Same here.
I usually play games in "hard" difficulty because I like challenge and I don't mind doing the same battle 3 times or more...
I'm absolutely not the greatest expert of D&D rules but I played BG1/2 many many times so everything is not new to me...
But here I have to admit that sometimes it's hard, even during random encounters.
SPOILER ALERT
I.E I choose to kill all the goblins at the mill. I kill the leader so the fight stop but I choose to do it again and kill every single ennemies before him to have more XP. This combat was not impossible but hard. I think it would fit a normal difficulty but with 6 companions.
Same in the goblin camp. Crusher want me to kiss his feet, I refuse, He fight me, I decide to kill him so the entire camp attacked me. The battle was hard because there were many many ennemies. Still not impossible if you use verticality but it's hard to fight during 1h against 30 goblins and not very "fun", especially with only 4 companions that need more than one turn to kill their opponent.
Now I'm playing in the goblin dungeon and still decide to kill them all. It's still possible, I don't have to reload but it's hard.
I usually have to rest after every battles.
I really like it but I think it suit a normal difficulty for a party of 6
With only 4 it's sometimes really hard to manage dying companions and the combats are very very slow.
I love those huge encounter so please, add more companions in party rather than removing ennemies
