I'm right there with you buddy. I think buffs either need something like this, or to be redesigned completely.

The big issue to me is that using multiple buffs to beat a hard boss sounds cool, but it's not actually ever practical. You can only challenge a boss you've already managed to get to. (You can beat level 74, so you can face the 75 boss.) but you only need like 1 uncommon buff to actually beat 75 if you're already that strong. And you don't wanna use more than necessary, cos they only last 2.5 minutes and by the time you've reached the next boss, your buffs will be over! Just really impractical and poorly designed, sorry to be blunt about it devs, but just wanna make it clear WHY people dislike buffs so much.

not sure I agree with you guys.
using buffs and clicking I can often go up to 10 levels higher than I could go without them.
it's not a useful strategy for early and mid run, but when you're pushing towards your campaign objective, it can cut hours off of your run.
Obviously you need to stock enough buffs to last you through 5-10 levels, but they're common enough that it's fairly easy to do.

1. Storm Rider is no longer bugged, and now gives its full bonus. it's far from useless when you're doing runs above your farming zones

2. the instant gold cards give the same amount of gold as the time warps. getting it as a time warp means you can choose when to spend it, and you get extra XP and cooldown resets.

3. the cooldown resets are VERY nice when you're trying to push through boss rounds. when you're pushing through 2 bosses, it's very nice when Fire Storm is ready even though your last boss was 5 minutes ago.

4. Power boost (and other buffs) duration is short, yeah. that's why you need to stock a bunch of them to push through multiple levels.

that said, yeah. most of the buffs are only good with clicking. if you never click, you'll never use them.