There was a similar discussion here:
So agree that some kind of easier and better way should exist and it will be created in the future. The Set-Node is for sure a good work-around for now but not a permanent and good solution also for the reasons you did give.
About Template-Nodes. What is planned in the future is to allow people to fuse a node-network into a single node on which then the needed inputs and parameters can be exposed. For the users it would look almost identical to a regular node but underneath the hood will not be regular-code, like under every normal node, it will be a kind of sub-workflow. This “fused-nodes” are then supposed to be easily shareable with and so reusable by other people in the community .