Official Next Smash - Speculation & Discussion Thread

[Diddy Kong]

So here I was criticized for wanting 4 characters from Three Houses , but all other suggestions I see so far are downright terrible.

Marth, Lucina, Ike, those are easily the most popular and iconic characters in the franchise. They stay, Byleth stays too and gets magic in their moveset to justify cutting Robin, and gets a moveset that keeps the "ranged demon" play style but all done with the Sword of the Creator. Edelgard, Dimitri and Claude as unique characters, as they're hugely popular too. I'd like to include Chrom back, but there's no doing so without also bringing back Roy. Unless they can make Chrom a Marth / Ike hyrbid as he was meant to. In which case, do that, and make Lucina HIS Echo.

I could play nice and say, yeah let's make Robin DLC, and give them a Grima alt and make Grima a stage. I'd love to, but that's bringing up another problem; "tOo MuCh fIrE eMbLeM ".

But honestly, cutting iconic characters as Ike for Elincia, Lyon, Tiki, Azura or Celica doesn't doesn't do it. You can have all the uniqueness Fire Emblem has to offer with the house leaders. Only character suggested so far I don't think is a terrible idea is Lyn. And she'd make most sense with Roy still there.

So to be more generous I propose;

Marth
Ike
Chrom (reworked)
Lucina (Chrom Echo)
Byleth (reworked to use canon abilities)
Edelgard
Dimitri
Claude

+Robin as DLC with Grima alt and a Grima stage. They're now slightly reworked to be more of a fully Mage fighter and no durability gimmick.

 

[Pink Yoshi]

No Ike makes Suco sad cause that's my main.=(

This but with Corrin, he's my best dragon boi. But the sad thing is I do think he'd be one of the most likely cuts in a future Smash game. The Fates era is behind us and with the negative response to Corrin, I can totally see Sakurai deciding to remove the poor guy...

 

[Gengar84]

So here I was criticized for wanting 4 characters from Three Houses , but all other suggestions I see so far are downright terrible.

Marth, Lucina, Ike, those are easily the most popular and iconic characters in the franchise. They stay, Byleth stays too and gets magic in their moveset to justify cutting Robin, and gets a moveset that keeps the "ranged demon" play style but all done with the Sword of the Creator. Edelgard, Dimitri and Claude as unique characters, as they're hugely popular too. I'd like to include Chrom back, but there's no doing so without also bringing back Roy. Unless they can make Chrom a Marth / Ike hyrbid as he was meant to. In which case, do that, and make Lucina HIS Echo.

I could play nice and say, yeah let's make Robin DLC, and give them a Grima alt and make Grima a stage. I'd love to, but that's bringing up another problem; "tOo MuCh fIrE eMbLeM ".

But honestly, cutting iconic characters as Ike for Elincia, Lyon, Tiki, Azura or Celica doesn't doesn't do it. You can have all the uniqueness Fire Emblem has to offer with the house leaders. Only character suggested so far I don't think is a terrible idea is Lyn. And she'd make most sense with Roy still there.

So to be more generous I propose;

Marth
Ike
Chrom (reworked)
Lucina (Chrom Echo)
Byleth (reworked to use canon abilities)
Edelgard
Dimitri
Claude

+Robin as DLC with Grima alt and a Grima stage. They're now slightly reworked to be more of a fully Mage fighter and no durability gimmick.

To be fair, I wouldn’t be upset with the house leaders. I don’t like Byleth because I’m not a fan of silent avatars in general but I understand why they’re in. I actually really like Edelgard and Dimitri so I’d be pretty happy with this even if I think it’s too much representation from one game. I wasn’t trying to say your idea was horrible. Sorry if I gave you that impression.

 

[Sucumbio]

Black Knight AT upgrade imo .. I can get behind a Tiki upgrade too now that I think about it.

 

[chocolatejr9]

So here I was criticized for wanting 4 characters from Three Houses , but all other suggestions I see so far are downright terrible.

Marth, Lucina, Ike, those are easily the most popular and iconic characters in the franchise. They stay, Byleth stays too and gets magic in their moveset to justify cutting Robin, and gets a moveset that keeps the "ranged demon" play style but all done with the Sword of the Creator. Edelgard, Dimitri and Claude as unique characters, as they're hugely popular too. I'd like to include Chrom back, but there's no doing so without also bringing back Roy. Unless they can make Chrom a Marth / Ike hyrbid as he was meant to. In which case, do that, and make Lucina HIS Echo.

I could play nice and say, yeah let's make Robin DLC, and give them a Grima alt and make Grima a stage. I'd love to, but that's bringing up another problem; "tOo MuCh fIrE eMbLeM ".

But honestly, cutting iconic characters as Ike for Elincia, Lyon, Tiki, Azura or Celica doesn't doesn't do it. You can have all the uniqueness Fire Emblem has to offer with the house leaders. Only character suggested so far I don't think is a terrible idea is Lyn. And she'd make most sense with Roy still there.

So to be more generous I propose;

Marth
Ike
Chrom (reworked)
Lucina (Chrom Echo)
Byleth (reworked to use canon abilities)
Edelgard
Dimitri
Claude

+Robin as DLC with Grima alt and a Grima stage. They're now slightly reworked to be more of a fully Mage fighter and no durability gimmick.

Wait, you said it doesn't DOESN'T do it. That's a double negative: that means it DOES do it!

 

[Pink Yoshi]

Regarding Three Houses...I'm pretty happy with just Byleth myself. S/he represents the game and weapons within rather splendidly, and I'm not just saying that cause s/he's a secondary of mine.

I'm pretty chill with whatever combination of FE representation we get. I just hope we get Grima somehow or someway, that'd make me one happy dragon fan.

 

[fogbadge]

Regarding Three Houses...I'm pretty happy with just Byleth myself. S/he represents the game and weapons within rather splendidly, and I'm not just saying that cause s/he's a secondary of mine.

I'm pretty chill with whatever combination of FE representation we get. I just hope we get Grima somehow or someway, that'd make me one happy dragon fan.

yeah but the way byleth is only represents 3 out of 4 paths

 

[Pink Yoshi]

yeah but the way byleth is only represents 3 out of 4 paths

D'oh...not gonna lie, I forget about that 4th path on a regular basis.

 

[Gengar84]

D'oh...not gonna lie, I forget about that 4th path on a regular basis.

Which path do you forget about?

 

[Pink Yoshi]

Which path do you forget about?

I haven't played Three Houses, but the ones I remember most regularly are the titular Three Houses focused on Dimirti, Claude and Edelgard. I tend to forget about the path that isn't focused on any of those as much.

 

[fogbadge]

I haven't played Three Houses, but the ones I remember most regularly are the titular Three Houses focused on Dimirti, Claude and Edelgard. I tend to forget about the path that isn't focused on any of those as much.

and that’s the one that was there from the start

 

[Gengar84]

I haven't played Three Houses, but the ones I remember most regularly are the titular Three Houses focused on Dimirti, Claude and Edelgard. I tend to forget about the path that isn't focused on any of those as much.

The DLC path with the underground students? I don’t really know much about that one either. As far as I know, there are no other paths, other than a branching path for Edelgard’s route.

 

[Diddy Kong]

To be fair, I wouldn’t be upset with the house leaders. I don’t like Byleth because I’m not a fan of silent avatars in general but I understand why they’re in. I actually really like Edelgard and Dimitri so I’d be pretty happy with this even if I think it’s too much representation from one game. I wasn’t trying to say your idea was horrible. Sorry if I gave you that impression.

You didn't give me that impression, if anything you gave your own idea and came close lat to agreeing to me.

Yes Edelgard and Dimitri would make the most sense, but you cannot exclude Byleth if you include them, and then why NOT also go for Claude? You'd be cool with 3, but not 4 characters of Three Houses then? I don't see why just one more character would be such an offense, given all characters are unique and the Fire Emblem roster isn't too bloated.

 

[Gengar84]

You didn't give me that impression, if anything you gave your own idea and came close lat to agreeing to me.

Yes Edelgard and Dimitri would make the most sense, but you cannot exclude Byleth if you include them, and then why NOT also go for Claude? You'd be cool with 3, but not 4 characters of Three Houses then? I don't see why just one more character would be such an offense, given all characters are unique and the Fire Emblem roster isn't too bloated.

I’m cool with Claude, he’s just my least favorite of the House leaders but I have nothing against him. I’m completely indifferent to Byleth. I don’t like or dislike them at all, the same as I feel for most avatar characters. If all four got in Smash, I’d be mostly okay with it, I’d just find it a bit weird and I do love lots of characters from other Fire Emblem games starting with Path of Radiance.

 

[fogbadge]

The DLC path with the underground students? I don’t really know much about that one either. As far as I know, there are no other paths, other than a branching path for Edelgard’s route.

the branching path is clearly the one they’re referring to

 

[Pink Yoshi]

I've always been nicer on Smash's FE rep than most to be honest. But I do get why others consider it over-represented. I do feel like other series like Zelda, Kirby, Sonic etc should probably get reps themselves before Sakurai goes any harder on FE reps than he already has, at least without cuts.

Honestly, I'd say one more FE rep would be perfect, and it should be a villain. With how many reps FE has, the lack of an outright antagonist is...bizarre to say the least. Most people say it should be the Black Knight, but y'all know what villain I want

Also I don't care for how FE's series icon in Smash is a sword, I think it should be...y'know, the literal Fire Emblem

 

[Gengar84]

the branching path is clearly the one they’re referring to

Oh, I thought there might have been a completely different path that even I was unaware of. I was always disappointed in how little they explained “Those that slither in the dark”. I always hoped there was a secret path where you could use a the house leaders and fight against them once you cleared all the main paths. Sadly, I only ever beat Dimitri’s path and half of Edelgard’s.

 

[Sucumbio]

I haven't played Three Houses, but the ones I remember most regularly are the titular Three Houses focused on Dimirti, Claude and Edelgard. I tend to forget about the path that isn't focused on any of those as much.

I played 3H for a day and a half before realizing I hated it. I'm literally stuck in gaming. Before the WiiU I had a healthy attachment to Franchises other than Smash.

WiiU was such a fn turd I literally owned 2 games and only played Smash.

Switch on the other hand has gotten tons of money from our family because it's portable and ofc Smash Ultimate.

But tbh WiiU ruined me on gaming. I played tons of games besides Smash and with alacrity but since Smash 4, the feelings fade after a day or two and I drop it which angers me... Sometimes greatly because lot of these titles aren't cheap.

Anyway the point is, with regard to FE, since the Wii game Radiant Dawn and it's immediate predecessor on GameCube there hasn't been an offering that kept my interest. It's frustrating because I know that it's partially due to Smash taking up what little gaming time I have, but it's also that I don't like the direction the series went after the Tellius games with the only exception being FEH, which I stopped playing because it was interfering with work lol.

 

[Speed Weed]

I think they should cut every FE rep we have and add Oliver

 

[Sucumbio]

Can he have his pet heron?

 

[PeridotGX]

Here's my go at redoing the Fire Emblem roster, because that's the trend

• Marth (gotta have Marth)
• Chrom (one Marth Clone seems reasonable enough, and Chrom is the most unique)
• Hector (FE7 brought the series out of Japan, and Hector used axes (cool))
• Black Knight (the only villain anyone gives a **** about. Plays simmilar but not identically to Ike)
• Robin (maybe slightly changed to use more magic)
• Dimitri (I'm pretty sure he's the most popular 3H lord in Japan, and he uses a lance)

Cutting Ike was tough, but I really wanted a villain, BK's the only FE villain that's remotely popular, and I didn't want to double up too much (Awakening gets a pass because it's the most popular game and one character is a clone).

 

[Sucumbio]

I will switch to Marth in Ike's absence (they're my 2 most used chrs since Melee.) BK would definitely entice me to keep Marth as a 2nd and try to main him, and I would personally prefer it his kit were more like his AT but not an upgrade like Dark Samus got... They're canonically different types of fighters which is why Ike can beat him (barely) and Greil would have wiped the floor with him but for his injury. They made his AT well by including his enchanted armor and Alondite. The ridiculous fast swings have similar arcs to Ike but come out much faster and have stupid high dmg. But he moves about as fast as a tank being pushed by ants which is totally his style. He's a come at me fighter so they're going to take much into consideration hopefully.

 

[fogbadge]

Oh, I thought there might have been a completely different path that even I was unaware of. I was always disappointed in how little they explained “Those that slither in the dark”. I always hoped there was a secret path where you could use a the house leaders and fight against them once you cleared all the main paths. Sadly, I only ever beat Dimitri’s path and half of Edelgard’s.

you only take them on properly in the other two paths with both of them having you take on their home base and in verdant wind they revive nemisiss the true villain of the game and to me it feels like the real final boss as if they were expecting you to do verdant wind last

 

[Ivander]

The only change I would make to the FE Roster is maybe take out Roy and Chrom and putting in Lyn in exchange to make this:
-Marth/Lucina
-Lyn
-Ike
-Robin
-Corrin
-Byleth

But otherwise, I'm okay with the FE choices. And taking out Robin and Corrin just feels like taking out the parts of Fire Emblem people want to see in Smash Bros. People would like to see more representing of Fire Emblem than just swords and blue-ish haired protagonists. Robin has Magic and Weapon Durability and Corrin is a Manakete/Dragon that can actually use their dragon powers outside of their dragon form compared to other Manaketes.
Taking those out just to add more popular characters or a character with another physical weapon like an axe or spear and nothing else to stand them out from the other FE characters? That sounds like the opposite of what people want to see from Fire Emblem characters. A character having an axe or spear they wield with one or two hands does not suddenly make them more interesting than the character using a sword they wield with one or two hands.

 

[ALongWistfulSquiggle]

When it comes to Claude, I would just prefer a different archer. It's nothing against the guy, but the only unique things he'd bring over other archers are a penchant for poison that has no gameplay significance and a wyvern that probably wouldn't make it into his moveset.

I'm in a bit of a wait-and-see mode when it comes to FE in the next Smash. The next FE could get a new lord who is super interesting gameplay-wise, or we could get someone super basic. And that's going to change a lot of people's outlook on how the franchise should be represented moving forward. Is the character different enough to stand alongside the current roster? Does the new lord replace an older, similar character? Do they coexist or become a clone? Is it so bad that we'd rather go back and dig up an old character like Lyn?

Just based on what we know right now and my own penchant for gameplay focus first (and some other biases), I'd go something like:

Marth
Ike
Lyn
Robin
Byleth

Oh, I thought there might have been a completely different path that even I was unaware of. I was always disappointed in how little they explained “Those that slither in the dark”. I always hoped there was a secret path where you could use a the house leaders and fight against them once you cleared all the main paths. Sadly, I only ever beat Dimitri’s path and half of Edelgard’s.

The slitherers definitely get the Dark Souls lore treatment. They do get more explanation in Claude's route, though. That's the route with the biggest piece to the puzzle, and then their role in the other routes falls into place. There's also some helpful but possibly sketchy info in the underground DLC area. At least that was my experience. I played Silver Snow -> Azure Moon ->Verdant Wind -> Crimson Flower. By the time I got to Edelgard's route I was like, "girl, you need to go to a therapist and then to the library."

Here's my go at redoing the Fire Emblem roster, because that's the trend

• Marth (gotta have Marth)
• Chrom (one Marth Clone seems reasonable enough, and Chrom is the most unique)
• Hector (FE7 brought the series out of Japan, and Hector used axes (cool))
• Black Knight (the only villain anyone gives a **** about. Plays simmilar but not identically to Ike)
• Robin (maybe slightly changed to use more magic)
• Dimitri (I'm pretty sure he's the most popular 3H lord in Japan, and he uses a lance)

Cutting Ike was tough, but I really wanted a villain, BK's the only FE villain that's remotely popular, and I didn't want to double up too much (Awakening gets a pass because it's the most popular game and one character is a clone).

To be fair, Hector and Ike would probably play similarly.

 

[SPEN18]

My thoughts on the FE roster have been made known before around here, but:

I don't think the FE roster needs a radical upheaval. Some of the clones can be cut, and I've advocated for Lyn quite a lot. After that, it's basically a matter of figuring out what to do with Corrin. On one hand Fates was one of the more commercially and critically successful games in the series, and on the other it's a highly controversial game with Corrin him/herself probably the least popular pick out of the FE uniques in terms of people wanting them to stay on for future installments. You also might consider qualifying Fates' commercial success with the circumstances of its release: it very much rode Awakening's waves. While I think Corrin could be one of the less controversial cuts that could happen, the situation is not completely straightforward.

As for Tiki, Anna, Celica, Black Knight, even Hector: while they all have their own merits and unique aspects, they're a clear cut below the ones we already have (and Lyn) in terms of importance to the series. None of them are as popular as Ike or Lyn, either, and those two are the ones that I think could most reasonably get in based on the mixture of legacy and popularity among the possible "pre-Awakening, non-Marth" reps. I can elaborate further on these also if prompted.

With the House leaders, it is a tricky situation but more than one rep from TH seems like too much. You have to consider the rest of the roster besides just the single series when it comes to situations like these, where one is considering doubling up on one-offs from the same game. Based on the marketing and overall plot relevance, I think it comes down to Byleth or Edelgard, with Dimitri a step below them and Claude another step below that (I say this as someone whose House of choice was BL).

TLDR, I think it should look something like this:
Marth
Lyn
Ike
Robin
Byleth
maybe Corrin and/or an Echo, but not as essentially as the five above

 

[Ivander]

I'm in a bit of a wait-and-see mode when it comes to FE in the next Smash. The next FE could get a new lord who is super interesting gameplay-wise, or we could get someone super basic. And that's going to change a lot of people's outlook on how the franchise should be represented moving forward. Is the character different enough to stand alongside the current roster? Does the new lord replace an older, similar character? Do they coexist or become a clone? Is it so bad that we'd rather go back and dig up an old character like Lyn?

I mean, part of the reason Lyn is brought up is because of her immense popularity. In the first Choose Your Legends where Fire Emblem fans treated it very seriously, Lyn actually beat Lucina in popularity and was the Number 1 Most Voted Female character, with Ike being the Number 1 Most Voted Male character. She is legitimately a very popular character and so far one of the few that is not in Smash as a playable character, as the other 3 Voted characters are all in Smash Bros. being Ike, Roy and Lucina.
The other reason that alot of people are hoping for is the possibility of a Fire Emblem 7(Lyn's game) Remake giving her the chance to get in Smash. Some of the Fire Emblem developers have mentioned that they want to do Fire Emblem 6(Roy's game) and both FE6 and 7 are connected. Quite a bunch of us are hoping they do a Fire Emblem 6/7 Dual-remake that connects the two games more easily and deals with some of the notable issues that could be fixed by making both into one game.
But that aside, Sakurai has mentioned that timing is a big part of choosing characters for Smash Bros and what some of us are hoping for is a Fire Emblem 7 Remake being made and released at the right timing where it allows Sakurai to consider upgrading Lyn from an Assist Trophy to a playable character.
---
And who knows if the Lord of the next game will get in. We don't know when the next Smash Bros. will come out. For Pokemon, Gen 4 and Gen 6 got in before Gen 3 and Gen 5 and already we're getting Gen 9 so soon. We could get two main Fire Emblem games before the next Smash Bros. comes out.

 

[SPEN18]

The other reason that alot of people are hoping for is the possibility of a Fire Emblem 7(Lyn's game) Remake giving her the chance to get in Smash. Some of the Fire Emblem developers have mentioned that they want to do Fire Emblem 6(Roy's game) and both FE6 and 7 are connected. Quite a bunch of us are hoping they do a Fire Emblem 6/7 Dual-remake that connects the two games more easily and deals with some of the notable issues that could be fixed by making both into one game.

I'll just add to this that combining FE6 and FE7 into one game is a controversial idea within the fanbase, as I have seen people both passionately in favor of and vehemently against the concept.

Personally, I'd take it either way, combined or separate.

 

[RodNutTakin]

All I know is my gut is saying the next Smash's FE lineup is going to look like this:
-Marth
-Lucina echo
-Ike
-Robin
-Byleth
-The latest FE protagonist in the spotlight when SSB6 comes out

I don't know if that leak has been disproven or not yet, but if it's real, would the Aquafresh toothpase-looking lady from those FE17/18 leaks be someone you'd mind getting in? They'd look more distinct than most of the other characters at least

 

[Ivander]

I'll just add to this that combining FE6 and FE7 into one game is a controversial idea within the fanbase, as I have seen people both passionately in favor of and vehemently against the concept.

Personally, I'd take it either way, combined or separate.

Well, one I want both into one game just to be able to put the FE7 characters in as characters you can find and recruit, and not have most of them just die for continuity reasons. Two would be to bring the Parent/Child system back and give some extra lines for the story and the hope of mankind and dragonkind living together if Roy is Eliwood and Ninian's child. And third would be adding a story in-between FE6/FE7 to give Zephiel some better reasoning why he loses faith in all of humanity.

Some other bonuses would be making Mark an actual character with their own backstory and whatnot, adding in the Fire Emblem 6 manga characters in as actual characters, and giving the Fire Dragon final boss of Fire Emblem 7 an actual identity.

 

[SPEN18]

I don't know if that leak has been disproven or not yet, but if it's real, would the Aquafresh toothpase-looking lady from those FE17/18 leaks be someone you'd mind getting in? They'd look more distinct than most of the other characters at least

Afaik Toothpaste leak has not been confirmed or debunked. In general, with these newer characters I think we should wait until the game actually comes out before making judgments.

 

[Swamp Sensei]

I can safely say that this thread is filled with terrible Fire Emblem rosters.

Honestly I prefer what we have now, lots of echoes and all, over some of these suggestions.

 

[TCT~Phantom]

FE representation does not need a radical shift.

I know that to this day this site has a vendetta against clones, but honestly the FE clones are some of the most cost effective in the roster. We have 4 popular characters that spawned from one moveset. Roy is super popular with Smash fans and is easy enough to make as a Marth semi clone. Honestly, the luigification of Roy in 4 and to a greater extend Ultimate was a complete success imo. Roy, while still having a fair bit of DNA shared with marth, now has his moveset finally fulfill that niche of being an aggro swordsman. Lucina and Chrom are imo the model of what to do with an echo fighter. You have a clear difference in gameplay and playstyle from one simple change, allowing for another cool character to make it into the game while also letting them ease on resources.

The unique reps beyond Marth also imo are all successes in terms of what new ideas and gameplay they bring to the table. Ike, rather than playing into the lithe, elegant, nimble swordplay of a traditional lord like Marth does focuses on something different. You have the Mercenary/Hero style in FE where Ike takes some direct inspiration from, but more importantly you get something Smash did not have at that point: a dedicated swordsman who was focused on pure power. Robin meanwhile is an obvious case of implementing the series' magic system into a moveset, while also toying with the idea of weapon durability. Corrin shows off transformations like Manaketes or Beastkin. Byleth attempts to show off the weapons triangle. The unique reps of FE all show off interesting ideas in terms of FE's gameplay much more than the very barebones criticism of lords with swords and counters.

I have seen people talk about cutting FE characters due to relevancy in the past, and to be honest this is a pretty baseless criticism as a whole imo. First off, plenty of characters that people like in Smash have not been relevant for a long time. You have obvious examples like K Rool or Banjo who got in due to their raw fan demand, but even in the roster plenty of Nintendo franchises are not currently as active as Fire Emblem and get none of the flack. But I feel Fire Emblem gets this extra criticism because it has this rotating cast. That being said, I think people are willfully ignorant of the theming that each FE newcomer gets that more or less helps future proof them a bit. As I said above, every unique newcomer since Brawl represents something that is a recurring element or theme in Fire Emblem. While you may not see Ike or Corrin again, you will see manaketes or heavy swordsmen. The only exception are the Marth clones, of which Roy has been decloned a lot and sells a different fantasy and Lucina and Chrom are popular characters who take the role of an echo in stride to offer a slightly different experience. FE will more or less always have a rotating cast for the foreseeable future. You will have characters like Corrin who will end up not being exactly a beacon of modern Fire Emblem. But does that really matter? It has not so far. On the other hand, you have people who want to radically change FE's representation with anywhere from 2-3 newcomers or reworked veterans and I think that is even more unrealistic. For starters, making a new character takes a ton of resources. Replacing 2-3 Fire Emblem characters with "better" picks is going to take a lot of time and resources at the end of the day, when you could just make two non FE characters and bring back vets.

The Fire Emblem representation next game, more likely than not pending a whole reboot of the series (which for so many reasons I doubt ), is gonna be our Ultimate roster sans maybe Corrin, and our new Lord to show off something cool and unique. Would I like Lyn or Dimitri or Edelgard or Michiah? Sure, but I am not gonna waste my breath expecting a fantasy. We have had FE newcomer discussion in three games now, we know how this series and Pokemon works.

 

[Opossum]

Of course I bring Byleth, they're the main character and still decently popular. Not having Claude, but having Edelgard and Dimitri would just be wrong. And you seem to overlook what they offer in terms of their moveset alone. Also, Awakening had 3 characters. Sure two are Echoes, but that's beside the point.

All four are main characters. Having all three House Leaders present makes Byleth redundant on such a limited roster. But even beyond that, if it were a case where Edelgard and Dimitri were present but Claude was not, there would be a reasonable hypothetical explanation: Claude's canon Timeskip class being a Wyvern Master, a bow centric unit atop a fairly massive wyvern. I love Claude. He's easily my second favorite of the House Leaders. But considering he's over all the least popular of the three, the timeskip versions of the characters are by far the most popular variants, and a fully dismounted Claude neglects a very unique aspect about him while Edelgard's Armored Lord and Dimitri's High Lord classes are perfectly doable, Claude has plausible deniability. It's sad, but true. That's not to say he can't work, but he'd easily require the most work of the three by far.

Also, Chrom and Lucina being Echo Fighters is not "beside the point." In fact, it perfectly illustrates the point. Awakening has so far been the only Fire Emblem game to receive more than one character, but only Robin is a fully unique character. You can't feasibly make any of the House Leaders Echo Fighters.

Moveset potential isn't a good enough reason to do all of this when, again, you end up ignoring most of the franchise in favor of a single game in the process.

Ocarina of Time also had 5 characters in Melee, Pokemon's first generation has 6 full characters and even if you count Pokemon Trainer as one (which you shouldn't) that's 4, and the first Donkey Kong Country has 3 characters even.

It comes down to this, the most influential game in the franchise gets the most characters. And Three Houses is just that. Sure it's much, but you get the most popular characters in the franchise, and 4 unique movesets to boot.

This bit is willfully ignorant of what is actually going on in your examples. The Legend of Zelda keeps a fairly static cast, and at the time of Melee only had like six games. And again, Ganondorf and Young Link were last minute clones used as roster padding, and Zelda and Sheik were a package set at the time due to their switching mechanic. It's completely irrelevant to what you are suggesting here. The Donkey Kong Country example is even more asinine. The series keeps an ENTIRELY static cast for the most part. You don't have a new main protagonist in every ****ing Donkey Kong game.

And Pokémon is arguably an even more ridiculous point of comparison. It is literally the largest single media franchise on the planet. By all reasonable means, it is an outlier and should not be considered the norm. Any random person off the street, when asked, will know who Pikachu, Charizard, and Mewtwo are, more than likely. They've transcended the medium and became icons of popular culture itself. Fire Emblem, meanwhile, is still firmly in the realm of video games alone.

I also like to see your source that Edelgard is the most popular, as far as I'm concerned, Dimitri is the most popular of the House leaders. His route is also the longest and has been shown the most love, both in Houses and Hopes. It's also the most traditional Fire Emblem of the three paths.

Most of what you said here is entirely irrelevant (lmao, route length as a measurement of character popularity? Not to mention Dimitri's route in Hopes tends to get heavily criticized for spoiler reasons I won't get into). Here are some facts instead.

The in-game usage statistics taken from roughly six months after the game launched (in other words, the period of time where the most amount of people were playing the game) showed that Edelgard was the second most deployed unit in the game, second only to Dorothea, another member of (what do you know) the Black Eagles.

In Heroes, whenever an A Hero Rises event takes place, usually the most requested free units are particularly meta defining and limited characters...with two exceptions: Edelgard and Dimitri, who had their base, brave, and fallen variants reach the top echelon of voting. This is a testament to both of their popularity levels. However, Edelgard always ranked considerably higher.

Finally, and most damningly, is Choose Your Legends. Some folks like to pretend this doesn't matter. However, it objectively does, as there are no fewer than two occasions where the results impacted things outside of Heroes. Namely, which Three Houses characters got Pop-up Parade figures (it's no coincidence that the six chosen were the House Leaders and then the most voted members of each respective house: Bernadetta, Felix, and Lysithea), and which formerly playable characters were excluded from Three Hopes (again, it's absolutely not a coincidence that Hanneman, Alois, Cyril, Anna, and Gilbert were the only ones cut when they were also the bottom five Three Houses characters on CYL). And in Choose Your Legends, Edelgard scored significantly higher in sheer vote count than Dimitri (who was second place) at a time when all then-currently-existing Three Houses characters were on the table for voting.

Every official source points to Edelgard being the most popular of the three. Being controversial does not diminish popularity...especially because if it did, it would affect Dimitri as well, who's also incredibly controversial.

 

[fogbadge]

I just want them to stop adding in the boring FE characters

 

[LiveStudioAudience]

Its times like this I wonder if there are any clueless parents who awkwardly attempt to relate to their kids by asking about SSB inclusions.

"Hey son, do you think that Fire Emblem will be in that next Smash Brothers game; he seems pretty cool to me."

 

[KatKit]

Personally, my most wanted Fire Emblem newcomer is and will always be Anna. Aside from that, I think Smash will add the protagonist from whatever the new game will be, but hypothetically speaking, if they don't have the time to include them in the base roster, I'd love if we got Shez instead, and then they just add the new protagonist as DLC

 

[Swamp Sensei]

The real troubling thing is... aside from Corrin, none of the Fire Emblem characters have good reasons to be cut aside from "there's so many," or "echo" and that can be countered by saying, "yeah but they're super popular."

Marth, Roy, Ike, Lucina, Chrom and Byleth are all CYL winners, meaning they're among the most popular Fire Emblem characters period. So that alone should be proof. Robin is very close and has remained around the top ten for a while now. They're often speculated to be winners in the near future (especially since Awakening fans got Chrom and Tiki in). Corrin's female version is surprisingly popular (staying in the top ten) but the male version is actually unpopular (while both versions of Robin and Byleth score rather highly). So it's not like Corrin is unpopular but they are a step below the others.

You could argue that echoes could easily be cut and yeah I could agree, but being an echo is also their greatest strength. Ease of development and putting in "extras" has always been a priority in Smash. So I don't think Chrom and Lucina are dead in the water.

As for Roy? He just isn't an echo. Unless you count Falco, Luigi, Isabelle, Lucas etc. as echoes which then I'd agree. Roy has been a semi-clone for a while and I'd argue semi-clones are always unique enough to be kept on gameplay merits. Roy has also always been intended to be kept having data for Brawl and straight up being brought back for 4. Unless you absolutely gut the roster, I can't think of a logical reason to cut Roy.

Corrin is the only cut that seems logical to me. The rest have too many reasons to stay or the reasons to leave are too circumstancial. But Corrin being significantly less popular is pretty damning.

Fire Emblem additions are probably going to stick to the newest games (hope you like toothpaste). I'd love characters like Lyn, Tiki or Black Knight but let's be realistic. Unless they get a lucky break like Chrom having an echo opportunity, they won't be getting in.

And there especially won't be cuts to justify their inclusion.

 

[SPEN18]

The real troubling thing is... aside from Corrin, none of the Fire Emblem characters have good reasons to be cut aside from "there's so many," or "echo" and that can be countered by saying, "yeah but they're super popular."

The thing, though, is that there doesn't necessarily have to be an explicit reason to cut them. They might just be low priority, which can happen with basically any clone (which you seemed to acknowledge to an extent, but here I'm reiterating the strength of the point). In Roy's case, we have a (largely) JP-only, non-relevant clone with a history of low priority (though I guess potentially being a package deal with Chrom might help save him). As much as you might say there's little reason to cut them, there also might be limited upside to keeping them, as evaluated on a case-by-case basis (and it's not like I'd totally discard the "there's so many of them" argument, anyway, especially not when Sakurai himself has commented on it). In this case, I think the franchise is represented well enough with a slight shave-down from what we have now, and I say that as a longtime supporter for more FE reps dating back to Brawl.

Clones, straight-up, aren't strictly necessary at this point given the roster size we're at. This isn't Melee anymore (thankfully). And on top of that, these characters are still competing with potential Echo/clone candidates from other franchises. While again there is not much of a hard statement on the resource differential between newcomers and vets, it stands to reason that the difference in work between vet clones and newcomer clones is even smaller than in the unique case, since the whole point of the clones is that they're easier to add in general. Even if you just look at vets, I'd personally still put Daisy and Dark Samus above the FE clones (and I'd also rather put more effort into making those more semicloney than include more FE clones).

While there are people who actively want more variations of the same moveset, I am not in that crowd, especially when much of the pro-clone crowd IMO tends to underestimate the work that gets put into even the filler roster spots. Every character, vet or no, clone or no, is hard-fought for during the dev process and nobody can or should get in without considering that cost.

To be clear, I'm not saying that there should be no clones at all; I just see little benefit from them unless they're characters who could justifiably make it in as uniques, with their cloneability simply allowing them to get in with minimal effort.

The popularity of the FE clones I don't really disagree with and it may help any or all of them to stay. But that's not the only thing to consider, nor is it an auto-retain for anyone. "They're super popular" is not an autokill for any counterargument because that's never been how things work, not even for uniques like Mewtwo.

I'd love characters like Lyn, Tiki or Black Knight but let's be realistic.

To be fair I don't recall a moment where I ever really expected Lyn to get in, but hey, I'll continue to argue in favor of a character if they're one of my picks. Me asking for Lyn is irrespective of likelihood.

 

[AlRex]

I mean, I have my unpopular/weird idea (though I've seen the latter idea mentioned a few times) that the next "Smash" type game should be less of a traditional Smash and more of either "Nintendo VS Everyone Else In Gaming" or "Nintendo VS [insert whichever VG company that makes sense here]", at which point, I think Fire Emblem would be extremely lucky to get two or three characters there, but that's a completely bonkers/separate situation entirely.