The year of the 11 lineup was the one year where the standard iPhone <LATEST_NUMBER> was a clear downgrade from last year's. It was a refresh of the iPhone XR from the previous year, which was the budget option compared to the flagship XS.

Yes, and the XS was the follow-up to the previous X and thus also the "Pro" model, before they were explicitly named as such. So my move that year was indeed a downgrade. Now I'm kind of worried of doing the same thing again - but spec-wise, the base 17 is really not at all a downgrade from my current 15 Pro, apart from the camera department.