You understand that PvP players like to PvP while doing all of the things that you listed? While PvP, to you, makes these things a tiring grind, to a PvP lover the fight makes these things more exciting.
PvP is not for you, that’s clear, but asking for an explanation as to why some enjoy PvP is like asking for an explanation as to why some people like cheese and others don’t.
Why do you start on a PvP server when you should’ve known that it will be “annoying” to you?
Back in vanilla, most times, people just did a /wave or /hi while passing eachother.
But occasionally people wanted to PvP, which ofc, you couldn’t stop.
So it was mostly PvE/you can actually complete 3 quests without getting jumped.
But the mentality now is: See opposite faction? Attack. Always.
This makes it so you get jumped 8 times by the time you finish your quest.
Noone really enjoys it they just pretend to because they’re elitists 
For me it gives an added dimension to the game.
Its just a matter of perspective, so for me your list would be related to like this:
Want to farm herbs or nodes or leather? I wonder how many I’ll be able to mine or ooh lets not tempt that lock and his skull level warrior pal, screw that node.
Want to grind up rep? Ok lets see if I can find another person or 2 to chill group with and see what w/e zone looks like
Want to run to your dungeon? I wonder who holds the area at the zone entrance
Want to go afk whilst flying? Tend to do this anyway even if I’ll be landing in a place that may be sieged and I come back to a corpse run
Want to camp at that npc who sells your recipe? Nope sorry you have to pvp against that ranged class in the corner, what a drag or whats this guy think he’s doing? You planning on taking my recipe?!
Want to go finish the last of your quests to get a bit of gold? Lots of different solutions for this in my mind from crap the area has a roaming Ally 60s murder squad, lets find some buddies to wipe them out or chase them off to screw it just 2 more mobs, see if I can quickly kill them before those guys come back to delete me.
Want to level an alt? Until level 30 this is a cake walk, even after phase 2. Sure you die to ?? and skull levels but its nothing like the BRM or DM periodic chain corpse runs or inevitable skirmishes in rep grind areas
I played nolife style back in 2005-2007 so had toons on both PvE and PvP servers.
I get the laid-back recreational vibe of easy gaming on PvE servers.
As other posters have already pointed out many times here, you can still PvP on these servers if you want. In fact, its even easier to coordinate mass WPvP bouts because you can create lvl 1 “rabble-rousers” or callers that can communicate intentions in the opposite faction’s General and Trade channels.
I do however think that being able to herb or mine without considering the players around you somewhat diminishes the overall play experience and trivializes things like rep grinds to solely just being a time sink which it ultimately is anyway of course, but it feels less like it when there’s the constant chance of PvP scraps.
I initially rolled on a pvp server because my friends were there, but now that I’ve had the experience, I would never play on a pve server. All of the points you listed as negative in the OP are actually positive for me. The potential of a pvp encounter makes the quite repetative (but still fun) pve activities that much more thrilling. I can fall asleep while in a dungeon, but I am always on my toes, while lvling in the open world. And I don’t use SPY, which helps the immersion greatly.
Yesterday, while farming Stranglethorn Vale, I felt like I was really in the jungle. There were ally players everywhere, most of whom were higher lvl and/or more skilled than me. Sometimes I managed to suprise them, sometimes they got me. I died many times, but every time I was happy because I was slowly improving my pvp skills, while also leveling and farming gold for my first mount. When I was ganked by numerous players and/or corpse camped, I communicated with people in my zone, in order to get out of the situation. And when I won the fights, especially against higher lvl players… well, it’s the best gaming experiene there is for me. PVE can never come close to that. I think only the Dark Souls series have given me such an immersive hybrid pve/pvp experience.
I play on a PvP server because I enjoy fighting against players more than fighting mobs. This is a multiplayer game — i enjoy playing with friendly people in groups to do quests, and I also enjoy fighting enemy faction. Because they are unpredictable and killing a real person is always more satisfying than killing a mob.
PvP server there is always random encounters and a heightened sense of danger that you have to be aware of who’s around you while you level, particularly at higher levels.
Hope that answers your question 
Oh come on Dottie.
Even before phase 2 alliance on both the realms I played had constant gank squads roaming lvl 30 zones.
Stop parroting what everyone else says and realise the faction imbalance only matters in large raid battles.
Other than that alliance players are as toxic gankers as horde are.
its not that i dont mind pvp, but its not really pvp when you’re just being jumped constantly by that same group of 10 alliance running around the zone killing low level chars.
farming gold and rep and stuff is super boring, having to fight for your spot and contest the best gold farms, bringing friends and guildies to control areas etc, thats the fun of pvp servers, you dont need a reward for doing it its just fun imo, now bear in mind this only works on a balanced server so right now this pov is completely useless but im talking about good private servers where wpvp was decent, also with bgs out so theres less world zerg and just small skirmishes etc
1st group ~ 5% of current pop. Are hardcore no life try harders that enjoy all the points in your list. - If you are enjoying a PvP server this is you
2nd group - 95% of current pop. Are (or were at point of choosing their relam) misinformed, ignorant or deluded, possibly all three, to situation they were entering for a number of reasons. - If you are not enjoying a PvP server this is you. And you were told - wPvP - Is unbalanced - You were told
The main issue, besides the try hard mind set, is server overpopulation. There are few 50-60 zones and they are relatively small for the amount of players, with few fp’s and weren’t conceived to support massive pvp, while
being quest, dungeon and farm hubs.
Wpvp experience in vanilla was nothing like what is happening in bigger servers, the majority of players signed up for vanilla experience, not for pserver paradigm.
Because every pserver enthusiast spewed about how wondrous PvP servers are and how they are the “true experience” before launch. What they didn’t tell you is pservers have like 50 players and 99% 60 and camping in capital cities so wPvP actually hardly ever happened. Now, we are seeing the consequences of PvP hype.
I was dumb enough to follow my IRL friends to alliance even as a 10 year horde main. I knew this would happen, because I’ve seen how insanely unbalanced retail is. Hench why I rolled a rogue.
I did think about rerolling to horde, since I personally like them more than alliance, but after reading these forums I decided to become a huge jackass ingame and gank every single horde I find. No matter if they are 48 or 59, if they are fighting a mob or are running away, I will always gank. And god let me tell you, it’s the best feeling in the world.
Become one of them, become a jackass. Fight war with war, and when BG’s come out, watch them cry while we go into instant queues with premades, making them wait 30 minutes just to loose a game.
People on pvp servers must be real no-lifers then.
All the gold farm, gear farm, dm jump runs, arena-angerforge, quest lines, full brd clears, ungoro elemental farming, devilsaur farming, mc clears, ony clears, leveling alts … AND on top of it all, they have time to ride around and kill npcs and lone players for hours.
Impressive.
It gives a sense of real danger in the world
Exactly. 10char
Normally i’d be against it ,but as long as u can make horde players quit the game by ganking them continously , then i agree ,it’s necessary since there’s so many of these damn maggots everywhere.
That is my intention, friend!
It adds this extra layer of ‘danger’ to the world. Although it may sound odd, I really like the fact that I can be killed anytime. Yes, sometimes it takes longer to complete a quest… Yes, sometimes it’s hard to get acces to a dungeon cause of ‘enemy players’… It’s so worth it though. The idea of a common enemy somehow enhances the sense of comradery within your own faction.
Well that’s it for me.