You still get reduced attack interval and higher crit chance by putting points into those stats. The reduction of hit chance and dodge seems to balance out being able to attack more often and hit harder when you do. (I think you could go all in on Precision once your attack interval is low enough and you have enough vitality and resilience to make up for the extra hits done to you.)
As you collect more essence and level those up to higher Tiers. You see big changes in combat. My t3 wolf gives me +20 damage and t2 boar is giving me +35% crit damage. You do need to spend quite a bit of time focusing on an essence to do that though. I left my character on floor 36 while I was sleeping to get both boar and wolf to around 50% of the way to t4.