Agreed. Movement and precision can be downright infuriating at times with the current setup. Took me awhile when I first started to even find out there was no partial select or full party select option outside of the cumbersome and fiddly "chaining" system. I much preferred the more fast and precise "click and drag box" of the original BG series. Also, the formation options gave me knowledge of exactly where a party member would go or attempt to go.
A quick and dirty workaround to the issue would at very least be a hotkey to chain/unchain everyone instantly. It would still suck and be just a marginal patchwork to a system that requires an extensive revamp, but at least there would be a convenient safenet against the most infuriating situations.
P.S. I literally just relaized that there's a typo in the thread title and I can't find an option to edit it, for some reason.