How do you make actual progress in this game? Every time I get a character to adept, she gets kidnapped. By the time the rescue mission is novice, so my novices can rescue her, I lose one or two of the novices in the rescue. Meanwhile, by the time I get the rescued girl back, the game has flipped her class, I can't even remember what class she was adept at, and I can't tell either as it lists her as novice on the class switch screen.
To expand on the previous posts, an important aspect of the game is knowledge.
Understanding what the enemies can do and roughly how much more beating your girls can take is key to making solid judgement on when to retreat and when to push forward. This includes curios as just clicking on any option is bound to result in something bad. The game actually rewards exploration, but only if one does it with a very careful mindset.
My advice is to first establish a single core team of 4 girls with complementary classes. You get two good characters at the start of the game (unless you're using any modifiers), a cleric and a warrior, so now you only need two damage dealers, such as a mage and a rogue. Aim for the two frontline damage skills with both (usable on the first two position).
Protect your core group at all costs until you get atleast one additional strong group. Prioritize missions which will raise their levels and look for strong early game items:
Decaying Watch and
Mark of Change.
The first one increases the damage of a girl massively with no catch but only if you're still on the first 80 in-game days, as it will become only paperweight after that.
The second one is ridiculously important. Get one as soon as possible! It will randomize all stats of a girl at the start of every combat while it is equipped.
So:
1, Equip Mark of Change
2, Enter combat with that girl until you have good stats (atleast one 19+ and Constitution not below 10). For a mage, randomize until her Intelligence is a 20, other stats don't matter as much if you protect her.
3, Unequip Mark of Change
4, Give it to another girl
Repeat until you have a team of exceptional stats.