Originally Posted by
Noctiphobia
Well, perhaps to you those were significant parts of the game, but I really don't see the difference. All that weapon skill did was make you spend some time (once per character) if you played a melee character and dropped a weapon of type that you haven't used yet. Spell ranks were irrelevant for basically anyone besides healers and maybe in PvP mages with rank 1 Frostbolt. The talent system didn't actually bring any value, almost every player who did end game content (which besides vanilla was basically the only content that ever mattered) just looked up a cookie cutter build and went with that. Kind of like after the whole talent system overhaul, except now people actually sometimes swap out some talents depending on the fight (PvE) or matchup (PvP).
Reagents were just clutter in the bag, not anything that actually changed the game in any relevant way.
Perhaps it's just a difference between the way we play the game, but to me, the only changes that actually affect the game significantly were the ones that changed the way I did (relevant end-game) content. Having to spend some additional time grinding something (whether it's weapon skills, professions, going to buy reagents, or grinding artifazerite power) is hardly something I consider the part of the core gameplay, just additional chores. If they suddenly removed summoning stones now, it wouldn't be a revolution in gameplay to me. Just another chore to do if I want to do PvE, but ultimately (besides wasting my time) not affecting the gameplay I care about.