Skullgirls/Squigly/Strategy

Overview

Combos

Resets

Assists / Team Building

Strategy / Counterplay

Strategy

I hope you like resource managment.

Goals

Squigly has a surprisingly straightforward gameplan.

Get your punch charge.

Priortizing punch charge is extremely important since it gives you access to the charged version of her reversal and, even more importantly, charged Sing. However, you also need at least 1 bar to use your charged Sing in neutral. Therefore, having 1 bar and her punch charge is the foundation of Squigly's gameplan. You don't even need to hold the charge, just having access to this move will forcefully slow down the pace of the game and force your opponent to respect you. While you should focus on getting punch charge, kick charge serves some purpose too so get it when you have the chance to.

Having a charge makes your stance cancels faster which allows for high damaging combos, faster mix-ups and more advantage on stance cancelled normals. You also get access to more conversions.

Squigly is a character that can easily and effectively capitalize on her opponents mistakes. If they make a mistake in neutral, you can instantly punish them with charged Sing + SBO/Daisy Pusher. She doesn't have the most oppressive offense, but she has amazing pokes that allow her to check the opponent while staying mostly safe. Playing Squigly requires a bit patience. Sometimes it's better to hold back and react to whatever your opponent is doing. If you get a hit in, blow your opponent up with a few resets and high damaging combos. If you have a charge that is.

Having not only a plan for how to get a charge, but also how to get it back as quick as possible after you used it is vital. Meter is precious for Squigly. She needs it for charged Sing, various conversions, and setups. Don't just throw SBO's out in neutral or burn meter in a combo that is not going to kill.

Offense

Grounded Offense

s.LP > f.HP or c.LK (mid, high/low)

c.LK > f.HP (low, high)

f.HP xx stance cancel xx c.lk (high, low)

c.LK > c.MK (low, low)

c.MK xx stance cancel xx throw

These are a few basic mix-ups. Squigly can go from low to high and from high to low however she pleases. Blocked s.LP gives you good frame advantage and allows you to go for either an overhead or a low after it. Poke your opponents and go for a mix-up. Thanks to Squigly's ability to stance cancel her normals she can make her standing overhead (f.HP) safe. Note that it is preferable to cancel f.HP on the 4th hit, since it will give you the most frame advantage. Canceling it too early might even leave you minus. You can also stance cancel any normal and just go for a throw reset. Having a charge makes your mix-ups even faster. high, low, low, high, high, low, throw - it doesn't matter, charged Squigly can just go ham.

Sadly, party time is over the moment the enemy pushblocks. Pushblocking will put your opponent out of the range of your standing overhead. Furthermore, these mix-ups are very vulnerable to reversals. Unless you have an assist to keep your opponent in blockstun, keep your blockstrings short. Be aware of the dangers of playing with purple fire.

Most people will be trying to pushblock Squigly as soon as possible for this exact reason. Your answer to pushblock? Frame traps. A simple and effective one is c.LK > c.HP or c.LK > c.LK. It not only works as a low mix-up, but it will also trip up people trying to pushblock. Amazing.

Aerial Offense

j.LK is her best airbutton. You will use this one a lot. It isn't just an amazing air to air, as falling with it is a great way to close the distance. The move itself is fast, hits overhead and can even be linked into itself. It also provides great advantage on block against standing opponents which allows you to go for a ground mix-up. Air to air buffer it into j.MK for an easy conversion. Against grounded opponents use s.LP or c.LK to convert off a hit.

Dash-jump j.MK can cross up standing opponents and sometimes even in air to air situations. Convert off it with either j.HK or H Divekick. If you hit a grounded opponent, you can also convert off it with M Divekick.

Dash-jump j.HK is useful for keeping pressure against a pushblocking opponent and can catch them pressing buttons. It can also be used to keep pressure on incoming.

Rising j.LP is a very fast and universal overhead. It will naturally work on Band, Bella, Beo, and Eliza, but will whiff against all other crouching characters. To make it work against the rest of the cast, you'll either need to execute a perfect instant double jump overhead - which isn't recommended, since it requires basically frame-perfect timing - or use a fuzzy guard setup.

Divekicks are a great tool to maintain pressure. Use j.HK xx M Divekick to keep a pushblocking opponent in check. Divekick makes Squigly land faster which allows you to follow up with a grounded mix-up. You can also end an airstring before the restand with M Divekick and perform a ground mix-up after. Keep a opponent in check with M Divekick and pay attention to which direction they block it: If they blocked it high you can most likely catch them with c.LK, and if they blocked it low you can throw them. Keep in mind that an experienced player will adapt to this, so vary up your offense frequently and stay unpredictable. If your opponent starts to punish M Divekick you can fake them out with j.MP xx M Divekick. H Divekick hits overhead but is punishable on block. You can cancel a falling air button into it (j.LK xx H Divekick, for example) to hit opponents who are conditioned to block low after j.LK as a risky surprise-overhead.

Neutral

Movement

Squigly's dash is rather slow. If you want to cover distance quickly, super-jumping and dash-jumping are better options. Having a double jump and j.LK also makes it more favorable for Squigly to move in the air. Don't be predictable with your jumps though; and remember that dashing is also an option. Holding charge gives you amazing walking speed and can be used to cover a short distance while charging.

Normal Pokes

j.LK is arguably Squigly's best normal. It's an amazing air to air that hardly any character can challenge. A good way to use it in neutral is after a dash-jump, giving it tremendous forward momentum and allowing you to close distance with ease. You can also use it rising or falling, depending on the situation. Buffer it into j.MK since it will give you a conversion on hit and keep you safe on block.

c.LK is Squigly's fastest low and her main ground poke. It not only makes Squigly's hurtbox extremely small, but it also hits on both sides. It can be used to low profile a variety of things, including other characters standing jabs. It can even work as an option against jump-ins and IADs since it makes some moves whiff and can catch your opponent on landing. Matchup-dependent.

s.LP is Squigly's fastest normal. Standard jab that leads into mixup. It's a decent poke but you are better off poking with c.LK in most situations.

j.HP amazing long range poke and a great way to interrupt whatever your opponent is doing. Use it falling to hit both airborne and grounded opponents. You can use it as air to air with the right spacing to discourage airdashers. Generally, you should only use this one at larger distances and j.LK for close combat. The whole thing has a hurtbox so it can be punished, even from longer distances. However, your opponent has to anticipate it so just don't be too predictable when throwing it out. You can convert off it with SBO or charged Silver Chord, if you land it in c.MK range you can even convert with that. If you hit an airborne opponent you can convert with j.LK, if close enough, otherwise just position yourself and/or get a charge.

c.MK hits low and has good reach. If you space it well enough you can cover a lot of grounded options. Its range might catch your opponent off-guard or catch them trying to jump. Covert off it with s.HP or c.HP, although c.HP can be more reliable(?). Converting off max range c.MK can be tricky since it pushes the opponent slightly back and can cause the first hit of s.HP to whiff. Converting off max range c.MK with c.HP can be just as awkward, since c.HP causes even more pushback and might push them out of the range of the last 2 hits. It can also just whiff completely.

s.HK is good at reaching airborne opponents while on the ground when used preemptively.

Getting the Charge

Getting your punch charge in neutral has high priority. At best you have an assist that acts either as a meat shield or puts your opponent in blockstun for a little while, to give you time to charge safely. Don't worry, solo Squigly also has ways of getting her charge in neutral:

• Create enough distance to get a charge. Some characters can't chase you down quickly or don't have a fast enough projectile to interrupt your charge. Abuse that.
• The soft knockdown that throw or c.HK creates gives you enough time to get a charge. Uncharged Mortis or charged Arpeggio will create a sliding knockdown and give you time to get both charges or one charge and a mix-up.
• Poking your opponent with j.HP can discourage their chase and even launches them a bit in air to air situations. This can give you enough time to get a charge.
• Landing j.MP > j.HP against an airborne opponent will set you to fullscreen. While you can get a charge from that against most characters, it's not recommended against Peacock or Robo since it gives them huge advantage.
• You can deal with most moves opponents throw out to interrupt your charge by cancelling it on reaction. There are also ways to get a charge vs "projectile spam", but more on that in the MU section.

Using the Charge

Now that you have your punch charge, you have access to your most powerful neutral tool: the move that skips neutral, charged Sing. However, you also need 1 bar to make it threatening. If you are out of meter you can try building it quickly by whiffing s.HP xx Stance Cancel at a safe distance. Charged Sing causes hitstop and can be super cancelled.

Due to these properties, Squigly can use charged Sing xx Daisy Pusher without the opponent being able to jump post-flash. Make use of this if your opponent is on the ground in front of you or tries to press a button in Daisy range. It essentially acts as a 360. Note that while charged Sing pushes your opponent towards you, this distance alone is not enough to get them into the range of Daisy Pusher. Only use charged Sing xx Daisy Pusher if they are close enough. On a side note, opponents who are already in jump startup will be able to escape Sing xx Daisy. Pay attention to that.

The second use of charged Sing in neutral is charged Sing xx SBO. As seen here, raw SBO can be countered. However, charged Sing's hitstop properties will prevent that from happening. More importantly, this is where the screen focus of charged Sing comes into play. Let's say your opponent presses a button at fullscreen distance. You perform charged Sing xx SBO to instantly punish them. The 5 hits of SBO will give you enough time to start a full combo. This is what forces your opponent to respect charged Squigly: You are able to punish any mistakes they make from anywhere on the screen (with exceptions explained here), giving you unparalleled control over the pace of the match.

Having a kick charge gives you access to charged Chord and charged Tremolo. Both of them are good, albeit more gimmicky neutral tools.

Charged Chord has incredible range and is faster than uncharged Chord. It's not possible to punish charged Chord unless in point blank range since it is -8 on block, but it's very punishable on whiff so watch out. Charged Chord is a hitgrab, and therefore can be used to break armored moves. It can even catch airborne opponents if they are close enough to the ground. Use it to check grounded opponents in neutral and catch people dashing.

Charged Tremolo will track your opponents position and hit low for 5 hits. If you time it correctly, you can even catch an opponent who jumps a lot with it. Otherwise, it can be used to break some armored moves and catch your opponent pressing buttons fullscreen. Convert off it with charged Sing xx SBO (uses OTG).

On a side note, if you happen to find yourself sitting on a life lead you can just play defensively and wait for your opponent to make a mistake. Approaching charged Squigly is scary for all characters. Don't get too greedy and waste your charge right away, playing more patiently pays off.

Defense

Uncharged Squigly is very lacking when it comes to defensive options. She gets blown up quickly and doesn't have any reliable reversals. However, Squigly with a punch charge has a great DP that can be made safe on block for the cost of 1 bar.

Reversals

Charged Draugen Punch is Squigly's most reliable reversal. You can enter charge stance through the light and medium version. The heavy version can't be held but is the only version with a fully invulnerable startup, and this primarily is why you should use the heavy version as a reversal over the other two. Holding the medium or light version still has a use since you can release them when your opponent attempts to hit you out of your charge stance and punish them for it. Charged Draugen Punch has a good chance of autocorrecting, since stances always autocorrect. If your opponent crosses you up during the stance startup of charged Draugen Punch it will autocorrect. You can both make it safe on block and convert off it by cancelling it into MK+HK SBO. Converting with MK+HK SBO even allows you to get your charge back before picking up! If you miss the super cancel window you can still try to convert with Sing xx LK+MK SBO, but it's a pretty difficult conversion. If you have kick charge you can convert with charged Chord which is also a bit tricky.

SBO->DHC is depending on which DHC a great reversal and can even be safe, due to SBO keeping your opponent in blockstun. Raw SBO on the other hand is a bad reversal.

Raw Daisy Pusher is an option, but not a great one. It's very active and has a lot of invulnerable frames but can be jumped out of on reaction and punished. It will only work if your opponent is committing to a move, and even then some characters still have ways around it. It will actually catch falling air moves and some IADs, but again there are character specific counter-plays so be careful with it. That being said, it's uncharged solo Squigly's only reversal option outside of LVL3.

Inferno of Leviathan, aka LVL3, is an expensive reversal/anti air. It works wonders against jump-ins but can whiff on short characters and most crouching characters. While the orb can come back to give you advantage on whiff, your opponent can also freely whiff punish you into snapback to remove the orb entirely. Note that the orb doesn't always disappear when Squigly is being snapped due to a bug explained in here. Convert off it with a jumping button.

Anti Air Options

s.HK can work but is slow and unreliable. Convert with a jumping button.

c.MP works against airdashers who like to stick hurtboxes out. Especially effective against Filia and Eliza. Has to be spaced properly, though. Convert with s.HP or Silver Chord at longer ranges.

Liver Mortis, both charged and uncharged, can work due to their strike invulnerable frames, though it's hard to time properly since they have no startup invulnerability. Uncharged comes out slower but has more invul frames, charged comes out quicker but has less invul frames.

SBO works against characters who can't counter-super it in the air or are out of meter. Which version of SBO should be used depends on the situation. You have to take a guess.

Matchups

Matchup Strategy

Beowulf

Beowulf's hopdash high profiles your c.LK. It's better to poke with s.LP against him.

It's possible to wall off ground Blitzer with f.HP. You can also punish Blitzer with SBO.

Squigly can low profile Chair Toss and Arm with c.LK. The timing is tight but it leads to resets that covers 2 of Beowulf's reversal options. (video)

You can punish Airwulf on reaction with LK+HK SBO.

Big Band (video)

Band can shut down charge attempts with Brass or H Giant step.

As shown in the video, it is possible to get a charge by partly charging and jumping if Big Band spams Giant Step from fullscreen. It's pretty difficult and requires some practice though.

Cerebella

Bella has nothing to prevent Squigly from running away and charging.

You can punish Tumbling Run with Seria Sing xx Daisy Pusher, however Battle Butt and Pummel Horse are both considered airborne. If you see their active frames after Seria Sing you need to block and punish instead of canceling into Daisy.

Bella can easily punish raw SBO with her Deflector.

Double

Pretty standard matchup. Double can't do much about Charged Sing.

Hard to combo. Aviod using long airstrings on her if you are not practiced enough.

Watch out for H Luger since it will beat your amazing air buttons. If Double starts looking for anti airs with H luger, change up your approach.

Canceling into Daisy Pusher will beat Car.

Easy to instant overhead with j.LP. Additionaly L Bomber will whiff on rising j.LP.

Eliza

Crouching in front of Eliza makes Horus whiff. You can use this to your advantage and mess with her grounded blockstrings.

Filia

A character that is easy to anti air with c.MP.

Filia is able to punish Seria Sing xx SBO with Gregor if the SBO doesn't connect immediately. Use with caution.

Fukua

Beats Squigly j.LK with her j.LP in most air to air situations.

Ms.Fortune

Her air normals can easily whiff on Squigly.

Robo-Fortune

SBO doesn't block her Beams.

Robo can prevent you from getting a charge with L Beam. You need to trick her into doing an air Beam to be able to charge.

Robo can reach the blindspot of Seria Sing xx SBO with her j.HK and fire L Beam from there. Very annoying.

Painwheel

Use rising j.HP against a flying Painwheel to shut her air buttons down.

Parasoul

You can punish her blockstrings by pushblocking and doing SBO afterwards. Don't do this if Parasoul has 3 bars since she can punish you for doing that with her LVL3.

c.LK low profiles L/H Napalm Shot and her jab. Great button to poke Parasoul.

It is possible to get a charge, even when Parasoul spams Napalm Shot from fullscreen. You need to low profile her tears with c.LK and partly charge between the shots. This isn't easy and requires some practice.

Peacock

A difficult matchup to play but one thats pretty even. You need to change up your general gameplan for this since Peacock has the tools to prevent you from charging/using sing and forces you to go in. Make use of Squigly's double jump and to avoid most projectiles. Superjumping forward gives Squigly a lot of forward momentum in the air. In combination with her small hurtbox you can evade LV1 and LV2 Item Drop.

j.HP is great to catch Peacock off guard in midrange. However it extends your hurtbox a lot so you can be easily hit out of it by air projectiles. A way around that is to superjump forward over the plane bomb and do falling j.HP. This should give you enough forward momentum to dodge LV1 and LV2(?) Item Drop. Otherwise close in and try to hit Peacock with j.LK.

Utilize your aerial pressure to avoid M Bang. Additionally c.LK low profiles M Bang and leaves Peacock open for a punish.

If Peacock holds an Item or has H George on the screen, Seria Sing xx SBO will trade and put you back to neutral. You can use c.LK to dodge H George after the super flash, but it isn't reliable.

If you use Sing and see an Item above your head use LK+HK SBO to protect yourself, otherwise you'll get hit.

You can punish Peacock for doing a special if she is in LK+MK SBO range. Don't try to punish a normal because she can cancel it into M Bang to punish you instead.

It is possible to partly charge during her bomb tosses. Hold forward while charging to avoid H George and cancel before the ground bomb connects. Keep in mind that Peacock can always punish you for charging with Argus.

Squigly's fullscreen Argus Punish (video)

Squigly

Cursed MU

Valentine

She can hit you out of your charge stance with Bypass easily. A possible counterplay is to bait her by charging Draugen Punch and release it when Valentine does Bypass. Or simply block.

Valentine can reach the deadzone of Seria Sing xx SBO and throw Crosses from there. Similarly annoying to Robo.

Even though Val has amazing air normals she doesn't have anything that is faster than Squigly j.LK.

Counterplay

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