Yeah, I've played around a bit now with my 10-base-energy/step setting - and it's a bit too harsh in the beginning - considering all other regular actions/tasks your slaves are involved on a daily basis the most you can realistically get out of a level 1-2 team is clearing a zone ONCE, and then a second time after resting in the field - after that you're exploration for the day is basically over.
That's quite a bit closer to what I consider 'challenging', but also quite a bit too far on the hard side - I would say trying for 7nrg/step base with a lower cap of 2 or 3 could work quite well. Without capping it on the lower side the early game is just way to limited while mid-lategame is as easy as it was before. But from the bit of testing I've done, I would consider the experience a bit clearer designed - before I went with 2 people around level 3 into Fairy Grove and just fished some high-priced slaves. Since I normally start with a Wolfkin 'companion' I can manage to 'scout' up to this zone-level, what negates nearly every danger since you can just pick the fights you want. And doing so, I regularly was able to circle 2-3 times to the zone - that's something you're unable to do, if you have to deal with higher energy cost though... so... I feel I'm on a good track in this department.
Viewing post in Regarding difficulty and balancing
i dont rl understand how clicking "end day" more times or gathering resources longer can made game more engaging
i m very involved in game design and i care a lot about moderm game market, but challenge should came out from
job or resource menagment or combat (for me erly combat and erlygame resource menagment in strive is prettty cruel already and i would just need something for lategame)
Leonais mod is not for me since he closed markets in other cities and basicly destroyed value in traveling to new places imo
but i like your case guys, just dont like methods you are using to made strive "challenging", i hope you will be more happy once you set it as you want and have fun playing
small NOTE: i m the guy who create Mage character with 2 magic affinity just to have 2x cheaper spells and is not focused on spells anyway, but needs 3k mana daily and alvays ends day with 120- -40 mana (even with 10 Nympho Sub-sexcrazed drows with every item thats gives daily lust and heavy drugs in their diet) and barely any gold left for 1st 10 days + my playstyle is heavy grind focused
Note2: i currently playing Strive without using Mansion upgrade points loop and its pretty challenging before you unlock sebastian as your source of mansion upgrades