Thanks for writing this up, Drath. It's been a lot on my mind as well - Larian's use of data and the conclusions they appear to draw from it making very little sense or being dubious to questionable at best. Each interview that gives rise to comments like this has mostly cemented the impression in my mind that they have already decided what they want/are going to do, and have already decided that they know what players want and what is objectively 'fun', and they're just looking to use the data to confirm the decision they've already made... which is absolutely not a good way to use data in an EA (or, really, anywhere).
Regarding buffing, I feel compelled to point out that not all buffing spells are concentration in 5e, though many, are. Choosing what one in-combat buff is the best choice for a particular situation is one of the tactical choices that the concentration system encourages; in older editions "just stack them all up" was more or less the only thing you did, every time. Many of the big or important buffs for various situations are not concentration, or are long-lasting, even possibly 'night before' preparations, which are then bolstered with in-combat buffs later. To someone completely new to the ruleset, it's not necessarily obvious why some spells are concentration and why other ones are not - and some may even find that it looks unbalanced on the surface, but it really is more nuanced than that. The game needs to explain this, or give the players the opportunity to understand it more accurately.
