You asked what justified the price bump, and he told you. Whether you care/will use the things that are raising the price is irrelevant. If you have no need for those features, then buy the cheaper version.
The price of products is more a function of the perceived value for the consumer, than a sum of the cost of the components.
Adding more expensive components to a phone, doesn't make its value go up if it doesn't add some extra functionality or durability or something.
The array of components for FaceID are just replacing TouchID, so for the consumer the net value is 0.
I don't care what they have to add to make it work, what matters to me as a consumer, is what value I get out of it. And at the moment it looks like a net of 0.
