im pleased that the normal mode is somewhat challenging and forces people to pay attention instead of afk. About time we got some difficulty increase given that there's 80 levels of learning before.
that said, the moment to use the tank level 3 lb is hard to spot depending on your camera as me and my brother found out as the mt and ot respectively

good to hear as well no cutscene in the ex version. I haven't touched it yet, but these long ones aren't good for extreme/savage. short ones like Zurvan are, or if we have to have cutscenes make em like eden so we reset and get 2 tokens :P