A good part of it does boil down to character building, partly in stats and partly in equipment. As you accrue weapons and armor with special bonuses (e.g. deals extra fire damage, protection from poison, etc.), you have a choice to sell them or have the academy blacksmith melt them down. This permanently teaches the smith those bonuses, and fills the academy's store with precious metals. Given that you have enough of a certain metal, you can then have bonuses added to equipment.
Part of the game also requires you to be familiar with potions, scrolls, spells, and skills, and not neglected to use them. Mostly, you have to know how to conserve consumables and be aware of when you should make use of them. Although enemies drop a lot of them, you're not always guaranteed to find certain buffs or restorative goods. Unlike games like the original Diablo or Torchlight, you can't just pull up to a store and buy 50 potions, then "1 key" your way to victory. Stores have limited supplies, plus consumables are pricey.
You will need consumables, too, because sometimes you bump into large crowds, or really tough champion enemies, or bosses that can wreck you almost effortlessly, or all of the above. I had trouble with one ice mage boss who could strip off more than half my HP with a single spell, plus she had minions. I not only had to figure out how to work a restorative item into my plans, but put distance between us so I could stay out of range of her attack, use a buff, and implement crowd control. Thankfully, there's a scroll that allows you to teleport you any tile visible to your character, plus I had a couple of battle skills that came handy when I got surrounded. One knocked enemies back several tiles and another allowed me to jump to a nearby tile and damage any adjacent foes. I ended up using the stairs to temporarily escape and rest to restore HP, which unfortunately healed the boss too. I was able to pick off her underlings with combat skills, then beef myself up enough to defeat her. Bear in mind that I didn't regularly run afoul of situations like this one, but it was the most memorable for me.
Stat boosting only helps you so much. I found 50 Proofs of Stremf in my campaign and I still find bosses who school the shit out of me. Mainly, I think the academy is there to help expedite the early phases of the campaign so you can get back to where you left off sooner.
The only thing my milkshake brings to the yard is a subpoena.
