We didnt have the “quest badges”, but the number of badges are equivalent to a single"World Tour" (which on its own takes less time to do), hence that is a very far fetched reason that WOTLK for some reason would lose value due to these. If anything, people went more out their way to do long chains they previously skipped, adding value and content instead.
Totally mixed you up with the OP, couldnt imagine two people playing Dwarfs in the same thread.
Those badges save you 1 max 2 ids so you would have completed prebis before raid release anyway or you lost like 2 days of content. Its not the issue here nor are consumables. Also if you lvl up you can get decent gear almost for free in 1 gdkp run since noone needs anything except 226 items or maybe trinkets.
Its not about when, but how. If I can do 70-80 in 2 days, then the number of badges prior to 80 is only relevant based on missed Heroic resets I could have gotten if I skipped the questchains. Is it worth for me to do long chains to get badges versus hitting 80 and jumping straight into Heroics? Depends.
So, if one would spend 1 extra day bothering with quests before hitting 80, to get those “before 80”-badges, one would miss badges worth one heroics reset. We are talking about 1-2 days of content, and you make it sound like this was the shortcut of the year - when infact questing to get badges prior to 80 was less time efficient. Its not significant.
Most people would have had the badges they needed within days anyway, quest badges or not. Its irrelevant in the long run for content that is supposed to last for months. This is not to reason why some people feel WOTLK is boring.
They find the most alt friendly expac boring? Ofc there are ppl sticking with one char instead of playing alts. Thats an easy way to double or even tripple the amount of fun! :>
Its not even about gdkp really. On my alt i dont remember doing any dungeons yet i was able to gear up easily. This game throws gear at you everywhere.