Both of those have been mulled over before. Colliery is now an aftergame set, and Laggy had no other place to put it in. You just sorta have to realize that, and it's also perfectly winnable at endgame levels. Sure, it means Cloud, Worker 8, Reis and Beowulf aren't going to see much use, but they were novelty PCs to begin with, and the rewards given by the Kolliery are certainly on par with the aftergame goodies you so much desire.
For Secret Hunt, honestly it's not a big deal. It's just one of the myriad ways to break the fuck out of FFT and LFT, and those good items involve commitment and design choices and sacrifices to make, in addition to still needing to know where to find those monsters and -getting- fights where they're in. Sure, it's powerful, but it also involves non-trivial commitment even with streamlined Secret Hunt. This is a testament to how idiotic poaching originally was, really.