I feel like the window manager is important, but for newbies I also consider the package manager and overall installation process to be very important.

I've had pretty distros that are basically busted after a package fails to install or video drivers are mucked with. An advanced user could fix most of these issues, but this is usually where a new user may go running back to their previous OS.

A good computing experience for me is all my hardware working with minimal fuss and all the software I expect to be available being a few terminal commands away (e.g. steam, developer tools, etc.)

on a related note, help I'm too used to my i3wm config and now I cant switch to wayland at all, what do I do when xorg gets fully depreciated

That is actually very true honestly but also needing sonething as stable as Debian, bleeding edge as Arch or right in the middle with Fedora and also which kernel the user made need for their hardware is also a factor in this as well. DEs take priority tho as it's literally the interface you interact with 90% of the time

I've picked xfce on basically every distro I've used and I've hopped through like 30 distro's.

cinnamon eh?

Yeah... but if the packagers dont test it, or ship "stable" KDE Plasma 5.27 which will simply not get most bugfixes (Debian, MX Linux and many more will have these issues for 4 years!) its actually important what Distro you choose.

It is not if

• your Desktop relies on Xorg garbage which is "stable" and will not evolve
• your Desktop is minimal and Distros orient their schedule on it (GNOME)

This doesnt apply to

• KDE
• Cosmic
• Hyprland, Sway, Wayfire
• LXQt getting Wayland support probably