The biggest point of range mode to me so far is that if you have it turned on, it won't attempt to heat the battery pack except with waste heat (so won't turn on the battery pack heaters). In middle of winter when you have the car cold soaked all night and not plugged in, that is a significant amount of energy saved in the morning, especially if you are not driving to a charging station as your first stop.
Range mode allows me to tell the car in cold conditions that no, it shouldn't waste energy heating up the battery when I'm just doing a quick 20 minute drive.