Yea, it's unfortunate.
The player-facing elements are some of the weakest design changes they made.
The Classes, the Backgrounds, even the Cultures have some problems, and the Equipment and Money overhauls... I wonder if they were the first things they did, or what, but they're the weakest elements in my opinion.
They're not outright BAD, mind you, but just not as well done as the new sub systems and monsters and NPCs and adventure hooks and region guides, etc. Which are all pretty fantastic imo
I've contemplated buying the Fria Ligan "Lord of the Rings 5E" player handbook (they took over the Tolkien license after Cubicle 7), and seeing if I can just use their Classes and stuff with AIME's DM material and sourcebooks...