I like Libreoffice ui better. There are different ui modes too if you want to experiment. I selected tabbed compact since I like compact UI, there are other modes which takes more space and have more features visible probably. Anyway UI might be about preferences but at least there are different UI modes. If you hate all of them, its okay.

Almost all your problems sounds like problems when mixing MS office. Do you face other problems that is not a compatibility issue with MS?