Would you consider perhaps compromising? Instead of making it feature complete before balance, could you alternate between the two? Feature then balance, feature then balance. I promise you it will be much easier than trying to balance a very complex system. It will also help with perspective. As right now the beginning of the game is super option loaded. You've presented too many systems to the player that aren't even complete yet. You should design a tutorial. I think that would help you get perspective. Try to see your world as a new player would.
I actually think your desperation theme is really good. I've seen a few games that make the player feel desperate, and it makes the game more engaging. But if it feels unfair, you will lose the player's interest. I like the example of the barnacle from Half-Life. Or the first Gumba in Mario Brothers. These enemies are so easy to outmaneuver, but they've likely killed an embarrassing number of players. If you make it so the player feels embarrassed about their failure, they're more likely to anticipate it in the future. 3 steps forward, 2 steps back.
I think a lot of the problems are my messy code, I keep finding bugs where (for example) stamina isn't being used when it should! Fixing those adjusts gameplay a lot which usually means a better balance as it gets closer to my planned outcomes, but those adjustments are also the reason I'm wary of changing other features that touch the same stats. The current build is already much more playable, although that means I'm finding further bugs!
Titania's room was originally meant to be the tutorial but the game is a lot bigger now and there's so much more to cover that it's no longer working how I planned. The problem is that I really dislike the Ubisoft style handholding when you start a game, since it really breaks the immersion, and ideally I would love for the gameplay to be intuitive enough that help is never needed. The art and UI overhaul in v0.7 should help a lot but I know it's an unrealistic goal so I've been prototyping a help system that should cover those gaps. Still a way off on that yet unfortunately!