I agree, the current system is a pretty good checks and balances way of doing things. Orbs are usually meted out on what your build absolutely needs and rarely do you have the excess to never plan far ahead (seriously only my Firestorm mage has enough to spare like that).
Interestingly, we did start with a point value system. We switched to the token system to try to simplify deck-building a bit. I think it was a good move.
I think it would be awesome to have an super-high level format where you can use level 50 characters at some stage - once we get enough players that we don't need to worry about splitting the player base.