this is one of those games where the difficulty curve is kind of inverted but the more party members you get the more interesting combat gets. don't snooze on getting ness a full loadout as your first priority when you get into town. you can get a better hat if you find the secret treehouse behind the library. the library also has a "town map" that works in every major town. the cookies and bread rolls you get right at the beginning wont be very helpful for fast healing mid-combat, for that you will need hamburgers. if you played FF3 it would be similar to Tonics/Potions

the "hint man" in every town is also based. $50 is a pretty steep amount of money early on but he literally gives you hints for every major story beat so if you are ever stuck you have a diegetic walkthru to help you figure out what it was you missed

"healing" spell heals status effects, and is directly comparable to the healing "herb" items. might be a bit difficult to parse which groups of status effects each level cures but thats ok. Healing γ has a 75% chance to cure death and Healing Ω has a 100% chance to cure it

the non-damage spells like paralysis, shields, stat change might be hard to use with just ness and paula but once you can keep people alive for a few turns they can help with the more challenging enemies

peaceful rest valley is hard for most people. its also my favorite part of the game now because im a sicko i guess

paula is gonna struggle when you get her. just get her some levels and she'll be aight