@slashCo
1) On normal diff enemy shouldnt be so much stronger then your army (playing paladin class you have enough runes for glory, and try to play at least enough no loss battles to get medal (+1000lds). It`s not that european studios make hard games, it`s american studios made your players soft
2) Yea orcs are a bit op in OotM, and their abilities are good if you have much adrenaline. So if you want to use them warrior would be better choice, because orcs need much adrenaline to be useful. Enemy orcs stacks are problematic since they start every battle with lots adrenalin and you must build it from first round
3) Mage is strong but not strongest hero. Every class have it`s perks, and for your paladin i get you dont care about losses in game, so you pick good. Try using some demon/executioner (unlimited retaliation) as meat shield/rage generator because paladin resurrection skill will get them back after battle.
4) About as you call it cheap play throughs for no loss game etc. it`s not that common as you`ll think. Yes there are quite a bit of them, but they all become boring after some time (imagine playing all game 300+ battles with same units/moves/spells/rage . . .).
I maybe speak for myself but those strategies are interesting to get to, be first to figure out new way to use some tactic in game and share with rest of forum (just check thread `droids are NOT overpowered` by impy for example) not to play all game till your eyes bleed so you can have some sick highscore. Because here multiplayer doesnt exist, so only way to compare with others is sharing your ideas, which got us to some great strategies/mods/unit builds. So i think it`s not poor design, but open options for trying out every combination you can think off in game and normal play through is enough to familiarize yourself with game mechanic unit/item/skill possibilities . . .
So try out different builds and maybe think of something new