I agree with you completely. I always use the off-line ISOs and you just need the first DVD. Currently it's debian-11.3.0-amd64-DVD-1.iso and the file size is 3.62GB.
As far as I... remember, which is 1-2 stable releases ago, debian only has (or had) just one cd sized iso for offline installation, the one with xfce and the reason for it is obvious: kde or gnome are too big to fit on an 700mb iso today.
Parole is xfce's media player and it uses gstreamer as its backend, thus its fewer capabilities compared to vlc or mpv. And similarly, all desktop enviroments have useless apps that come preinstalled, because, hypothetically, they provide a better user experience out of the box, e.g. the games of gnome and kde. For me, the added bloat is not related to the desktop enviroment. For instance, even for a minimal installation, debian installs aspell because it is a suggested or recommended dependency of a core package. And that is the reason I no longer install suggested and recommended packages, because their dependency chain goes to far. E.g. a month ago I wanted to verify an issue of gplaycli. Having no debian user near me to ask for help and a couple of arch users simply denying, I asked a friend who occasionaly runs kali in a vm. Gplaycli, without any suggested or recommended dependency, is a 5-10Mb install. With the 2 recommended dependencies it is a 600+Mb install because one pulls java and java, in turn, pulls a lot more for itself.
Cant say for sure, but if u are asking my personal opinion which comes mostly from same virtual machine testing , the latest desktop environments such [of] gnome and kde kinda ready for mass use...
I would go for Xfce or Mate, both are simple, stable and easy to use. I have used Xfce a lot and would recommend it, Xfce is probably the most popular default desktop, if it isn't the default option it is always offered ie MX, Manjaro & Mint.
I'll try on a virtual machine and if I'm satisfied I'll test live on a hard drive. I try this as a hobby to relax.