Because other languages might be faster, and we don't want to be "forced" to run in italian or something.

If you don't install LoD, is the game as a non-expansion character different if you upgrade to 1.14? By "classic" I mean just most recent patch but no act 5, runes, etc.

Technicalities aside, you can just make some basic rules as a community if players and viewers mostly prefer them. I'd cast my vote on "Must be 1.14b and expansion character at all times" to qualify for a standard LoD run. You can have Diablo 2 without LoD as a seperate category and different patches as sub-categories if enough people are interested.

Doesn't mean I'm right, just what'd be preferable to me as a regular viewer and potential future runner. There's usually a bunch of confusion in the chat when a runner does a "classic strat" so I'm not alone.

As an observer, I think any% LoD should start and finish as a LoD character, and have classic as a separate thing. A lord of destruction any% run could potentially be 12 out of 13 acts played in a different game, which seems silly to me... imagine the scenario where getting lvl 60 and diablo hell is all done in classic and then the last 15 minutes of the 6 hour run are act 5 hell are in the actual game you're attempting to WR.