Back in the day, my first Level 50, Superluminal, took about a year of real life. When I popped 50, it felt like a massive accomplishment, exhausting yet exhilarating.
Then I joined an SG that ran mainly TFs and AE. Most, if not all of my toons after that, were either (mostly) PL-ed or door-sat in AE. Probably had about fifteen or so level 50s, and only really played about 5 at the end (not enough hours in the day). AE was fun to get new ATs to 50 for all their new crunchy powers, but as others have said here, I played a mix of styles and ATs and missions and TFs.
Everyone (I'll generalize), wanted to take advantage of the clearly broken XP-leveling mechanics of AE, when it first came out. I know I did, and many members of my SG did. Why wait weeks or months to fully realize a new AT or feed your alt-itis, when you can have that toon to 50 in hours? We all took advantage of that.
On the new servers, I probably have about 15 toons or so. None are over 20. Two have gone through AE (still less than 20). I have run door missions, countless Sewer runs, contact and radio missions, and will continue to do so. I make it a point, if they want, to mentor new players. To run Sewer missions for newbies and those of us trying (retrying) old and new ATs. I have found that many want to team, at lower levels, but none want the star themselves. I hope that will change.
AE will always have its place in CoX. Genie is out of the bottle. The sense of community and excitement in 2019 is intoxicating and I'm sure many of the new players cannot appreciate how giddy us veterans feel about the game being (perhaps temporarily) reborn.
Let AE farmers and hangers-on farm. Stay out of their way. Play your own style and content. Solo or team to your heart's content. There was too much drama back in the day over AE. The community in 2019 has real concerns about the future of our game (which is currently FREE!). That should be our focus, not on rehashing tired arguments and complaints.