I voted "not sure"
I purchased A1 via sprocket (and via CD before that, but lost the CD, so much for that...) and A2 via sprocket as well, and A2OA via steam, symlinking the directories to get the combined arms setup (even a caveman could do it...)
Yes these kind of workarounds are boring
Yes steam is easy to use and is not much of a bloatware (although I don't like it when games insist on launching steam to run)
Yes steam will happily bankrupt you because you buy too many games "on sale" you dont play
No it is not entirely clear why any game by any developer would ever want to be "steam only" that sounds like you are cutting out a piece of your market, and for what?
No I think all available options should be maintained to allow more users to play the game
