Can’t agree more with ‘Artificial difficulty’. It’s the main thorn in the games’s side.
I told it already once, I think some backgrounds need their core perks pretaken. For example:
HedgeKnight – Battle Forged
Swordmaster – Nimble
Their cost is hight and It helps to use such recruits on frontline immediately in their natural roles instead of long time piking from behind.
Or maybe just to give them an exceptional opportunity to take these hightier perks despite lower levels.
There are plenty of other highskill backgrounds such as sellswords which are free to build.