It seems half baked because it was meant to be a short duration thing, to be scrapped a few weeks into SB. Think the only reason it is back up is the major uproar people have been throwing over Ixion...

However you are right in that this is no excuse, and that if they are going to implement something which they KNOW will be back eventually (either it be at the drop of an xpack or in the middle of one) they might as well add some, as you call it, basic functions to it.

Having to actually fly out of a map and then back in can get kinda troublesome...