For example, one thing I used to do when I built an early sniper vs Soviets was screen him with deep snow. This meant if they popped Hoorah to try and rush him down they would get bogged down in the snow and the sniper could be quite safe.
That's nice, except there was so much deep snow that it actually affects both attacker and defender equally most of the time. So most cases just come down to who can support their indirect fire/support troops better and that has nothing to do with cold tech. And your example is simplistic in suggesting that one player simply chooses to ignore deep snow while the other takes advantage of it. In a more egalitarian example, it just creates more extreme situations, where a squad caught out of position is more likely to die than it would without cold tech. I guess whether you like that or not is a matter of taste.
But again, situations where you could gain some significant advantage with proper use of deep snow were so rare to be almost insignificant. Most of the time people just camped a little harder and relied more on vehicles and fire.
Also, A squad won't freeze to death retreating through deep snow unless it is ALREADY FROZEN BEFORE RETREATING. It takes like a minute of being frozen for a squad to lose one member. The fact that it is being brought up so much in this thread really demonstrates my point that people didn't keep their troops warm. I don't understand, how is building a firepit any more microintensive than building sandbags?
Actually, most people were complaining about retreats through deep snow without the freezing effect. The freezing effect was so insignificant that it could be ignored most of the time. Which begs the question, 'why keep it at all'?
Back to deeps snow retreats: since you can't really avoid deep snow on most winter maps, it essentially turns into punishment for flanking and capping the more distant points. This leads to more static play, less valid strategies, more high stakes play.
None of these appeal to me so, I'm happy.