I definitely don’t disagree with the author here. Combat does feel tedious. I spent 2 days trying to kill the owlbear on balanced. I had to quick save every turn to avoid my entire party being 1-shot in the same turn. I think I had 15-20 game over scenarios when attempting to fight it.
I never much enjoyed dnd combat either, so that’s probably a major focus. Combat feels almost entirely random with next to no consistent hit rules. Honestly it’s on me for not researching the game more before buying it. It’s a great game but I have a 0% chance of ever finishing it due to how frustrating the combat is.