Some roguelike fans have been pretty vocal about not liking at all the removal of permadeath; I get most of them haven't played the game to really understand the rationale behind the change: with the small pool of hit points, and a combat system that puts the player head to head with enemies, it's just too unfair on the player to completely end his run when the hearts run out. 

Removing permadeath, however, doesn't remove the "persistence of consequences" that is so important for traditional roguelikes; although your life will be spared and you will be warped to a safer location, you lose one Heart Container, and when you are down to three containers in advanced stages of the game, it just becomes non-viable to continue.

Removing permadeath also doesn't mean you can openly "save scum ", your save file still gets deleted when used, so you cannot save and reload to cheat on exploring a dangerous location or event.

In any case, the game FEELS much better now, let me know what you think :)