Adobe Support...what's the trick?

From your post I have learnt one thing; solve a problem of your own.

"So, how does everyone else deal with Adobe support?  Is there some secret word you have to utter to get real support rather than this kind of hack?"

I have not had questions where I have needed to call Adobe support, but I have needed support with various companies over the years. It sounds like you reached a real person, but if you use the Chat icon, the "secret word" is to type "agent" to bypass the bot. Here's what I do in general:

• Ask for the name and ID number at the beginning of the call. If it goes well, as it usually does, I can thank the person profusely by name. Not every company has a number assigned for the employees, but many large ones like phone companies do. With Adobe, you can also ask for the case number.
• If things are not going well, usually because the person has no idea what they are talking about, I politely ask for the Tier 2 support to get someone with more training. It's a complete guess, but instead of working with other customers, your support person may have been new to the job and was looking it up or consulting with someone else when he was gone for 10 minutes. When it seems futile, as it did for you, I have no issues with saying I need to speak to someone else.

It looks like you solved your own issue. I've done that before, too, after getting erroneous advice. I looked at your profile, though, and this is your first question in the Photoshop forum; the others were in AfterEffects. You can always try asking here first. 😊

~ Jane

Adobe customer support is good for installation problems. For bugs submit them to Adobe Feedback site and cross your finger. Adobe will fix major bugs.  However Adobe does not fix all acknowledged bugs.  I gave up trying to deals with Adobe support for anything but installation problems decades ago.