There are times when all you need to do is put your articles in a couple of columns. No need for cards or tiles or other fancy styles. Although, it's easy for your site designer or an author with a bit of CSS know-how to dress a two columns layout up with special colours, shapes, sizes, and so on.
Can you combine the cols-2 class with other classes like cards, masonry, and so on? No, not really. Maybe one day. Except file tiles.