I started playing IWD2 under GemRB, and even the Prologue was tough. I had to use Sleep and Entangle on the goblins on the docks and kill them with ranged weapons, or else even my Paladin was taken down quickly if there were several of them. That was with leather armour and a small shield.

Now I'm using PlayOnLinux, and despite having copied across the icewind2.ini from my GemRB install, and having checked that I'm on Insane difficulty, the goblins die quickly and their HPs seem to be at 4 even though they are supposed to be doubled at Insane. Or is the HP scaling only for HoF?

At any rate, their damage should be noticeably more than at lower difficulties and I'm not picking it up. What do people typically find for damage done at this level? I'm seeing 2 often at Insane difficulty, and I'm sure that is too low.

Insane difficulty doesn't double HP only damage. Look at the weapons the goblins use, they all do 1 damage minimum according to the description.

Insane is not really difficult on the long run since you get double XP, if you want to have a challenging game don't enable MaxHP at level up and create your characters' with dex and con lower than 15.

Thanks! Not sure that XP scales too. Have levelled up earlier than my last party, but now have only 4 not and not 6.