Dearie me.
Let me try again in the hopes that if I specifically refute each point you make, you will understand. The homing attack does not make Sonic more accessible. I have played with it enough to say this with confidence. It doesn't solve the problem where Sonic struggles with platforming.
[1] All of the shields work just fine on their own and are designed for use with every character. The Attraction Shield is the only implementation of a homing attack that the developers have found acceptable enough to put in the main game. Giving Sonic the ability would be a net negative.
[2] We just said no to this. We, as in me and several other people who may or may not be actively designing this game and are firmly planted in their decisions. Sonic gets one jump ability and it should stay on jump. What happens if he gets a shield? He loses thok and now his decision making is warped around that. You know what's dumb? Intentionally taking a hit just to get back your speed ability. Also, you have put a double jump, an actually desired ability in platforming, on the same button as the move that will uncontrollably fling Sonic toward whatever the game deems acceptable. I shouldn't have to explain why this is a bad move.
[3] This isn't about the radius, it's about any enemy. Have you tried to homing attack a Snapper? Or a Pyre? Or a Crushtacean? You're more likely to get hit by those than you are to actually hit them. That's a fact. That's what I've observed with
every character with a homing attack. It's bad.
[4] That will give people more reasons to hate this game than they do right now and it'll go back to the problem of getting abilities you didn't ask for when you wanted to use the other option on the same button.
[5] Then why not just argue for the double jump on its own? The homing attack isn't a benefit here. Try having it in Aerial Garden and then have fun getting dragged off course by random flying bees, going straight down to hit monitors and having your progress lost, or hitting springs you didn't mean to and losing all of your momentum.
[6] Whatever.
[7] No it isn't. No other character can situationally lose their mobility just because they're
near a hazard, not even touching it. Rooms full of TNT or exploding mines aren't a problem for Tails, Knuckles, Metal Sonic, or Fang because they don't lose their options. You give Sonic a homing attack and then suddenly he can't have his air dash or double jump without running the risk of flying into them automatically, getting hit and/or dying.
[8] You don't see why it's bad that a basic ability would not be useful in record attack? You think it'd be just fine if Sonic using his ability would cause him to get stopped in place bouncing on one spring for a few extra seconds just to keep moving again?
[9] I can't even respond to this. Refer to anything Mystic has said and then try again.
[10] I've experienced this as every character with a homing attack. It's targeting range borders on being a full 180 degrees in front of Sonic. The reticle will not be on screen and Sonic will move toward it anyway. You can't be mindful of something you can't even see or hear.
Why not just use the triggers for the camera, allowing the face buttons to be used for actions like in most games? Refraining from adding a third action button because some people are used to more eccentric old control setups like that sounds like the "tradition over progress" problem mentioned previously in this thread to me.
Are we going to just shun people for their control setups now? I can't even bind the triggers to the camera because the deadzones in SRB2 are not configured to allow it. The camera will spin endlessly. And if I wanted to use Standard controls comfortably, the best option would be a twinstick setup where I would not have very many buttons left to bind that I can use without the whole thing feeling clumsy. Right now, just Jump and Spin is the maximum.
Or better yet why not consider the fact that adding a third button and systematically changing the whole game just so Sonic could have a toggle on his jump ability is absolutely ridiculous and would probably result in sweeping changes the game doesn't need just to justify that third button outside of playing as Sonic.
And then as for everything else, why is the discussion on how to fix Sonic's jump ability turning into nerfs for Tails and Knuckles? That's not productive, that would be actively detrimental. You're just going to make the overall experience for everyone worse like that. Right now the game is the hardest for just Sonic, out of six total characters. We only need to bring him up, not drag everyone down just to "balance" a primarily single player game, especially now that Ringslinger and Race are considered dead gamemodes.