I agree with that 100%. I played through the game as a rogue and found the game really hard. I had to use tactics in every battle to win, because of that i found combat a lot of fun. The battle with the red dragon was almost impossible to do.
I re-played the game but with a fighter/blackguard and found it to be far too easy on hardcore level. No one will ever be able to create a AD&D game that caters to these extremes.