Only the start (and a couple of encounters) is actualy hard when playing on Dark Mode and knowing what you are doing, as soon as you get some decent gear, Dark mode is not that bad.
I played dark mode on my first runthrough, and didn't find it too demanding, especially not with the special armour sets, which make at the very least the rest of the chapter you find each one in slightly trivial. Witcher 2 builds dark mode General Discussions > Topic Details.
