Ness is not getting cut man, seriously. Not in a scenario like this. It’s especially a bit less defensible if you want to add two brand new Xenoblade characters on top… these series are arguably the same size. Mother’s presence in the game is too significant to handwave away like that - two characters, like four stages, lots of music, items, two ATs…. Losing all of that at once would be extremely arbitrary and unprecedented.
Realistically are we going to part ways with a series with this much content that can and has been brought back every game? Dismissing all that under the guise of “it’s old” is not giving it nearly enough significance or credit. Ness is demonstrably one of the most frequently played characters in the series and EB has only gotten more popular over time. Its absence would be deeply felt and this roster does not commit hard enough to a full scorched earth reboot to justify it. It’s just cutting a series with a massive footprint in Smash because it’s old.
I don’t wanna be too harsh about it and ignore the other ideas here, but I just need to set the record straight on that. If we’re getting a whole 44 characters back then Ness is one of them.
As for the rest, newcomers are decent. I respect the commitment to Rex but I really don’t think it’s going to happen - giving Xenoblade a whopping five characters (Pythra as two) also just makes any full series losses here sting a lot harder. Nook, Chun-Li are exciting and fall within my expectations too. Don’t think Alear is a necessity because Engage‘s success and lasting impact are not particularly strong on its own and the timing doesn’t feel optimal. I’d rather have Robin back.
Xenoblade is something I’m torn on. Do I rather want to indulge the fan demand for Rex after Ultimate ended? He got a new design, and I can see Sakurai looking at him as a potential second character, especially if what I believe is that proposals for a tag-team Noah/Mio moveset fall through.
On the other hand, Sakurai has been shown to relax on spoilers before. We saw this with Ultimate changing Shulk’s Final Smash. Perhaps next time, enough time has passed to let Pneuma have a playable role.
And then there’s just the really versatile position the Xenoblade series is currently in for new faces. Alvis as a Shulk echo, and N as a Noah echo are both scenarios I could also see occurring.
As for the second roster, I didn’t really want to cut all of the older picks. But when the roster gets down below half of all characters, sacrifices have to be made somewhere.
I understand that this is like your opinion/experiment and stuff, but when both rosters have 3 DK characters, I'm really not sure why you removed K. Rool and added Funky? Like Funky is cool and all, but removing one of DK's primary antagonists for another Kong family member feels like if you removed Wolf and replaced him with Slippy.
I know you did remove Wolf on there, but just for example's sake.
I just thought Funky would be a decent consolation pick for the DK series. He seems to be prime clone material, and while a lack of K. Rool can be felt, I didn’t want to completely gut the DK series of all representation.
Plus, he’s an echo for DK. Echoes are naturally going to be lower priority picks for characters who won’t get in otherwise.
Cuts are hard to think about, but K. Rool’s lack of presence in modern DK moved my hand to cut him first over say, Diddy.
Mainly, this roster deals with the changing times we’re living in when it comes to Nintendo. Once prominent faces are now not as big as they once were. New faces have joined the brawl, and that needed to be taken into account.