On the gnome portal:
I have noticed the town halls but gnomes are all about temporal power, hence infinity time as a prime example, so some kind of time theme there makes a lot of sense here thematically.
On the old maps:
I see your point about them perhaps being overused. My main interest with it is nostalgic. If/when they do migrate them to the new game there will undoubtedly be changes. All the same I find adding more maps is a good thing. More options for quests and ops is one reason. We also only have 2 Gardens & Graveyards maps and 3 Herbal Assault maps whereas in the old game we had 4 G&G maps (I don't consider the night versions as truly separate maps). That gives GW2 1 more turf takeover map but less variety in the separate types. Even if we don't get the old maps we need more maps.
Honestly I think the largest issue is class and map balance. Once we get those issues under control we can use new maps, class variants, etc.
I'm also curious about the 2 'missing' classes, one from each side that are often brought up among the community in regards to the 2 empty slots, 1 each in the respective home bases in the backyard battleground. More classes may muddy the role waters even more than they are now though.
If I had a dollar for every time I accidently left the booth during a turf takeover game and went to the backyard I would have like 23 bucks.
