A Legendary Armored Core 6 Feat
Armored Core 6 is packed with huge set piece battles, but one mission stands out for many players: the fight against the Ice Worm. Normally this towering robotic monster is meant to be taken down with a special weapon, the Stun Needle Launcher, which is designed to pierce its nearly unbreakable shields.
Some dedicated players are never satisfied with doing things the normal way. Over time, challenge runners have tried to defeat the Ice Worm without using the Stun Needle Launcher at all. Recently, one player took that challenge to a completely new level and pulled off something that sounds almost impossible.
X user @2K_heso managed to destroy the Ice Worm with no Stun Needle Launcher, no guns, no missiles, and without taking a single hit. His weapon of choice was pure melee combat, a style the Armored Core community has dubbed Rubicon Karate.
How Do You Punch Out a Giant Robot Worm?
The run is the answer to a challenge originally posted by another player, @IBIS824101, who called on Armored Core 6 experts to beat the Ice Worm without the Stun Needle Launcher and without taking damage. Months later, @2K_heso responded and pushed the idea further: a no damage clear using only melee attacks.
According to his own comments, this was not something he pulled off in an afternoon. He says the run took roughly 150 to 200 hours of attempts and practice. That is hundreds of hours spent learning every move, every animation, and every attack the Ice Worm can throw out.
In the video he posted, you can see his mech dancing around massive laser blasts and ground attacks, reading the Worm's moves even when most of its body is off screen. The positioning and timing needed to avoid all damage while staying close enough to land melee hits is extremely tight.
Interestingly, his build for this run is a heavy one. At first glance that might seem odd. If you are not planning to get hit, why stack up on heavy armor and bulky parts?
The answer comes down to how melee works in Armored Core 6. The core move of Rubicon Karate is the boost kick, a flying kick you launch while boosting. The damage of this technique scales with the total weight of your mech. The heavier your AC, the harder your kicks hit.
The Ice Worm fight is basically a damage check once its shield is taken down. Rusty, the allied pilot who helps you in this mission, creates very short damage windows by knocking out the Worms shields. You need to squeeze in as much damage as possible before those shields recover.
As @2K_heso explained, if his kicks were not backed by enough mech weight, he simply would not be able to put out the damage needed in the small openings Rusty creates. In the final phase there is an effective time limit. If you do not completely destroy the Worm before this point, Rusty can no longer take down its shields and the run is over.
That is why the heavy parts are essential. They are not there to tank hits, but to power up his melee output so that his kicks can actually kill the boss in time.
Rubicon Karate and the Skill Behind the Run
The run has grabbed attention not just because of the rules he followed, but because of how clean the combat looks in the clips shown. It is all close range movement, precision boosting, and carefully timed melee hits. No ranged weapons to rely on and no fallback plan if something goes wrong.
When another user asked why he focused so much on armored parts if he never intended to get hit, he laid out his logic: the fight is designed so that without massive damage in those brief windows, the Ice Worm will simply outlast you. Going all in on weight is the only way to make pure melee viable.
His approach shows a deep understanding of how Armored Core 6 systems interact, from weight and damage scaling to boss scripting and timing. It is not just a flashy stunt. It is a carefully engineered build and strategy tailored for one of the game’s biggest encounters.
Some skeptical viewers have pointed out that the X clip does not show the entire fight from start to finish. @2K_heso has said he achieved the clear in a run where he felt he was making plenty of mistakes, and he plans to upload a full version to YouTube later. The final clip clearly shows that he had not used any repair kits before landing the finishing blow, backing up the no damage claim.
A look at his YouTube channel helps explain why most people are willing to believe him. It already includes dozens of videos showing similarly wild Rubicon Karate feats, all focused on melee centric play and strict challenge runs. This latest achievement is just the peak of a long series of experiments in pushing Armored Core 6’s mechanics to their limits.
The community reaction has been a mix of awe and playful disbelief. One commenter summarized it nicely by telling him that he is already mad, but as a compliment. It captures the strange respect gamers have for players who willingly put themselves through hundreds of hours of extremely difficult attempts just to prove something is possible.
For Armored Core 6 fans, and PC gamers in general, runs like this show how deep these systems can go once you start bending them in unexpected ways. You can follow the intended design and use the tools the game gives you, or you can spend 200 hours perfecting heavyweight flying kicks against a skyscraper sized robot worm. Both are valid ways to play, but only one earns you a place in the Rubicon Karate hall of fame.
Original article and image: https://www.pcgamer.com/games/action/after-200-hours-of-intensive-worm-punching-rubicon-karate-master-melees-armored-core-6s-ice-worm-to-death-without-taking-damage/
