You can (and should) just use their standalone product.
https://support.1password.com/sync-options/
Subscription pricing is pretty optimal for something like 1Password since if there is one product you want to make sure is being actively worked on it is the one with all your passwords. If you previously purchased a license you can continue to do that.
I'm a huge fan of 1Password, and also a fan of paying subscription pricing for apps and dev teams making things I enjoy, but I'd seen the linked doc and parsed it the exact opposite way: "If you don’t want the benefits of a 1Password membership, you can use these third-party and advanced sync options:" --> ~"If you don't want to pay for a subscription, the non-subscription version of 1Password supports the following"
Up until now I've been counting the days until Agilebits finally sunsets the non-subscription plan since I thought the subscription option didn't support the "advanced/third-party" sync options. Will go re-evaluate that now.
If any Agilebits folks are lurking, it may be worth disambiguating that "switching to subscription billing" does not mandate "switching to an Agilebits-hosted vault"
Of course they can change their minds at any moment, but they did enough things right over the years that I have chosen to trust them.
Business-wise, they already have the best of both worlds: a cloud-based option for regular users (which generates steady income), and a standalone option for pro users who want full control (which generates spiky income, and a lot of goodwill).
From a brand perspective, pro users are much more likely to be spreading the word to friends and family (I definitely don't want my mom to be dealing with Dropbox issues, so cloud is just fine for her). From a cost perspective, maintenance of the standalone version is likely minimal, compared to supporting a cloud service safely.
Killing the standalone option would be net negative.
I don't think these statements have any value whatsoever if AgileBits is unwilling to expose this option on its website and make it easy to buy. There is no way to buy the standalone option without spending a lot of time on the website and hunting for it (or asking on the forums). It doesn't have to be (and shouldn't be) so hard, unless AgileBits is not confident about the subscription model or wants to hide something. As a potential customer, this is how I see it.
Despite all that, AgileBits goes way out of its way to not only provide a standalone password manager but keep it within shooting distance of the functionality of the non-standalone product.
But that's not enough for you: if they don't actively advertise and promote the variant of their product that is most expensive for them to provide, unlike, you know, any business on the planet, you're unsatisfied with their support.
I'm totally fine with it. It's a very reasonable business decision to try to steer away users towards the cloud option, while still offering the standalone (even if it's a bit buried). If you can't find the standalone subscription with a few more clicks, maybe you really shouldn't be using it in the first place.
Kudos to AgileBits for staying true to their origins. Provided they don't screw up, I'll continue to promote their products to friends and family.
Of course, I don't use 1Password (standalone) because I don't think a company that actively hides the standalone option deserves to get my money. "A few more clicks" is actually not the correct way to describe it. Like you, I will continue to state this dark pattern for as long as AgileBits follows this and warn people about such tactics, which I strongly believe are not good.
As for other popular commercial password manager being subscription based, that's not the topic of discussion in my comment. Such a deflection is not useful for discussion.
https://blog.agilebits.com/2018/03/28/the-1password-7-beta-f...
It makes some amount of sense, by now they have picked up most of the tech savvy crowd and for the average user hearing a list of sync options is intimidating.
[0] https://blog.agilebits.com/2018/03/28/the-1password-7-beta-f...