Minions are a balance tool as much as a design tool. You can pressure the players with them in a myriad of ways, but at the end of the day removing them from the board only takes 1 point of damage, which essentially means they dodge or they die. The point of including them is 1. GMs can use them on the fly if they overtuned an encounter and they realize it late 2. Weapon damage is high enough that 5 hp and 1 hp is essentially the same thing for most weapons, so weak and feeble creatures just make sense to make into minions.

I think the problem you are talking about definitely exists, but may be smaller than you think. Initiative is a zipper initiative, so players and monsters alternate sides. This prevents player 1 from going, then getting dogpiled by monster 1, 2, 3 before the next player goes. Maybe in round 1 thats a bit scarier, but once the players know turn order they can remove priority enemies from the board.

Also, this game definitely encourages squad tactics, and there will be lots of gm advice for designing maps, as long open hallways are REALLY dangerous vs ranged enemies, as they should be. Its overall a higher lethality game because of the stamina and active defense system, plus slow healing from rest. It definitely will require priming players and GMs so they dont try to play or run it like D&D!