Difficulty

I feel like I'm playing the spreadsheet version of Dark Souls, not POE.

You can stop dying often by investing into defense, or playing more tanky build.

But yeah, currently its fine, play glasscannon - prepare to die and don't cry on forums, don't want to die - play carefully, make character tanky, improve clearing which also in a way defense.

Had me in the first half, not gonna lie. lmao

+1 I think the difficulty is okay where it is.

Some specific changes, like monster density in breach and ritual, or just placement, could help some.

but a lot of complaints about difficulty are people who need to learn to move, dodge, attack, WSAD.

The river hags everyone complains about, aren't that bad. You just need to walk around their attacks.

old ARPGs taught you that you could just stand still. This no longer works.

I tried POE1 last night (level 95 jugg) and it was like a clicking simulator. You click on something, and everything dies. Stand there and do nothing, nothing happens because you're functionally invincible outside of a few circumstances.