For the record, I want to put my chips in supporting the cosmetic changes. The cosmetic changes look very professional and work to differentiate Brawl+ from vBrawl, especially when you say, take it to a convention or another open game outing. Hell, if it were me, I would put even MORE cosmetic changes in. I love the fact that stages come up as their replaced counterparts and that we get a new strap screen and title screen, but I would go the full monty (if you guys have time of course). I.E. I would change handicap on/off in the options to buffer on/off. I would (if at all possible) also make the stages show up as their replacements in the options screens (Such as music and random stage select). I would do my best to make this look like a professional patch, because honestly, it just makes people take the whole project more seriously.
Case and point, Brawl+ at conventions. I took a build with no graphical changes to a con gaming room, and the overwhelming reaction was "oh, is this that mod that was made becuase tourney ***s were whining". Afterward I took a build with the graphical changes (title screen, buffer instead of handicap, so on so forth) and the overwhelming reaction was "this is pretty cool, its nice to know there is a group of people fixing nintendo's mistakes".