Learning every thing means shit since you can...you know...actually set your skills.
If you teach Kaim every type of magic there is and equip him with them, of course it's gonna be easy as shit. I'm not saying LO was HARD, but it was a HECK of a lot more challenging than BD.
On the first disc, Jansen was really my only healer until I got Cooke in my party. So the first disc was consistently challenging and I had to use some strategy to get by a lot of times. The fight at the grave yard with the horse knights was TOUGH because of this.