[soraminazuki]

You're over-fixating on the misuse of macros and generalize that to make a statement about Vim [1], almost as if that's the only useful feature in Vim. There are more basic editing commands that are much simpler, quicker, and powerful. It's what is actually used most of the time.

Also, getting bulk editing perfect, including the edge cases, is inefficient regardless of the tools you use. For the majority of those cases, I would just combine simple search and replace (cgn), dot repeat (.), and undo plus skip (un) for the edge cases. Then jump back (N) to the edge cases and make manual edits. It's quick, provides instant visual feedback, and requires less cognitive work than trying to process it all at once. And that's the approach people likely have in mind when they mention dot repeat.

[1] Or at least stepping right close to it.