Your score breakdown is quite different than ours. Could be part of the difference of opinion. I find the final round to play out really differently from game to game, mostly based on how players have been building up. We’ve only rarely had short rounds with few combats at the end. Our winning scores are usually between 150 and 200. Odin’s Throne is a good get with 2 random quests (around 10 a pop) since it’s averaging around 13 points a card. Frigga’s Domain and Eternal Dragons are often worth between 48 and 64 points total as a combo (more potent if you have the sea serpent or prepped for the combo in the previous round) which is 24 points a card on the lower end. With max horns, if other people are pursuing Loki strategies, you can pretty easily get 30 points off Thor’s Domain (that scores units on the board) and have an easy time doing location quests.
Because of how effective the various Dragons cards are in general, we commonly have a lot of boats on the board. A surprise boat combat victory can really open up the board. In general, I think players who appear to benefit from losing a battle are often in the best position to go for surprising easy wins with pretty low value cards. When this happens, it usually means the location wasn’t successfully pillaged, so the board frees up significantly. Plus you’ll gain points winning battles and almost certainly have a chance to die again later in the round.
With all that in mind, I find the final round to be really dramatic and tense as everyone tries to nail their last combos to their fullest.
I can see what you’re saying about the stats (especially Rage, which in the final round I almost always end with a few left over). However, I think their value changes a lot depending on your strategy. It took me a while to find strong axes strategies but they’re definitely there. If you use some early cards to pump axes twice in your first battle and average winning 2.5ish battles per round, that start plus focusing on axes can get you around 40-50 points from battle points.
It does often seem like the last age is the only one that matters. I think in part this is because the huge scoring bonus from stats is added in in the last age and I often associate it with scoring there. Still, we usually come into the final age with around 40-50 points which is often less than the final score difference.
I’d also fully agree with your assumption about the expansions. They’re “fine”. I personally think Mystics degrades the game a little and Gods of Asgard is pretty take-it-or-leave-it. I regret getting them. Blood Rage is strange like that. It’s one of the only big Kickstarters I’m glad I got at retail because adding extras to the core game really brings it down in my opinion.