I think this game has a lot of potential once it manages to fine-tune various combat aspects. I was digging the straightforward school arena premise, the letter system is cool for moving along the "story" of what is mainly a combat-focused game, the art stands out and knocking out people through pain feels very satisfying. I look forward to more weapon/skill variety that is built around that meter rather than HP loss.
That being said, there's something that really isn't working with the Action Points. I tried a run avoiding the use of Beg beyond just using at as a debuff (my Edith doesn't grovel!), but I can see why it's currently so overpowered by allowing you to to avoid relying on MP. Given how several enemy attacks often reduce yours, the optimal strategy so far seems always being on the offensive (crippling the enemy with status effect stacks by doing so) until you run out, pausing to rest only when the enemy can't act so you can sneak in an extra attack. No point in hoarding them if they get chipped away.
The "Back Away" mechanics are really punishing, and once you run out of MP it's really not fun having to wait 2+ turns not doing anything. I wouldn't mind it being so severe if I didn't feel incentivized to go full cavewoman/unable to ration MP effectively, and if it wasn't a situation that seems to inevitably happen every fight regardless of how it's going.
All that being said, I'm looking forward to any future work on this, seeing how it will continue to shape up.