Melee is HM.

Range is EZ mode.

Agree? OR DISAGREE?

God dam right it's HM.

reflects is op

BV is melee. Other than that, yes.

Melee is easier to play and scale in the earlygame up to low-tier maps, then hits a plateau in yellow to red maps where ranged generally scales easier. If you manage to overcome the plateau with a solid build and good items, IMO there isn't much of a difference in endgame. It depends more on what skill you're using if anything. If you've got something with good AOE coverage or high mobility (flicker/shield charge/cyclone trigger build), IMO you'll be fine.

The unpleasant part is the mid-to-high tier maps plateau where stuff suddenly starts hitting HARD and getting beefy while you've already done most of the scaling of your damage and defenses and typically there's just some life and a little damage left to squeeze out until you hit some significant gear upgrades.

Wouldn't call it exactly hardmode, it's just a bit different.

With ranged there's a problem where you rarely get hit by anything since you blast everything before it touches you so you might overestimate your capabilities and get served. It's not an issue in SC, it can play you a bad joke in HC. Melee has its own range of problems, of course, but at least with a melee build you have a better sense of your guy's defensive capabilities as you go up in map tiers.