I would definitely say that combat is to fast right now. Once I got 3 party members I pretty much never had time to look and see what the enemies were even doing or what my attacks did to them. My recommendation would be to put in a combat speed slider in the options. That way if someone has difficulties with a harder fight they can slow it down and take they're time figuring out the best battle plan. While with farming essence they can crank the speed up for enemies they know they can blitz through.
Another suggestion since I'm here: I think the after battle regeneration should be buffed or changed. As is, I found myself having to go back to camp to heal after every "late game" plant fight. I see a few ways you could do this. You could just increase the max regen either by default, through an upgrade (like the teleport), or via level up. You could also make it so instead of healing to a set value every time, you instead heal a certain amount every time. The last possibility I can think of is to just regen to max every time, after all it's not really hard to move back to camp every fight right now, just tedious.
Suggestions aside, I really love Aftersoul! Keep up the good work.