"Nothing you did in XCOM 1 really mattered lol"

If we want to go into the whole nitty-gritty of "whether this mattered in the story" or not, all your XCOM 1 campaigns were combat simulations by the aliens whilst they kept you frozen in an ayylien cool-ranch refrigerator.

Before we go into details into your opinion about XCOM 2, I'll just say that I feel it's unfair to compare the game with Enemy Within because the latter was an expansion to the vanilla game.

XCOM 2 is an objectively more polished game compared to Enemy Unknown/Within. Each class is, more or less, a far more fleshed out version of its predecessors and plays out very differently because of Concealment being a thing.

You may argue that Concealment doesn't add much, but having the ability to guarantee an ambush and a pod wipe has always been important in any XCOM mission in my personal opinion.

"how is the ranger which can scout any different from a scanner" Because said human 'scanner' can shoot, move, isn't one-use and doesn't use up an equipment slot. It can also sword things.

Personally, Overwatch ambushes were not more common and effective on EW: it required you to anticipate where a pod would randomly move and also required to- again- use a scanner. In XCOM 2, pods have specific patrol paths, making it far easier with a Phantom scout. This is not to mention the aim penalty, which concealment overwatch negates in XCOM 2. (admittedly, it is one-time thing at the start)

"Customisation" - I'm sorry, what? Are you really telling me XCOM EU had more customisation than XCOM 2? I'll assume that by 'Customisation' you mean variety with skill builds, but- let's be honest, even in EU there were clearly defined Skill Builds most characters used for maximum efficiency. Nothing has really changed here coming over to XCOM 2. If you meant character customisation, I hope you get abducted and get a chip shoved in your brain.

I'll fully agree with you that Long War is 'miles ahead'- but remember what its target audience was compared to vanilla XCOM.