Yet Another Post about Difficulty Discourse
So with all the (usually aggressive) discourse on the difficulty of the game, I thought I'd throw my equally worthless opinion into the mix. I feel people who weigh in against the "game's too easy" camp tend to resort to "you're playing on a lower difficulty" or "you haven't even gotten through the game yet" in addition to the more traditional "Lol sweaty, no life elitist, go touch grass" responses.
I think it's a bit disingenuous to write off tactics as "maybe on lower difficulties" when it's clear the people who use them are playing on the higher difficulties (because they crave difficulty in the first place, go figure).
Some arguments about counters (teams that you might run into that counter your one-shot death squads) is valid to an extent, but in all honesty, you reach a point where counters for the ai are invalid because they don't have gear, stats, or tactics to leverage those counters. For example, in my first 100% Expert run, I had a mixed Alain squad (warrior, housecarl, Radiant knight, flex slot) and an all cav squad (3 knights and a rad knight with a flex slot) and I could one shot every non major boss enemy (and most major bosses) in the game, including flying units and spear units (who should in theory shut down my cav squad and half my Alain squad). I didn't do charge first turn cheese tactics. Heck, I didnt even use valor, so nothing like xp boost or wild rush or anything. I didn't do anything special. I just played the game, but the game can't keep up with the player.
I had to stop doing side missions and liberations because the game's level progression keeps you overleveled for the entire game, even if you carefully try to avoid that.
This means that points about only being able to solo squad or duo squad maps being a low difficulty tactic is also wrong. In fact, it's probably the strongest strategy to employ. Gear is limited, even if xp isn't, so arming up 10 squads can be a challenge, and while you may think soloing would be more difficult, it's actually easier because you can build the few squads you use up more. Unfortunately, if you try to go wide for a challenge, the abundance of xp and catch up mechanics mean they'll catch up too quickly and be in the same boat.
I partially blame the Stamina system for this. While it was clearly designed (and told to us in the tutorial) to discourage overuse of one unit, it actually has the opposite effect. If I have two units near each other and one is running low on Stamina, its preferable to constantly switch my 0 Stam unit in for combat because they effectively have infinite Stamina now and I can keep my other unit fresh. Because enemies will always Path on roads and never go around you, you can kill everything that moves on the map by parking in a single spot for many maps.
This would normally be countered by attrition (from regular damage, as well as assists). Unfortunately, this is either mitigated by the aforementioned first turn nuke builds (preventing all combat damage), or even more simply, solely by having 1 or 2 sustain units in your squad (which I actually think is a good thing as it encourages more balanced team building).
This is all assuming you're just not attaching a flyer to your super squad and skipping the map entirely (with a speed boost valor skill because you don't need the valor to deploy other units, or really for anything at all).
Now, some people are playing wide, with many units (stretching resources thin and playing maps slower), which is a perfectly valid playstyle. And these people might find the difficulty to be a bit higher as a result of this playstyle, but that hardly discounts the complaints about a more typical (and even if it wasn't, at least an equally valid) playstyle. People can say "their" squads are incapable of soloing maps, but that hardly means "no" squad can clear maps by themselves.
I'm glad others are enjoying the game, and I respect others' opinion on the difficulty and enjoy discourse on both sides. I just take issue with writing off one side because their experience doesn't match with yours (which applies to both sides, I admit), especially when people are playing in a completely different way, which again is fine, but to say others' ways are impossible, or they must be playing lower difficulties just comes off as dismissive and closed to discourse, which is a strange stance to take in a forum meant to engage in discourse.
Unfortunately, these problems persist, even in TZ, as permadeath doesn't matter if you never take damage in the first place. Further, there is an abundance (technically infinite amount) of items to revive the dead, even if you did knowingly enter a battle with a 100% accurate forecast and die, so throwing units at a problem is still an option (though an unnecessary one).
The issue isn't just one thing, either. It's not just cav squad or just charge spam, but rather any effort you put in will be met with no resilience. There is no rewarding feeling for coming up with a cool unique build to overcome that one challenge, no sense of accomplishment for clearing that particularly difficult map. You can engage with the mechanics as much or as little as you want, but battles will always play out the same. Send your 2 death squads forward, skip everything, clear map. It's easy to miss whatever you're fighting because the game never makes you bother to check. Its just "see red, blue smash." And that's a shame because there is a lot of depth to the system, and the arena even showcases some of that potential, but unfortunately, that amount of care and thought is not put into the rest of the game. The game reminds me of Persona in that regard, where there's so much depth to the combat, but unfortunately, the game never even asks you to use it, and if you do, you are punished because whatever semblance of challenge there was is obliterated.
And saying "just challenge yourself" is just as unhelpful as telling people who say the game is too hard to "get good." For example, in my TZ run, I am doing only story squads (Alain childhood friends, Tricorns, Old Guard, Blue Knights, Rose Knights, etc.) with no items, no valor, no repair, no side quests (except to recruit specific teammates), no liberations (except story ones to recruit or borders, or if it blocks a part of the map), no aux battles, etc. And I still can't get the challenge I crave, even with all these restrictions. I even did a no cav run back on an Expert run and full cleared a couple regions before just dismissing that because it failed to present an adequate challenge.
As a last note, people who say the game is just right, or even difficult, aren't necessarily wrong, either. They are experiencing that feeling, and that may be based on their own skill with these types of games, their own playstyle, various challenges they may have imposed upon themselves, etc. I listed a lot of reasons the game is too easy "for me" and some others, perhaps, but I'm sure they could list off a list of reasons the difficulty is adequate for "them" and others.
The point is, I think it's more helpful to have a discourse, when both sides list out their reasons for stating their claims, rather than just resorting to dogmas or repeating their premise in usually derogatory ways (the game is easy, how could you be finding any challenge; or the game is so difficult, you're lying about it being easy for your own ego). I just think this is an unproductive and disingenuous way to have a discussion. So I'd rather explain my side and see others do the same to have an equally unproductive, but more genuine discourse.
TLDR: Here's a list of reasons I think the game is too easy, but people who experience the game in a different way and find the difficulty to be adequate also have valid opinions. And I think it's just weird for either side to dismiss the other offhand, especially when there are so many points of evidence and specific things to cite.