Yeah, when I used to work with a company that religiously followed ticketing systems, it was always developers being forced to larp as the user. All to satisfy the "scrum master", as far as I could tell, because nobody else cared about the larp.

"As a user, I want a damn fine software product that just works, and I wish I didn't have to go through 10 layers of indirection to communicate that to the devs..."

That is often said and there is truth to it, but not universal truth.

I worked with many clients that knew exactly what they wanted and (very importantly) could write it down in a way that they could validate. That is often not the perfect spec from an implementation point of view but by and large a solid aporoach.

> Most of the time clients don't know what they really want

I know this happens but it shouldn't. If the client doesn't know what they want then they shouldn't be wasting money on developers.