It's turned from people discussing the aesthetic of sword wielders to a debate if whether or not Roy is a clone of Marth anymore. Because Fire Emblem can never stay out of a thread.
It is because a lot (though not all) of the supposed dislike of swords is really backwards constructed arguments to rationalize a dislike of Fire Emblem (and sometimes Xenoblade). I will pick on a couple of posts on the same page as illustrations of what I mean.
I don't consider any of the Links as primarily sword characters due to their other tools being prevalent.
To seanbean's credit, he acknowledges the likelihood that he dislikes Fire Emblem characters because he has not played their games--something I suspect applies to a lot of the other users as well--, so I do not accuse him of hypocrisy. I merely pick out this portion of the post to illustrate the problem identified.
Link has the 10 moves that do not use his sword:
neutral aerial (flying kick)
back aerial (hook kick)
grab (hand)
forward throw (front kick)
back throw (back kick)
down throw (elbow drop)
neutral special (bow)
side special (boomerang)
down special (bomb)
final smash (light bow)
Young Link and Toon Link have fewer non-sword moves. Both use a sword based final smash. And Toon Link's aerials are sword moves.
Robin has 10 moves that do not use her sword
grab (magic)
forward throw (magic)
back throw (magic)
up throw (magic)
down throw (magic)
neutral special (electricity magic)
side special (fire magic)
up special (wind magic)
down special (dark magic)
final smash (electricity and fire magic)
Not included in this list is that Robin's specials and smashes generate throwable items, which is not directly linked to the normal funciton of the moves. At best the Links merely tie Robin in the number of non-sword moves.
The raw number of non-sword moves is only part of the equation. The other is how they are thematically tied together. Link's non-sword moves consists of 4 tools and moves where he uses parts of his body. Robin's non-sword moves are all magic based: 5 attack spells and 5 magic assisted throws. While Link has a grab bag of non-sword moves, Robin's clearly tie into the theme of a mage. This makes it much more sensible to exclude Robin from the list of swordsmen than it does for Link.
Aesthetically speaking, Link wears a tunic, pants, and boots. He carries a longsword and a shield. He is the platonic ideal of a light swordsman. Robin wears a long coat, carries a book in her left hand, and carries a short sword in the other. Whatever concept that image is supposed to conjure, it certainly is not a typical swordsman. Their animation accentuate this difference. Smash being a cartoon fighter, most of Link's sword moves of course do not correspond to anything practical in real life. But they are powerful slashes and jabs that paint a picture of a confident and skilled swordsman, which is what he is supposed to be in the Zelda games. Robin's slashes and jabs often look weak or awkward, painting the picture of a scholar who happens to carry a sword for self-defense, which again is what she is in Fire Emblem.
Here is an example of giving Link a pass, even though it makes more sense to give Robin a pass on the same grounds.
The whole topic is about Fire Emblem. This was made with the statement that people are aginast sword users in Smash. They aren't. The complaints you hear about Cloud, the Links, Metaknight, and Mii Swordsman rarely boil down to "they're just another sword guy".
People don't have a problem with "just another sowrd guy" they have problems with "generic looking anime knight guy that uses a sword the same way all the other generic anime knight guys use a sword."
Here we can see some other illustrations of bending the categories to bash Fire Emblem.
The first is the use of the term "generic looking anime knight guy". The much more common term is "generic looking anime swordsman". Knight conjures up the image of someone in medium to heavy armor, which would only describe Meta Knight and Corrin (and Link SSB4).
The second is who are supposed to be a "generic looking anime knight guy that uses a sword the same way all the other generic anime knight guys use a sword".
We have Cloud, a spikey haired guy with a shoulder pad and leather gloves, carrying a gigantic two-hander, who swings his sword around in almost all his moves and who sometimes create magical effects by swinging his sword around. Then we have Robin, a twin-tailed girl in a long coat, carrying a short sword in one hand and a book in the other, who casts spells for all her specials and uses lightning shot out of her sword for 40% of her sword moves. And we are supposed to believe that Robin is more accurately described as a "generic looking anime knight guy that uses a sword the same way all the other generic anime knight guys use a sword" than Cloud is? Hardly. And if we use "generic looking anime swordsman", Cloud is among the best poster children for a generic looking anime swordsman, while Robin is more likely to be used for a Dungeons & Dragons character illustration than to represent a generic looking anime swordsman.
You should not be surprised if a topic that is really about why some Smash players really hate Fire Emblem characters to turn into an argument about Fire Emblem characters.
At least you can take comfort in the expectation that in Smash 6 (or wave 2 of the DLCs, if there is one), Shulk, Rex & Pyra would get lumped into the generic anime swordsmen category, even if Rex & Pyra get a unique dual character mechanic.
who only uses it in smashes)
