Hempy buckets are hydro, just like any other hydro. You can make hydro easy or hard, your choice.
You'll hear people say, "Shit goes wrong in hydro fast," but the other side of the coin is "Shit gets better quicker in hydro."
More people grow hydro, more failed hydro grows. Plenty of beginners in soil fuck up to, just less of them so it doesn't seem that way to you. Take a look in the sick plant section, most threads and the biggest problems seem to be plants in soil to me and when there is a problem usually the soil guys don'T have a clue what's going on.
You can also make growing in soil easy or hard...much like anything else. But, how can you be so sure that "more people grow in hydro"? Especially if you believe this whole "soil is easier" ideology is nothing more than a myth perpetrated by e-parrots (whom apparently account for 90% of us); well you might presume all them e-parrots would be able to convince more people to grow in soil and that there appear to be more soil-related grow problems because more people are actually trying to grow in soil and not hydro as you assume.
As for the "soil guys" not 'seeming' to have a 'clue what's going on', that
might be in part because the majority of the more experienced growers here get sick of answering the same basic questions over and over again... or maybe 90% of us really are null-knowing e-parrot's.
Are you beginning to see how inane it is to make suppositions based solely upon wild generalizations such as what
you believe you "always" 'hear people say' or how things "always"
seem to
you? When a person truly believes that something is a certain way, anything that is however likely to reinforce that point of view is going to stand out more to them. This goes for pretty much every one and has to do with most anything.
Hempy, but I've done aero-nft, dwc, bio-buckets as well. They were all amazingly simple. In person I could teach anybody what they need to run any of those system easily within an hour. Most of the problems you see on the net in hydro are from people who didn't have the right teacher or are doing something wrong, not fair to blame hydro for that.
I could just as easily say that growing in soil has always been amazingly simple for me. I could teach anybody to grow in soil easily within half an hour. Most of the problems you see on the net in soil are from people who just don't know shit and are too damned lazy to take the time to read through the newbie section. Not fair to blame soil for that.
All I can really say is that I am always going to find my way of doing things easier. At the end of the day I am going to say that growing in soil is easier for me, because I know better than anybody else what my needs are and what it is that I like. To make soil growing easier you start with a good soil and good seeds, water and let the plant grow. I know of no easier way.