I can relate to most things said in this thread.
And I am not a fan of the subscription license model in general – be it explicitly declared as such, or otherwise.

I am still running a fairly old version of Designer Pro for several reasons – the main reason being my personal preferences, needs, and my workflow.
And the feature set I actually use. Which is the vector tools, basic image editing, text, page design, and the prepress facilities. In other words, I can easily live without sophisticated image editing and web design within Xara Designer.
But that is just me, because I do those tasks in other applications. (I very much understand though, that others like to have everything in one package, and so well integrated as in Designer Pro)

I am more than pleased therefore that Xara gives me a choice. So, instead of upgrading my Designer Pro version, I will opt for the Page & Layout Designer as soon as the new version is released. Which in all likelihood will be a “Page & Layout Designer 365”. ;-) Oh well! I guess I can live with that. But, for now and into the foreseeable future I can’t live with out Xara Graphic software. Luckily for me, P&G Designer meets my exact subset of the Pro version. At less cost of the upgrade price to the Pro version.