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Is Jiggs REALLY as bad as people say she is?

FlamingUmbreon

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I don't think so, and I'll go over why I think she's mid tier at best. Here, I'll go over Jigglypuff's strategy, and how her moves could be used in accordance to her strategy or play style.
Strategy!

Jigglypuff's strategy is simple: throw the opponent off the edge until they can't recover anymore. Jigglypuff isn't meant to kill, but to gimp. She's the epitome of what smash bros originally was-- throw them off the level to win. This could be a double edged sword, though, as Jigglypuff can gimp very easily as low to mid percents, but over 100%, her options become somewhat limited. But, if her optimal strategy is to gimp, what about it? How would anybody use that to their advantage? And what about Jigglypuff's smash attacks, then? Well, going over ever move Jigglypuff has, I'll go over how they can be all used to reach Jigglypuff's goals. However, since Jigglypuff isn't the fastest out of the bunch, you might need to play a bit defensively to reach what you need to do. Now, let's look at the facts:

(Things she has to her advantage are in green, conversely red is at her disadvantage. Gray is neutral!)
Facts:
1) Jigglypuff has the near fastest air speed (with Yoshi being the fastest iirc)
2) Jigglypuff has a very small hitbox
3) Jigglypuff has a great horizontal recovery with Side B and her Jumps
4) Rest, while not as powerful as in Melee, still can KO faster than all of Jigglypuff's smash attacks. It's also very fast (comes out frame 1), and has super armor.
Speaking of Rest, Rest can actually be combo'd into! A weak Fair can combo into a rest at low percents. Lastly, Rest, even if it doesn't kill, puts a flower on them for even more gradual damage. From that, you can play very defensively and rack up damage while you wait.
5) Jigglypuff has a great duck, being able to dodge multiple attacks like Marth's Shield Breaker and Corrin's Fsmash.
6) She can perform great walls of pain with Weak Fair/Nair > Fair.
7) She can edge guard exponentially well, as she can be able to afford going off the stage very far and gimp with a weak Fair or Nair
8) Her defensive game is very good, being able to shield, and then jump out of it into the air (the one place she shines in), and counter attack with Dair, Bair, Nair, or Fair (conversely, Upsmash, rest, or even Sing can be very good options!)
9
) Her Down Smash can make opponents slide!! This will be very important later on
10) Her Side B (Pound), can actually perform adequate shield pressure, and since Jigglypuff has excellent air speed, AND since Pound stops most momentum, you can move upwards above their shield (away from grab range if they try grab out of shield), Side B downwards to the top of their shield, and do tons of damage to it. With this, they'll often times stop shielding to prevent a shield break, letting you go a little bit more offensive if you need to!
11) Her Bair is an excellent killing move, and can apply somewhat decent pressure onto shields at high percents, as the shield will be damaged or the opponent will be knocked very far if they drop their shield. Even her Nair can kill if you time it correctly near the side of the screen.
12) Jigglypuff can juggle sometimes with Uair.
13) Did you know Rollout and Sing can ledge cancel? If you jump and use either of the two, you can still grab the ledge! This means if you're at the edge, you can sing and grab the ledge, cancelling all her lag! That makes for an easy punish once you get up.
14) Rollout itself doesn't take too long to charge, and is very fast and powerful. In fact, rollout is a good fakeout tool as you can use rollout, charge to them, and hold in the other direction! This makes rollout do no damage, and even go past enemies, before turning around and then hitting again. This can be repeated until rollout is finished. This means that if you're up against a Corrin and they counter, you can predict a counter, use Rollout and go past them right as they counter, and then hit them from behind!
15) Dair is probably the weakest of Jigglypuff's air moves, but it can be used as an anti air if you're above somebody. It, too, can combo into rest or Fair.
16) Her Uptilt is very useful as it can push opponents into the air, where jigglypuff is great in, and combo with up air.

16) Her Up Smash is somewhat strong compared to the other of jigglypuff's attacks, but it is slow. However, with correct spacing and timing this isn't usually a problem. Same for side smash and dash attack.
17) Her taunts are very lolsy, her "JIGGLYPUFF!!!" taunt just seems to make the salt rise out of people
19) Her weight is very light, which sometimes can be good to escape combos, but often times just makes her easy to kill.
20) Her running speed is slower than ganondorf after eating 50 big macs during a mountain dew drinking contest, she's so slow that you NEED to jump and hop all the time, which makes you open to attacks. If you air dodge close to the ground, lag happens. You can't shield safely unless you're on the ground and you NEVER want to be on the ground as her.
21) Her shield kills you if it breaks. Seriously, sakurai, why did this happen? Was that pun of her being a balloon pokemon and popping her shield really that necessary? But yeah, don't shield if it's too damaged. Ru- I mean JUMP to the edge and play defensively until you can regain your position
22) Her weaknesses make her need to play defensively 90% of the time
23) Almost all of her tilts are useless, with the exception of Uptilt. Her Forward tilt can be okay as a "get off me" move if they're in front of you, but Jab is usually better at doing that. Typically, if you need to, Fair > Forward Tilt can be used. Down Tilt, though, is useless. NEVER USE IT. It's worse than every other move in the game, without a doubt. It hits nothing, comes out too slowly, and is too weak to use with anything.
24) With the exception of Side Special, all of her special moves put her in tons of lag if they aren't used perfectly. Even then, sometimes the opponent can still perform a slight punish after being killed with rest. Oh, and if you hit somebody in midair with rollout, good luck dying. You'll rollout to your death no matter what. Sing is also pretty bad, and with the occasional ledge cancelling, sing is rarely used. Although, if you think it's worth it, you can sing after dying. When you respawn, your opponent will usually roll BEHIND you since they're on the edge trying to wait as far as possible for your invincibility frames to stop. If they roll and you predict it and sing, you can perform a free punish. This is risky, however, because they can punish you after.
25) Jigglypuff can be killed literally without attacking. How so you might ask? One word: Footstools.
26) Jigglypuff is just somewhat slow compared to the rest of the cast.
27) Most of her throws don't combo very well, and are typically used to get superior stage control
28) Back Air is somewhat slow to hit


Playstyle:
Now, with all this being said, how should we use all of her moves to our advantage? Well, since Jigglypuff's goal seems to be to gimp and not to kill, Forward Smash and Up Smash are rarely to be used. Getting them to one side of the stage and trying to gimp them is better. However, if you do break their shield with Pound, AND they're at medium percents where Forward Smash won't kill, you can charge a Down Smash and push them off to the side and down, and try to gimp them even further! Her most useful moves are: Fair, Nair, Uair, Pound, Dair, Up tilt, Forward/Back/Down throw, Down Smash, rest, Rollout (a tad situational), Side Smash, Jab (very situational but it comes out fast so it can be used if necessary)

So, with all that said, and since jigglypuff is typically slower than the rest, she needs to play defensively for the majority of the game. Baiting is very useful as jiggs too. Unless there's a good reason to, going too offensive will just open up weakness that are easy to defend against, such as trying to Fair too much or dash attacking too much. This doesn't make her a bad character, though, as some characters are just better for a defensive playstyle, while others are more aggressive.

Now, if I'm being an idiot, somebody please tell me, but otherwise, I don't think Jigglypuff is THAT bad as people say. She could be mid tier, but she isn't bottom tier for sure. She has tools, and plenty of them.

Thoughts? sorry for this tl;dr, I might make a better post but I ran out of time so yeh
 

Zerp

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Just going to point out that she's not seen as Bottom Tier because she's unusable or has no tools, she's seen that way since she's perceived to not be as strong as the rest of the cast. Your not being a idiot at all, but your logic for her not being a Bottom Tier character seems like it's a bit misguided, while yes, she is usable and has plenty of tools, that unfortunately really doesn't mean much for her tier positioning, what actually matters for that is how she compares to the other characters in the game.

Also, welcome to Smashboards!
 
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Wintermelon43

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Imo she's a little better than what people say but still bottom tier basicially. 6th from last imo
 

Infinite901

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What Zero Soul said is exactly correct. She's got a lot going for her, but she just doesn't have as much as the rest of the characters. The only character I think is worse is 1111 Brawler.
 

FunAtParties

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I think a huge reason Jigglypuff is seen as so weak in this game is that her biggest advantage in past games (recovery/edgeguarding) has pretty much dwindled down to nothing. Ledge trumping and magnet hands don't really help her as much as the ledge mechanics in past games did, and recoveries are better/easier than ever in this game (accept hers oddly enough); in short it took away one of her biggest advantages, and while she's still an offstage threat, she's not the edgeguarding nightmare she use to be, this hurts her a lot.

Then we look at her punish game which isn't as good as it probably should be. Overall she's a bait and punish kind of character right? So it sucks that she lacks in the punish department. She just doesn't have many solid options to deal with over aggressive play, her throws don't combo into anything or kill at reliable percentages, and she doesn't have the kind of frame data to deal with many characters. Maybe this is just my inexperience talking, but some matches just make it seem like the other character can play as unsafe as they want because we can't do anything about it. We rely too much on making reads, and monk-like patience against some characters to really be considered good in the punish game in my opinion. At best we can punish some unsafe stuff with Rest, but anyone worth a **** isn't going to go for anything that unsafe anyway.

Continuing off Rest, her combos into Rest are pretty weak. She can't jab reset anymore, utilt to rest only works at percentages that won't secure the KO, FFUA and a solid dair aren't the easiest things to land, and hitting sourspot nair/fair to rest will only work if the opponent is chasing you in the air, which they should never do, or offstage which is a trade in a stock. Really the best Rest set-ups is tech chase reads in my opinion as an opponent rolling in, outside of a few characters, won't be able to react in time to avoid the punish, and it works from many options at many percents, whether they tech or not, but that's still (obviously) very read dependent, and getting the opponent to roll in will have to get you to condition them with other punishes (like dash attack near the ledge) to get them to stop rolling back/teching in place. All of it just makes her best kill option a mediocre one imo, and this is supposed to be one of her advantages over the rest of the cast.

Then we look at her neutral, which to my limited understanding of it has never been a great strength of hers in the past anyway, but it seems somewhat worse now. She doesn't have as good approach options in this game. Her bair was the best/safest option in past games, but it doesn't have that ridiculous disjoint anymore, nor the top aerial mobility/frame data to back it up. So what it's turned into is a two frame kill option at high percents/off stage, not a terrible one, but not a great one either. The rest of her neutral will consist of spacing and mixing up fairs/nair/dairs hoping to tack on damage and get stage control, or get them to commit to a bad option that can be further punished (but as said not that well). Projectile users can force you to approach, and with nerfs to range and aerial mobility,Jiggs doesn't have the easiest time spacing her aerials anymore, so from that perspective you're always ripe for a punish if someone tries to lame you out, and you get frustrated with it. From my understanding, the best way to play her in neutral is space out aerials about head-level hoping to bait them into unsafe options due to over aggression; not awful, but there's a reason we lose to sword users, and she could do way better with some healthy buffs.

Then there's her defensive game, which is arguably her greatest strength. She has a tiny hurtbox, the best(?) crouch in the game, six jumps, and the second best aerial mobility in the base game allowing her to weave in and out safely. Implementing shad makes her extremely difficult to zone out. Because of her light weight, and floatiness she can also escape many combos much more quickly than others. The only real disadvantage is her shield, which is a guaranteed stock if broken, but it still covers her well and she has decent OoS options so it's not really a bad thing in my opinion. All that being said, her crouch may be the only thing helping her have any winning, or doable, matches at all, as just because she has good defensive options doesn't mean she can capitalize on them. That being said her crouch can reliably negate certain character's options, and be worked out of fairly quickly so it's pretty much the only reason we having anything.

I know this was poorly written, and maybe I'm just being to critical of Puff, but from my perspective she needs buffs EVERYWHERE to be considered good. Air speed, frame data, range, knockback angle changes, buffed side b for a better recovery, etc... are all absolutely necessary to make her viable in my opinion. She has decent tools, and that's great, but so does everyone else. The question is, does she have any great ones? Any ones that make her stand out, and give her a healthy advantage over half the cast in at least one area? I don't think she does, which is why I definitely believe she's (almost) as bad as people say.
 
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(M)

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Hi jigglypuff mains, it's M. I just wanna say something. While I'm not a Jigglypuff player , I can sympathize with you all. Jiggly is just mediocre. More is needed to make her viable. That's why we should host a #BuffThePuff campaign !


Your best Jig players can deliberate among one another as to what buffs will help our puff become viable. Then we can make a video of those requested buffs. After that, we gather support with our hashstags and petitions


Its a long-shot,yes. but if we unite and voice out opinion enough, we can be heard :)
 

(M)

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i dont wanna ask for a jigglypuff buff cause she could get nerfed
That's why we highlight her weakness andrequest her strengths to be buffed :) and also mention how shes one of the worst characters
 
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FunAtParties

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That's why we highlight her weakness andrequest her strengths to be buffed :) and also mention how shes one of the worst characters
I'm not sure whether the team still plans on doing patches or not anyway. If they do, I've heard they base the results off of FG stats and Japanese tournaments. Not sure how true that is, but maybe we're just too damn good.;)
 

Infinite901

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I'm not sure whether the team still plans on doing patches or not anyway. If they do, I've heard they base the results off of FG stats and Japanese tournaments. Not sure how true that is, but maybe we're just too damn good.;)
Maybe we should all go on For Glory and lose a lot
 

MisterDom

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Jigglypuff is without a doubt extremely underrated. That is absolutely true! We got combos! We got edge guarding and gimps! We got rest! We got air speed! We even have a low crouch! Obviously we aren't as bad as people say, but look at the cast. Every character left and right.

They have options that we're missing. Combo and kill throws, a decent to great neutral game, KILL OPTIONS, zoning tools, better movement, the list continues.

Now, of course, we can use OUR options to do some fun stuff and win. There are several Jigglypuff mains and secondaries that get good to decent tournament results and cause upsets. She's obviously viable! But try to name 5 to 10 charcters that are worsr that everyone agrees on. Maybe only like 3? We are among the worst in the game imo. However, we're still viable. Everyone is. We might not even be the worst! But we're bad.

Many will disagree. Of course we have enough tools and such make us possibly mid tier, and we do. But we don't have all of them. Here are some things to prove this:

• We depend on the air for decently fast movement. Ground is more important :(

• We lack kill options. This doesn't really show until you play more higher level players, but it's there, and is nasty! You can't take every stock with rest.

• We have no zoning tools. Making your opponent come to you stops working if you don't have the lead at higher caliber. We can't camp every match we play.

• Gimping and edge guarding will get tougher at higher levels of play. If this is one of our most important killing options, than its a problem!

• We don't have much approach options. :(

• Our neutral is weak compared to other characters.

• Other than a fully optimized dash dance, we don't benefit much from tech.

• No combo or kill throw.

We can cope with these disadvantages in mind, for our advantages are great, but in the end, we aren't at the same tier as Lucas or Link or Charizard or Samus.

We are still not exactly a great character. We are underrated, but not great.

Many people argue about buffs and such as well, and to me the following things are most important to buff:

• Lack of kill options***

• Lack of a combo or kill throw

• Lack of ground speed

• Better frame data and auto cancels
 

MarioMeteor

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I've always stuck to the belief that Jigglypuff isn't a bad character. Maybe she isn't necessarily good, but I would never call her bad.
 

OmegaStriker

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Jigglypuff is not bottom tier because she's useless. Think about it:

You give a character a bazooka, they're going to be dangerous. But if everyone else has a nuclear bomb they can use without even bothering to get close, it's going to be hard to see that character with the bazooka as being more dangerous than the others. If that analogy was weird, what I'm trying to say is that Jigglypuff has tools that make her stand out from the rest of the cast, but they don't make her stand out and excel where other characters do not.

She has a good air game. So does Rosalina and Luma, Yoshi, Ness, Zero Suit Samus, etc. without coming with the drawbacks of having a pitiable ground game and excessively low weight, along with short ranged moves.

She has Rest. But its hitbox is tiny and unreliable and the risk/reward ratio is skewed. Rest just becomes a stock trade if it's used at high percentages unless they get Star/Screen KO'd. It's not fair that we successfully land Rest and then get KO'd for it.

She's not bottom tier because she's purely useless. She's bottom tier because the tools that she has in comparison to the rest of the cast are inferior, though not unusable.
 

Mario & Sonic Guy

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Jigglypuff's biggest problem is not just the fact that it has no projectile attacks, but its reach is rather poor, and a lot of its attacks are not safe on shields; even Pound can't protect Jigglypuff from getting shield-grabbed. Also, as good as its air speed is, that doesn't do Jigglypuff much justice if most of the cast can outreach it; even Ganondorf can pummel Jigglypuff hard.
 

Mythzotick

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As much as it pains me to say this, but Sleepypuff is indeed bottom tier in this game. I've even thought for MONTHS that she is the worst character in the game mainly due to how much the Smash 4 mechanics hurt her more than any other character. To be more specific, the new ledge mechanics take away one of her biggest strengths in edge-guarding and rage does her hardly any good since she is the lightest character in the game; not being able to live long enough and will more than likely die even earlier because her opponent(s) will be at that point where they can benefit from rage.

But now, I don't know for sure how bad she really is because of what Hungrybox has been able to accomplish; beating Fatality 3-2 at a decently stacked tournament and ended up finishing 3rd place not too long ago. She could very well still be the worst character in the game right now, but I'm kind of starting to think that she might not even be a bottom 5 character anymore. It is possible for a puff player to go for a timeout by camping in the air even though it's a lot harder to do compared to other characters that are notorious for camping (I'M LOOKING AT YOU SANIC!) and rest is still a HUGE trump card to have despite it not being nearly as good as it is in Melee.

Dear Mashpotato Samurai,

Please buff the puff.

Thank you.

Too bad it probably won't happen.
 
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