Vanilla wow was created and designed at a time when the only thought was putting out a cool game for people to play. Outland came about as an internal project both pitted against and developed in conjunction with the release of vanilla.
Blizzard was actively seeking a replacement game for Wow, due to the massively unfinished nature of Vanilla. If you think it’s a ‘completed game experience’ well that’s Blizzard Marketing for you.
Basically, some large % of the game was never even started for vanilla. Much of it was moved to TBC and the design of moving everyone to a new place, adding new level cap, new items more powerful than anything else before it… the WORST aspects of this game, was done as a byproduct of ‘TBC is ready for launch.’
It had nothing to do with intentional design in any capacity, and the haphazard nature of early Blizzard, especially during Wow’s early days, nearly prevented the game from being developed at all. Every aspect of the game you regard as ‘meticulously hand-crafted for a perfect online play experience’ is actually just ‘what Blizzard devs were able to cobble together in time for release.’
That whole design-by-committee approach everyone loathes and no one at blizzard will acknowledge as bad, let alone do away with. The Merits of Vanilla wow is that it was MOSTLY a great play experience, despite it being largely haphazard and unfinished. That’s why people gravitate toward Vanilla ERA and ask for those servers.
Because Blizzard just happened to hit a ball deep into left field, long enough for a couple runners to advance. But then the coach saw the team hit the ball into Deep Left and decided to move the entire outfield and shortstop into deep left, released TBC, WOTLK, CATA, MOP, ect, ect. Here we are, on TWW, Blizzard still has half their team in deep left field, anticipating a triple.
Really, what we need is a new coach. Someone who knows how to play baseball, how to get on first, advance to second, and use Deep Left when they want to force a home, rather than it being the only strat they are capable of. Blizzard is the worst baseball team manager in the world, and it shows.
If you want anything to last long term, your best bet is to NOT play a blizzard product, or pick one they themselves have forgotten about (starcraft, Warcraft, you know, the lame stuff).