My biggest concern is that the Deutschland Tour always tried to be like the Tour rather than utilize what it could potentially do with German terrain, and ASO being in charge of the revival will only exacerbate that. You can have a real all-rounder's week-long race in Germany all over the place, from echelon-baiting carnage in the north, brutal, cobbled ex-DDR roads in Sachsen-Anhalt, real Classics hardman terrain in Saxony, the Nürburgring's history of the sport, some tough-but-not-too-tough mountain stages in the Schwarzwald, and some chaotic puncheur's terrain around the Rhine-Mosel area and the Saarland. And the Berchtesgadener Land is there if they want to hire Angelo Zomegnan.
I agree. I would even say the initial Deutschland Tour was an awful race, well at least the 9-day Protour(was it called like that?) version of it.
Before it was still acceptable if a bit disappointing. So from 1999 to 2004, it was a 7-day race with a rather light profile, usually, one queen stage which was on the level of an intermediate mountain stage, the rest was flat with a few non-decisive hills somewhere along the route. I believe it was ranked on HC level/the equivalent of it back then, so maybe it didn't need to be a very tough race.
After 2005 they made it a highest level race over 9 days, pretty much like the Tour de Suisse, but in fact nothing like it. The weak profile continued, but now each and every queen stage was held entirely in Austria, as well as around 2,5 stages (Tirol was a major sponsor). Nobody cared about the race there, the roadsides were empty. So it was that one high mountain stage (usually 1, sometimes 2 HC like climbs) plus a rather easy intermediate mountain stage held in Germany, the rest was pretty much for the sprinters except from the one TT.
Now I have nothing against going abroad every once in a while, but not to that extent for a 9-day race and not for the most difficult part of the parkour AND not all that for every single year! They maybe could have made up for it a bit if they had another or 2 tough stages in Germany (and yes as the race designers of those forums have shown there are in fact enough tough ascends in Germany to make it possible.) And why not make it the trademark of the Deutschland Tour that it maybe doesn't have 3 stages with HC climbs every year but only 1 and 2 or 3 very though intermediate stages with plenty 2nd Category climbs and yes have a tough stage with cobbled sections regularly. It could have been a very unique and exciting race.
I know it was cos of the doping scandals but just cos of what poor race it has been it was just appropriate it was discontinued after 2008.