My opinion of the exam (having not sat an ST yet) is that the exams are terribly worded sometimes.
The mix between breadth and depth of answers is rarely well expressed in the question. And there appears to be the odd time where an answer is a combination of that for a question that was asked and a question that wasn't.
Sometimes it seems like the examiner comes up with a question and then assigns marks beyond what's reasonable (forcing some ridiculous preamble or extensive discussion on a hypothetical scenario).
That said, the more exam prep you do the better the chance of syncing up with the way to answer the questions.
I get the feeling that if I pass it's going to on the basis of getting credit for reasonable alternative approaches, though I'm not sure how much leeway there is there.. Personally, I wasted a lot of study time thinking about things instead of learning off the CR, I think I'll end up missing easy marks in some cases, which you can't afford to do.
Also the size of questions in ST2 can be ridiculous. A paper with 5 questions with only a few parts each is considerably more difficult than a paper with 7/8 questions split between many parts in my opinion. Trying past papers I find my marks are much better when there's 7+ questions (though that doesn't mean I'll pass if there's 7 questions tomorrow..)
Time constraints present a large problem, as does the fact that it's a written exam and not typed. I'd get way more down on the page if I was typing, plus it would allow for restructuring when you think of something else.. what are the chances of everyone sitting exams using computers or paper depending on preference? I know some people already get to do this for one reason or another, it's kind of an unfair advantage in my opinion.