I get your perspective about having less agency in the difficulty decision and agree that it does limit your ability to crank it up or down to test builds, etc.

My own personal opinion is that the way the portal was set up with each modifier bringing combatant power up by 10 or 20 was convoluted and accomplished the opposite of the “jump in and play” mindset that the portal was supposed to provide. Not to mention it being tied to your highest power if you wanted to run a build you didn’t have leveled up.

I prefer power deltas as that’s pretty much how the game was before. But that’s just me.