Originally posted by dimmyzor:

It's not "cheating" to prepare the area for the boss fight you know.. maybe down the trees, level the ground, build some protective walls, clear nearby enemies before the fight.
Generally, level up your items to max, like you said, max foods and all that, survey/scout the area and have fall-back plan if you get overwhelmed, in all situations.

Yeah, true.

@Trike
Definitely worth clearing it out at a minimum.

Learning curve can feel unforgiving, however, once you learn the nuances it is really a sweet game.