At first you idea to replace EVM seemed to me very ambitios, cause it rises the cost of porting dapps from ETH, but then I imagined how would the platforms comparison look like:
Classic
Language: Java
Execution expenses: 1/10 ETH
ETH
Language: Solidity, Serpent... WTF!? Javascript? OMG! No way.
Execution expenses: 10x ETC
Classic wins and ETH looks like a hackers club for enthusiasts. Java has many tools for writing code, there are many experienced developers and also it is widely used in fintech and banks. I don't comment on ADA, cause know nothing.
RE: The HardFork drama is an opportunity for Ethereum Classic to fixe technical challenges