I get both sides though since I read both the manga, WN, and LN while also watching the anime.
The anime, yeah I get that it has poorly animated stuff. Especially the dragons having bad CGI but I kinda get why. They're trying to cram probably 7 volumes worth of content. Plus it has be really hard to fit stuff from the novels too since this series is monologue heavy (same reason why albeit animated by ufotable, Fate/Stay Night will always be hard to animate) and is from different PoVs. Notice that we're already in the 10th episode yet it is only finishing volume 2.
I have to disagree though that Alaba is just damn accurate and cool in the anime. They nailed how he looks in the novel.