I played through it, and i never had to kill more than like two enemies per area to get the resources needed to progress, and every boss is totally beatable without health dust, and one is more than enough of a safety net. To be fair though, the combat system is about buff and debuff management and for those who don't play turn-based games that might have flown right over their heads.
Combat is basically this - keep poise up at all times, try to have the touch debuff up if you can, cleanse any severe debuffs on your end with struggle. It's actually pretty cool how it starts simple but every level adds a new ability and thus a new layer of things to consider. I'd go so far as to call it just straight-up a good combat system.