Tribal Wars has never been a particularly forgiving game for the newer player however the reasoning for that has not really been elaborated upon in this thread.
It has very little to do with the settings. Stronger walls and Pay to Win make it more difficult overall for newer player. There are certain small aspects of the tutorial, mainly the free defensive troops and the teaching how to use militia that slightly help new players. It requires knowledge to abuse the Pay to Win system should you so choose it and the free resources given out of the tutorial to the maximum extent. The advantage of stronger walls to a weaker player pales in comparison to the advantage it gives to a stronger player.
It never has been the settings that have really disadvantaged newer players though, a game should have a skill and learning curve and Tribal Wars has that. What really hampers newer players is the tribes they join. Generally in most lower level tribes, there is one or a small group of players who are considered to be comparatively good and the rest of the tribe generally listens to them if they have any questions. This is fine in theory, but even the standard of those players is not very good when it comes to the scheme of things, so newer players do not end up learning much or the wrong things. Eventually they get rimmed by a small select group of players who do know how to play the game. They join the next world, since they are still bad, they have to join a bad tribe and the cycle continues.
There is hardly a way for newer players to even get to my level, no matter how much they are willing to get better.
As for my reckoning about this change, I believe that microfarming was not taken into account either as an oversight or a lack of knowledge from the balance team. Not that it is actually hampering microfarming at all, since at the high level, barb shaping is used. The purpose of the different wall settings is more pronounced in the later stages of the game where defence is significantly buffed. For example, it lowers the defensive mid-late stack threshhold from 7Ds to 6Ds, despite defence being weaker overall on this world due to lack of archers. It may even also change optimal ram numbers overall, though I would have to research this. Though I suppose that matters less if everything is to be P2W from now on.