage Edge Guarding
"Desynced Ice Blocks": One of the best edge guarding tools in the game is desynced ice block at the edge- it leaves a very thin and predictable window for players to drift into position to perform a low recovery, while taking a only a second to set up and almost no effort to maintain. [see: Smesty's aerial landing lag desync tutorial].
Off Stage Edge Guarding
The Ice Climbers' low recovery goes from S tier down to F with a single aerial hit that separates or otherwise incapacitates one or both of little snowshoes. Also, belay is a great tool for attacking opponents above you, but physics is applied in some arbitrary fashion and Nana will slow down and fail to slingshot popo if she hits an opponent early enough in the attack. Stocks can be (also have been, also will continue to be) lost at literally 0% this way, so it is not recommended except in rare cases. However, it's still fun as hell! Some notes below about good options when off stage.
"Fair": Great option for keeping opponents spaced far out and simply spiking opponents when you get a good read on a double jump back to stage.
"Runoff Blizzard": This option both walls out and has the opportunity to freeze players, which leaves them helpless as they fall to possible death. When timed correctly is exceptionally effective at catching opponents who are drifting into position for a low recovery.
"Dair": Situational, dair is a great option for chasing opponents when they fall off the stage due to being frozen at the edge. This will fall faster than a frozen opponent, and most times will catch the opponent while they are still breaking out of the ice.
Ledge Trapping
Traditional Ledge Pressure
Dtilt is the traditional tool for punishing ledge stalls, as it outranges other tilts and has an excellent low knockback angle. With Nana starting the same move 6 frames later, it can effectively be a long held, multi-hit, disjointed hitbox for catching 2frames. However, it takes some practice to get the timing right.
Blizzard is also a high commitment move for covering the ledge, but can also catch 2frames and ledge stalls and makes for great ledge guarding at higher percents.
Desync Ledge Pressure
Desynced blizzards make for great ledge pressure while leaving the secondary climber available to shield / react.
Ledge Trumping
"Trump Fsmash": Ledge trumping can be done via a well placed shorthop[big d - short hop ledge trump].
"Pivot Grab": You can also ledge trump by doing a pivot grab with popo when approaching the ledge, and perform a half circle on the control stick to get nana to proceed to flip over the ledge (best video so far is this, no comment / explanation though: [v23 - "Ice climbers have the best ledge trumps in the game"])
Examples of Quality Ice Climber Play
The sleeper duo of Ultimate still doesn't have any significant tournament presence, but it does have some really impressive players maining them and the videos are insane. Here's a good video of the Ice Climbers doing their thing, meta is pretty good as of March 2019:
Best ICE CLIMBERS Players in Smash Ultimate Competitive
Old videos of quality IC play:【Smash Ultimate】Crew Battle Japan Ice ClimbersTeam VS King K. Rool Team (Dec-2018)
Discussion
Discuss how to play good with the ICs! Most of this document is just information gleaned from the ICs discord, so find us on there and help craft out how to make the sleeper hit of Smash Ultimate into the tournament winner we know this duo is destined to be!
Last edited:
