There is a huge difference between running a routing node and just running your node to plug into the rest of the network. The former is indeed more demanding, I think the latter is still very doable for a plebs.

I ran a pretty profitable node more than a year ago, even though I am not that technical. But back then, mistakes were not that costly... so in the current environment, I agree that you better know your shit, or that you learn quickly from your mistakes.