i personally prefer the faster pace.
What i realy enjoyed about the game before is that essentialy an entire army could get destroyed and rebuilt and this process could happen around 5 times per game, shifting around the focus (what kind of units) of the game quite a bit.
Although that doesn't really fit with the idea of the campaign map, now does it?
If you move around only a small fraction of the units you routinely deploy in RTS mode, it seems a bit strange.
And the dragon was simply too weak before, but a stronger factor now.
Of course, that's only my opinion.

But, didn't Larian mention somewhere that the old pace will stay an option in the menu?
If that's the case, both sides get what they want and everyone is happy!