I haven't played in awhile before 1.19, but it feels the same to me, I recall doing +6 synths to get ~500 sp a craft, and being very frustrated early on by the occasional unavoidable failure when the synth totally goes awry from the start, even on even level synths. I agree with your assessment of the frustrating randomness and excessive volume of crafts necessary over level 30, but I don't agree that it's new...