Yeah no it does suck it made me think the Linux experience was at least 3x worse before I tried another distro.
And not just a DE thing, every part of the distro feels like it was slapped on without actually thinking of the consequences.
netplan
apt
default systemd dependencies
ubuntu GNOME
snap
ubuntu pro
cloudinit conf
You can find forums and docs from as old as Fedora 11 that's still relevant yet Ubuntu utterly fails to keep consistency across a single version update because they changed something that's only mentioned in the changelog.
Every downstream of Ubuntu is essentially focused on removing all the BS the upstream has so you can use your computer without something breaking like it's Arch an overused meme about Arch.
There is no right answer to the correct distro, only a wrong answer, and that is Ubuntu because practically anything else including its downstreams like LM are better for you as a user.
I had similar bad luck with Linux mint. So many things just didn't work, or didn't work correctly. Wifi issues, sound issues, graphics issues, issues setting up particular things for software development. I've switched to NixOS and I'm having a much easier time. A significant amount of my improved experience could be attributed to more patience or just an improved ability to deal with problems. I also suspect cinnamon was causing some of my problems, somehow whereas now I have GNOME on my main rig and lxqt on my laptop.