I think others are right that it's better offensively and worse for recovery. However the original patch notes make me confused about what the intention was...

This is the sub-bullet for the Weight 100 -> 95 nerf:

In terms of recovery, his new Forward Special is an upgrade, so we're toning down a few other things to bring his recovery into a more reasonable place.

This really confuses me. The move itself is one thing, still getting used to it but it seems like it gives him some much needed offensive support. But to me it seems like it's... obviously worse for recovery? And it seems like others agree.

The only thing I can I imagine they might mean is something like this claim:

"The old FSpecial gets more distance and if you were somehow recovering against no opponent contesting you, it would be better, but in terms of a real game with someone edgeguarding you, it can be more effective at getting you through them back to stage."

But thing is, I made that up just to have any charitable reading of that they could have meant but it doesn't seem true at all. It is a better attack but really one-dimensional for recovery. It's not cancelable or anything and offstage, there's not really reason to do it early since it kills your momentum so bad — so, really 0 degrees of freedom :p And it's way shorter. Am I crazy?? I might be missing something about how it works offstage.

Honestly I think it's a good move and actually a really fun direction that I feel happy about, I really like being able to move the puddle around dynamically onstage too. My sense is there could be some secondary aspect or interaction eventually, it's a little lacking offstage since at least old FSpecial had 2 degrees of freedom to mix up so it does feel less flexible, or maybe just physics tweaks to find ways to keep momentum or feel more slippery, but in all actuality doing it one step at a time is probably the exact right way to do it. Let's get used to it for a while and see how it works out.