My excessive FE:A grinding was more of an overzealous OCD in trying to max most of the relations and classes in a single playthrough, not because I hit a wall. The only wall I ever hit was on Lunatic, when I was forced to grind away the little money I manage to gain from some missons because I was stubborn enough to not use Frederick at all during the first chapters. Let's just say that chapter 5 was...annoying (putting it mildly).

On Bravely Default Hard the bosses themselves are the walls since they're not your regular jRPG bosses, but more akin of Etrian Odyssey bosses (Bosses that have massively improved abilities and stats over the rest of the common enemies plus once they go below a certain HP threshold they go full berserk), at least on the demo.

On the main game, things will probably be different. The jump between bosses will be significantly lower and with the previous knowledge of what abilities to seek, it can be planned ahead to avoid any kind of unnecessary grinding. After hitting a certain number of abilities and balancing my team, I'm confident i'll be able to manage Hard rather well (at least better than in the early stages of the demo).

Congrats on the boss, beat it myself with knight sub ninja, Valkyrie sub ninja and two black mages sub white mage.

There is one gamefaq which I looked through, based on that either the demo is heavily orchestrated in terms of skills or the altered version we are getting is that different. Skills like black resonance had to be learned for example instead of being an inherent skill of the job. Also looks like most of the good jobs need to be unlocked via quest.

I'm unlocking the village because someone said that carries over, which would be good as the "special" that was blocked out looks to be linked to rebuilding the village.

Whoa is this confirmed in anyway? If true, it'd be a major plus to carry over. Having 4 lvl.3 stores and being able to buy Haste accessories + Ethers from the get go would be huge.

And yeah, I've been reading about the jobs over at FF wikia. It seems you'll have to work harder to get some of the best skills, like Multitask and Buff Up. Thankfully that'll balance things out more. 

Also, how much HP did the last boss had on normal? Because it seems that on Hard it doesn't have the 50% +HP if it's indeed 10K HP on Normal.

Yeah, that my main issue with RPGs in general. I get real OCD about wanting to get 100% of the game in a single playthrough and usually screw myself of the challenge because of that. For example, KH games might as well come with a single difficulty for me, as Proud/Critical mode does nothing to stem the OP of Sora when you start doing Synthesis before completing the main game. 

I must say, I actually am really, really enjoying the game. I tried the demo on hard and went straight to the soutern ruins and was destroyed, so it put me off a tad but now I've got the hang of it it's actually really fun. Hopefully the full game is just as fun!

My only worry is it'll be a bit short...

http://www.howlongtobeat.com/game.php?id=1307

Granted this is out of two polled people only, but I'd also read somewhere online that the main quest could last up to 70 hours, without 100% completion. I'll try and find that link for you.

Here you go: http://nintendoeverything.com/bravely-default-takes-60-70-hours-to-complete-plus-other-details/

Interesting stuff. Looks like my fears were pretty baseless after all! 

I think it's a wise move getting this game early. There's a good chance it'll become extremely rare and I don't want that.

Same here, especially the CE. That'll fly off the shelves/preorders and won't ever see the light of day again, at least on retail.

It's not confirmed no unfortunately, (I need to stop getting your hopes up) my bad. Seems the bonuses and villagers and street pass carry over. So at least you will have the extra villager from the demo. I really only care for the ether's in all honesty early game.

Boss was definitely 10, 000 hp on normal, at 30% he starts to heal himself so I had to use the skill for scan so I could plan and time the final assault.

I was fortunate enough to overcome that heal mostly through sheer damage (2 Ninjas Dual-Wielding Kunais are too OP on the demo). 55% on the first 3 BP turn, the rest on the next 3 BP turn. 

Might try with a party of Valkyries and B.Mages to see how a different approach goes. Since Valkyries Two-Handling Mythril Spears have an insane P.Atk (105 for Tiz, 102 for Edea), their jumps are deadly after a few buffs or Love Songs.

Even if it's just villagers and bonuses, that's already good for Hard.