There was skill expression in royal road, much like there is skill expression in every opportunity cost job mechanic that has been or still is a thing in this game. People complain about those because they can't be arsed to deal with damage gap closers, ED, or any proc control tool, but it doesn't change the fact that they do imply decisions, which means player agency on whether they want to use something in a way or not to achieve a goal, play greedy or not, etc and that's exactly what burning support for enhanced/extended balance fodder was. Now we can certainly discuss whether the support requirements were enough or not to counterweight this (I do believe that they have been alleviated way too much in SB comparatively to HW), but the concept remains provided the control tools don't overshadow the rng and allow coverage of everything, or to the opposite do way too little for the player, leading to frustration.