Workbenches work just fine and as I mention are cheaper to make.

Just overlap their areas so there are no gaps and no spawns will happen at all. You can make the area so large that raids may happen but nothing will spawn or they will spawn far enough away to not aggro on anything and just stand around looking stupid.

I have played about 15 complete playthroughs including some after H&H and the dynamics have not changed since the game came out.

If you mean workbenches cause spawns in that it is one of the structures that count as one of the 3 needed in an area to be considered a "base" but I would assume wards as well as many other items count for that as well. Having more than 3 isn't going to increase the chance of a raid. And you are likely to not set up an outpost without at least 3 of the items anyway since it includes beds and fires... many things.

The only raid that happens outside of a base is the wolf hunt event. That only should happen away from a base in either the mountains or plains.

If you are worried about them being attacked you can cover or bury them as well.

I've even taken over whole plains areas with just workbenches. No spawns, not even deathsquitoes ... although I ended up opening up an area so lox could spawn and I could farm them.