I am more and more convinced that they planned the game with the difficulty curve of act 1.
But someone got kicked out of the company or got sick and they replaced her or him with a game journalist.
I have a few theories about the difficulty:
1. they wanted streamers to shine while they played, and so they made the game relatively easy for that purpose. Streamers feel good playing because they're doing well, looking impressive (on tactician!), and so they keep streaming the game.
2. the early play testers for Act II were better suited for a lower level difficulty.
3. the fella in charge of setting the tactician difficulty either sorely misjudged the mark or erred on the side of caution. relying on too much feedback from folks who should've been giving feedback to a lower level difficulty.
4. it's just tough to get the difficulty right and it's a work-in-progress.
If I had to guess, I'd say it's a combination of all four.
