OneDrive is, unfortunately, forcibly crammed down user's throats, but there are some good reasons for that. Rather than debate the issue, I may have thought of a way to make it less of a problem for you and others.
I don't even bother to set up OneDrive, so I don't have the problem or a testbed, but the functionality is similar to iCloud for Mac. The biggest problem that cloud sync services have is that they start by moving everything that exists in certain folders to the cloud and then leaving a stub file on your local system. Some programs don't deal well with the actual file not being immediately available for file activity, especially because the cloud services are integrated to the point that the OS is lying to apps and pretending that the file is really still there while it fetches it.
I know that you have searched in vain for a way to exempt files and folders from OneDrive, but have you tried the inverse? Isn't there an option to always keep a local copy of files and folders you identify? I know that iCloud for Windows has that feature.
Okay. I hit post, then did my own search. You should be able to use the OneDrive
Files On Demand settings to ensure that the files are always available on the PC:
Learn how OneDrive Files On-Demand syncs OneDrive files and how to turn it on.
support.microsoft.com