You could have suggested them to ignore the tree sentinel or Margit, hoever was their first enemy, you could have suggested the to explore the game and ignore hard enemies just like in skyrim we ignored trolls, bears or dragons until we levelled up… Idk, anything but “you didn’t even try how dare you say you don’t like it” wtf.
The first enemy is meant to destroy you. You skip him and find other things to do and come back later when you’ve leveled up. It’s an open world game.