Ice Climbers Matchup(Updated 06/08/09)

Ice Climbers



General Discussion

When I played my first IC I was shocked at how a total of 5 grabs led to my death of all 3 stocks. Playing the IC's is competely different than any other character you will play in brawl. The strategy for this is simply do not get grabbed. There are various ways to avoid getting grabbed, like not getting close, but this can be very difficult. But, overall, pika is very well equipped in this matchup and has the tools to win. Unlike other chars, like ike, who need to get close to attack, pika has a great run and hit game which will win this for you if mastered.

Pika's Advantages

1. Hit and Run game
2. The dsmash/fsmash
3. Can attack wit an airiel and stay out of grab range
4. Speed
5. Tjolt uses

Pika's Disadvantages

1. Grabbing is almost rendered inneffective
2. Can be Cg'd to death at any percent
3.Gameplay is completely different

Strategy for Winning

Getting grabbed by the IC's

To start off the strategy I feel that you must know what makes the IC's so dangerous if you dont already know. If you are grabbed by the IC's you can be CG'd to your death from any percentage. This means, potentially, that only 3 grabbs are required to win this for the IC's. If you sit back and think about your previous matches, try and count how many times you were grabbed then and compare it to what you need to here. Not getting grabbed by the IC's is your main priority. I will discuss different things that you can do to help, but in the end it totally comes down to execution and being unpredictable.

Now lets say you do get grabbed by the IC's. There are a few things that you can do to prepare for your escape. The first is noticing how they are CG'ing you. If they are standing in one spot and bthrowing you then all you can do is just hit your jump button. This is actually good for every CG. Try and jump cuz the IC's will probably mess up and you can sometimes jump out of it. The next thing that you need to watch is if you are near the edge. IF you are near the edge then you will be fthrown>fair which spikes. You cannot do anything but try to DI away and if hit immediately use your QA to try and grab the ledge.

The last thing and probably most important is if you are at a fairly high percentage. We will say 80% and above. Why is this? It is because the IC's can grab you and fully charge their usmash and then throw you into the usmash and succesfully kill you. This means avoid them at ALL cost when at a high percentage. If it wasnt a priority before, it better be now.

Your Objective

Other than not getting grabbed, your main priority is to separate/kill nana. IF you can popo by himself then you can be aggressive and start pressuring popo.


Using Your Controller

When you get grabbed here is what you do immediately. Turn the control stick 360 degrees as fast as your hands can move and do the same with your c-stick. Pretty much button mash as fast and as much as you can. This may enable a grab release. It works quiet often.

Some things to watch out and try when playing the IC's

Desynching

The IC's can desynch nana and popo. This means that nana and popo can be used separately as two characters. thsi is useful for the IC's when they create a wall of blizzard. Popo will jump and fall using a blizzard then nana will jump over popo and fall using blizzard and so on and so forth. The best thing to do against this is to time your tjolts accordingly or just spam them to hit one of the climbers. The can use the same method for using ice blocks and making our tjolt useless from afar.

Another thing to watch out for is if you grab one of the climbers. The other can just fsmash you if you do not react in time by bthrowing. Just because one cannot attack it doesn't mean the other can't be used. This is a desynch'd IC. Another example is if you ahve knocked popo off the stage and waiting for him to try and recover and try to edgeguard him. Well if nana is unning behind you to get back to popo then, if timed right, you can end up getting fsmashed from behind by the nana!

Popo's CG

Lets say you kill nana when you are at a low percent. You still have to be careful of a CG. Popo can cg you to the ledge and fsmash you out of it. The best thing to do is to DI away and try to jump out of it as soon as you can.

Approaching/Attacking the IC's

In reality the safest ways to approach the IC's is to run at them and use a rising nair/uair. This way they cannot grab you after the attack. You don't really want to approach the IC's. Spamming tjolt and using retreating aerials are your priority. The tjolt is your best friend so if you use 100+ tjolts in one match its completely fine and understandable.

Now since the objective will be to separate/kill nana, your best tools will be the bthrow/dsmash. Use your fsmash a lot in this matchup too since it pushes them back when they shield it and it can go unpunished. But as for the bthrow, you will want to run up and grab one of them and IMMEDIATELY bthrow. This will cause a separation of the climbers. From there you want to attack nana and stop her from getting back to popo. If you can fsmash her when she gets close to you.

A popular method is when you see the IC's getting close to you and running in for a grab, spotdodge>dsmash. Works wonders. And it even separates them. Sometimes it even send them up for a thunder kill which is always amazing.

Edgeguarding

Getting the IC's off the stage is one of the best things you can do here. If they are both off the stage you can try to tjolt them and then grab the ledge to force the recovery of solo popo or you use your wall of thunder. The IC's have a horizontal recovery that can be beaten by thunder and is easily timed. When popo is by himself he will most likely use this to recover so be sure to time the thunder right.

If they are below the stage be sure to grab the ledge and force the recovery of solo popo. This will happen when you have invincibility frames and popo can't grab the edge.

Quote from Anther:

"If you get both ICs off stage, try to control their landing with thunder and try to make them recover low. If they recover high above you with squall, that's a free hit, if they get to recover at about level height with the ledge, they're probably safe.. so you don't want that. When they have to recover low is the happiest time for you, as they have one of 2 options, squall up or up-b to the ledge.
If they squall, you can counter it with a fsmash or an invincible nair on the ledge. If they up-b, grab the ledge so nana can't get it, and HOLD it. Nana will fall to her death a lot of the time.

It's also just generally a good idea to try to fall on them with a nair or dair when they're low and off the stage, you'll probably gimp them somehow."

When the IC's are edgeguarding the can use ice blocks or blizzard. Drop down and qa back to the edge until you find a time to jump off and get away from them.



Helpful Video's

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Overall Matchup

Even

Hmm......

i can honestly say you have to play as gay as possible, i may go into detail after i leave this tourney.

I actually played a pretty good IC last saturday in several friendlies so i could scout the MU.

Grabs:

As you all know, IC have the deadliest grab game in the entire game. If both climbers are near each other, one grab = death from a good player. However, pikachu has a fairly easy time with separating them. As pikachu, the only throw you should use in this matchup is backthrow. It will send one of them off the cliff, and the one you didn't grab will have a hard time getting back to the other one. However, if you grab nana, you may be D-throw CG'd to the edge of the level and then F-smashed, so even when they aren't together its still dangerous.

Separating:

The main crux of your game will be separating the 2 climbers. With pikachu, this is relatively easy. Since D-smash has to be Tap DI'd out of, it is the perfect thing to separate them. Nana is several frames behind, so even when popo DIs perfectly, nana may still be caught in the **** storm of pikas D-smash, and will give her extra damage and have her in a different direction. After this, it is easy to abuse her even more with attacks that can send her flying. A surprisingly good way to separate them is thunder. Lets say popo is on the right and nana is on the left. If you run to the left and jump and thunder, popo will have no way to get to you, and nana, being intelligent as she is, will most likely run into the thunder and add more damage. After this, follow up in the air with a nair or a little uair nair combo. The key to this Matchup is killing nana as soon as possible.

Nana's alive:

When nana is alive, you must thrive on platforms. Although IC have a disjointed uair, you must bait them onto the platforms where they have little to no CG room. If you are on a flat level they can approach with alternating blizzards and ice blocks, which can be very hard to get in to. Be ready to camp if you are winning, because if IC are losing, they tend to get over aggressive with landing their grabs, and you can punish accordingly. Try to maneuver on the platforms so you can hit them with a T-jolt that wraps around or a D-smash if they don't Uair fast enough.

Killing:

The only real thread to being killed is when both of them are alive. It is hard for IC to get the kill if you aren't being grabbed by the other. The most common way to die is being held and grab attacked by nana while popo charges a u-smash, sending you to your death around 95-100%. WHen they are alone, you should still watch out for F-smash. It is scarily fast, and if you aren't expecting it, it can send you at a horrbile trajectory with bad DI. However, most of ICs kill moves are really predictable, so you shouldn't die until you get to the 140s at least, even as pikachu. However, it is relatively easy to kill IC. Once you get popo off the cliff, he is dead in the water. His only recovery option is his fB, and although it has good priority, we can wait it out.

Attacks:

Since there are 2 people in this 1 character, your attacks will be diminished twice as fast. So, if you don't kill with an attack, you can basically take that off your list for killing them. Choose your moves carefully pikachus, they may be your last (10 points for anybody who gets the reference). Still, you shouldn't use your kill moves before they are at 110% unless its thunder. That means for people who like to space with F-smash, you really won't be able to kill with it now. I found that the most reliable way to kill is to FF fair, land behind them, u-tilt, and thunder. They can't Shield Grab you out of it, so its relatively safe. Most of your ground attacks will be grabbed out of shield, and if nana is alive, you will be infinited. Be very careful when using laggy attacks. THEY NEED TO CONNECT!!! SInce nana lags a few frames behind popo, you will be able to hit her with things you wouldn't normally hit her with.

Overall: Pika>IC 55:45

man thats a reference to the movie 300. i got this.

but on a more serious note i agree with your scouting esam. the thing also that i noticed when playing ICs is that our grabs mean jack s%it. even if we grab, the chances are 50:50, even if we landed a grab on the right one, we are still liable for an attack from nana.

my favorite move int this matchup is definately thunder. safe and effective. especially for killing nana.

Okay first of all, ice block spam > tjolt spam.
This means that the only effective way to camp is on the ledge. Expanding on that, ledgeplay is a critical asset in this match-up. You should be able to ledgehop and use tjolt or fair/dair if they are too close.
Aside from that, approaching with tjolts seem work well only unless they are spamming ice blocks. When a tjolt connects, one of the Ice Climbers will be pushed back and you'll be able to swoop down on the very temporarily desynched Ice Climber with a FF fair into grab/dsmash and maybe usmash for the kill.

DSMASH is a useless smash attack? Well, for the most part. However, in this match-up it can make or brake you. It is your best tool to desynch the dangerous duo. When this happens, it is recommended to eliminate Nana ASAP! Trust me- Popo may be able to hold his own against you until Nana comes back to him.

In this match-up, normal grabs are not advisable. Shieldgrabs are fine, as sometimes your pummels can subdue the other Ice Climber as well. But do be aware as you pummel, or just throw immediately. Reverse FF fairs or RAR's work moderately well, but can be guarded against if your opponent wises up. Try them out until they fail. Do not go QAC-crazy against Ice Climbers. Their blizzard ***** that tactic. When edgeguarding, you can ledgehop thunders as they attempt to recover due to their predictable, low-starting recovery.

grabbing IC is not bad 0_o just grab attack > bthrow right away. (works for Ike so why not pika?)

Ussi said:

grabbing IC is not bad 0_o just grab attack > bthrow right away. (works for Ike so why not pika?)

Click to expand...

What I meant is dashing up to them for a grab is not advisable. If they see it coming, you can fail hard and set yourself up for an easy blizzard counter-approach or even a nasty chaingrab. Shieldgrabs are absolutely fine, as I stated.
B-throwing one Ice Climber is a great tactic that I forgot which will desynch them. Thanks for that input.

EDIT: Btw, due to Pikachu's options for desynching this cold-hearted couple, I'd put this match-up at 55:45 Pikachu.

De-synced ice blocks shut down a lot of pikachu's approaches, making your only approaches extremely predictable or easily punished. You have to get really creative in this matchup, making use of stage features and platforms. If you separate the climbers, you can not mess up in killing Nana if you want to win. If you get a lead, camp. Any stage with at least one platform is good.

Obvious but nair and bthrow are both really good in this matchup. Watch a video of Anther playing against ICs to see what I mean.

Anther has the best experience for this match up. He should say a few words.

do we have any vids of anther and IC's? i remember watching a few but dont know where to find them.

I'm more inclined to say this is 45-55 more in favor for ICs.

Sure Dsmash will separate them. But dsmash is very... laggy. Very easy to grab you after you whiff a dsmash or hell they can shield it and hope they don't get shield stabbed. All it takes is one grab...

ussi is totally right. one grab will ruin you. you have to get lucky when grabbed to get out of it. if you are playing a vet, you will die most likely. at most you will live 2 grabs per stock.

Well imo Pikachu is a good matchup I used to play him myself and thinking of picking him up again
anyway about the matchup
The advantage of pikachu are is Projectiles we have one and thats the ice block that blocks pikachu's normal b but then he still has down b that can be irritating wich when timed correctly screws up the grab ive got that alot in my matches against pikachus wich makes big advantage but
We have the deathgrabs and we can desynch witch neutralizes the whole down b advantage

We can beat pikachu but we must not think easy about him cause he is a powerful little brat and underestimated by most of the people

in my opinion its 60:40 Ic's favor but thats just me tho

Matchup's about 50:50 imo without the CG... and with the Cg.. since getting grabbed is gonna be your mistake.

Anytime you get predictable with any move in this matchup you can get grabbed, and that'll either get you 40 extra percent from single popo or death. I lied, if you run in and do a rising nair or uair, you can't get grabbed. It's your safest approach and best one.
I'd say the level of perfection that you have to play with is proportionate to the ability of the IC player to cg perfectly. Thunder is really good at edgeguarding as usual, fair and dsmash are very dangerous to use in general (You know how often you get grabbed out of those ;0...) Dsmash is safe to use when you know they can't shield it (either by a ledge or if they have to land on you)... but I'd usually prefer a nair to interrupt their landing as opposed to dsmash as a higher chance to land option.

If you get both ICs off stage, try to control their landing with thunder and try to make them recover low. If they recover high above you with squall, that's a free hit, if they get to recover at about level height with the ledge, they're probably safe.. so you don't want that. When they have to recover low is the happiest time for you, as they have one of 2 options, squall up or up-b to the ledge.
If they squall, you can counter it with a fsmash or an invincible nair on the ledge. If they up-b, grab the ledge so nana can't get it, and HOLD it. Nana will fall to her death a lot of the time.

It's also just generally a good idea to try to fall on them with a nair or dair when they're low and off the stage, you'll probably gimp them somehow.

In general 50:50, never land near them when it's high risk, quick attack in the direction they don't expect you to go, be very patient, their camping always has a flaw pika can eventually pick at. Ics in general aren't much of a threat if they aren't campy, but pika's hit and own game > that.

Ice climbers grab...thats the one where one of them grabs you while the other one beats the crap out of with his hammer? I hear their chain grab means ****

IC matchup is finished. Please feel free to critique.

Gallax, add this information:

Nana is 6 frames behind popo. Guess how many frames it takes for a shield to come out? 6. That means that the popo will never power shield since nana will always get hit, so you usually don't have to worry about any of that punishment out of shield.

that is partially incorrect

that is if their standing, if the ICs stay in motion they can powershield.

this is a great read, i need help against my buddies ice climbers