being drained of so much power than she could barely pass her accepted test, YET given a 'sa'angreal' which she says will make her MUCH more powerful than before.

Is it just some clever('ish) way to make Moiraine basically more powerful, with some lame explanation?

Why not just make her more powerful, or less? The angreal/sa'angreal business just seems odd.

I mean why would Moiraine even wish for that? If she could have any wish for an object of the Power why not ask for an access key or other nigh omnipotent sa'angreal. Also sorry but this wasn't acting like such a powerful angreal when Lanfear had it.

We know that a 'weak' angreal (according to Elayne) can only triple your access to the OP, so a strong one that is nearly a sa'angreal would probably be 10 to 100 times as strong. I don't think Lanfear was even 2 times her strength with this angreal, let alone 10 times where she could have torn Rand into a thousand pieces before he ever thought to use his angreal.

This angreal's (sa'angreal's) strength is definitely being retconned by RJ/BS