Wandering Monsters: Changing Shape

Why is it that, despite lycanthrope supposedly being viewed as a curse, it was just oh-so awesome in 3rd Edition?

I am not saying that I or anyone I knew actively sought it out, but if a werewolf just happened to bite you, and that bite resulted in, among other things, a boost to your Hit Dice (which also boosted your attack bonus, saving throws, and skill points), a Wisdom and natural armor bonus, damage reduction, a bonus feat, and so on, is that really so bad?

Sure, afflicted lycanthropes transform during the full moon and perform actions dedicated by their animal’s alignment, but half of them are Neutral, and werebears are even Lawful Good. I guess the only real drawback, in the case of the wererat and werewolf anyway, is that you can end up with the animal’s alignment, which in both cases is Chaotic Evil. On that note, why does your alignment change at all? Why are werebears Chaotic Good? Eberron gave some interesting and conflicting history to lycanthropes, which would be a lot better than “because this is how it was in an older edition”.

It is because of this that I liked how 4th Edition handled lycanthropes: if you got bit, you might contract moon frenzy. No animal form, no extensive stat boosts, just a penalty to Will and/or the chance of randomly attacking your allies (and it did specify allies, despite how silly this might seem). Sure, it did not keep in with the folklore by causing you to involuntarily transform and go on a murder-spree, but then Dungeons & Dragons has always selectively chosen which parts of which mythologies it adheres to, and more importantly there was no silver lining.

I also preferred how 3rd and 4th Edition handled harming them: the former gave them a combination of fast healing and damage resistance against non-silvered weapons, while the latter gave them regeneration, which could be shut down for a bit when they were hit with a silvered weapon. In both cases this made silver weapons useful, but not necessary, which is what I would prefer, especially since against the typical commoner they are still pretty potent.

I think that an animal should affect one physically and mentally, why do werebears tend to live in cabins in the woods? Why do they act as wardens for an area? I am all for defining some physical and personality traits, especially when they are thematic to the animal (like wererats being thin, wiry, and sly), but without a compelling story reason giving, for example, werebears a global preference for specific types of buildings and self-appointed roles does not make sense to me.

I am also confused as to how doppelgangers, broadly described as “parasitic shapechangers that live off the efforts of others,” are Neutral. At the least adopting the identity of someone else in order to acquire wealth strikes me as Chaotic Neutral, if not outright Chaotic Evil, particularly for the ones that like to mentally plunder prisoners on a daily basis. Also, what is with immunity to sleep and charm effects? Likewise reading minds it is not really explained, but I guess that it is at least immediately useful to their agenda.