In my view unless statistical results show that either white or black seems to have a big advantage, all the 10x8 variants are pretty much alike. Once past the opening phase the strategy and particularly the tactics of the games won't be all that different whether you play Gothic, Embassy or any other arrangement with the Marshall and Cardinal pieces. What variant a player prefers will probably just come down to their own personal tastes. Experienced Classical chess players may even prefer something like Janus chess or even Carrera's chess. They are very similar to good old chess and one's previous studies are easier to apply. Other more adventuresome types would probably like the more unique arrays found in Embassy, Gothic or even Grand Chess on a 10x10 board. In these variants you would have a harder time trying to apply variants of classical chess openings.

Some arrays of course will have flaws. One can picture trying to set up something even closer to classical chess like this array: CRNBQKBNRM. However the problem with this array is that when white play 1.f4 black's choices are already somewhat limited. Is he going to defend the a7 pawn which is undefended and already attacked on white' first move or try some other counterattacking idea? Regardless white seems to be already dictating the game. Change this array a little and say make it a game of Marshalls MRNBQKBNRM and maybe the array isn't so bad. The game in fact might be a lot like classical chess. Marshalls like Rooks don't have a big effect early in the game and the openings that develop might not be unlike those in classical chess just with the extra pieces and manouvering room.

It's hard to say if classical chess is quite ready to be supplanted yet, but it would be interesting to see more financial support of possible future alternatives. I guess Janus Chess had money behind it at least at one time and even attracted big name players to play in the events. Is this type of support still going on to any degree?