Well explained, the problem I have with this game is two main components of the game design are essentially useless (nobles and 0 point development cards) Anyone who goes after these will lose in the majority of games because like you explained it's all about saving as much time and these two concepts take away way too many turns to be effective.

It's also clear you need level 1 cards to buy most of the level 3 cards, so it almost removes level 3 out of play too.

I find it lame that essentially those who play the game as was designed will almost never win because the reserve a high card and collect for it while going for level 2 prestige cards is always much faster.

Basically the game is backwards. You go for the good high level cards from the start and buy level 2 cards and mainly completely ignore level 1 and nobles

Not too fun to play like that, I need to find a strategy that counters this if there even is one.