>> [OOP] can backfire badly if coders end up doing simple things in complex ways just because they can.

Very true. I'm taking several courses where the vast majority of students have only been exposed to Java, where as I've come from a C background with experience in several other languages. I'm shocked at how the other students have no sense of efficiency or simplicity - everything has to be about making other classes do the work, and it ends up being a horrible project.