OK, I believe the following:

1. Characters in Strive are still categorically different from one another.
2. Characters in Plus R are more unique and distinguishable in more ways from one another than characters in Strive.
3. Depth is unrelated to breadth.
4. Accessibility is great.
5. Accessibility does not have to come at the expense of variety, but it can.
6. Cutting down moveset size limits variety, especially when the majority of the moves have legitimate use cases and different from one another, as is the case in Plus R.
7. Limiting variety eliminates knowledge gaps, which limits surprises and upsets; ergo, it makes games more accessible for newcomers.
8. Strive is guilty of implementing accessibility at the expense of variety.

Let me demonstrate this:

Character D can anti-air using moves A, B, and C. Each move is applicable in a different scenario and leads to a different juggle combo.

Character W can anti-air using moves X, Y, and Z. Each move is applicable in a different scenario and leads to a different juggle combo.

If I’m counting differences between these two characters, in terms of how the anti-air and those juggle combos work, specifically the conditions for the antiair to hit, move variety and systems used in the subsequent combo, I have 2 more points of difference than I would if each character just had 1 anti-air move and 1 combo route; ergo, they can be considered less homogenous and more different.

Also, 1 anti-air with 1 route to follow is a lot less for a newbie to deal with, which in turn makes the game more accessible at the expense of variety, but not necessarily at the expense of depth because, at the end of the day, it’s an anti-air and a juggle combo that follows, so not much was lost on that front.