[bashosfrog]

I may be missing the entire point here, but I pretty much ignore Styles view for mass changes and just use the Utilities panel. ie. Select "All Level 2 Rows" in the lower window (OO clicks into Styles View), then make changes in Inspector = all Level 2 rows changed as expected.

I don't really "get" Styles View either. Not for everyday use. But I haven't needed to use it in order to set up OO documents of stunning style :-)