The main campaign quickly turns into a mess of visual effects, bloated numbers and pointless after pointless fight. After the soul crushing experience of the last two acts (at least) of the main campaign this is a welcome change of pace: low level, focussed on character builds and not overpowered items, to the point narrative with low stakes.
I specially liked how they work around the limitations of the engine to implement scenarios where you might be outmatched but you can still use the environment in your favour, the problem is of course that the limitations still play a role, because all of these clever solutions can be easily found by pressing tab. In anycase, this is the right way to push the series forward,
I'd only add more open world into the experience, being able to return to areas and find new challenges will add a lot, the experience in Through the Ashes is just linear.
As for number bloating and constant power creep, it might be ingrained into the base rule set, but regardless of where it comes from, it really helps to keep the max level bounded and the experience challenging without the need of constant more and more powerful enemies thrown at you.
By the end of the main campaign I have so many tools at my disposal that just pre buffing (which I hate) could become a chore of minutes and then still miss some of the buffs that the game made necessary by amping up enemies with all kinds of ridiculous buffs, and even then I would not use 80% of my arsenal because it wasn't necessary, that's just a sign of lack of focus and more breadth than depth design.
So if you like a more focused experience that engages your brain, gives you the bare minimum and forces you to use all of it, this is a campaign for you.
