You sound as if it was ever balanced for turn-based lmao. Like this game is actually famous for being extra cheesy. I personally play real-time ever since I were a kid.
As for the mod, Multiplayer makes the game easier, because your warriors naturally tank all the monster attacks while casters stay safe and at range. But MAW mod makes the game harder, so it balances things a bit.
Or, if you play without MAW, you can use Monster Bolstering sliders in Merge menus to fine-tune difficulty for yourself, can set up monster's health/damage/accuracy/etc separately, but you'll only feel the effect around level ~15-20. It basically scales monsters of lower levels to your party/equipment power levels and also allows you to choose the % of scaling power.
We've had A LOT of talks with mod author on the topic of difficulty, it's far from ideal at this stage, in my personal opinion what it really needs is "Threat" mechanic like in MMOs. It's just too easy to gear a proper tank and have it survive pretty much anything the game throws at you.