RPGs Where Staying A Low Level Is Helpful

Key Takeaways

• Final Fantasy 8 scales enemies to the player’s level, promoting the Draw system.
• In Dark Souls, staying at a low level benefits PVP modes.
• Dragon Quest 7 discourages grinding to prevent class system issues.

Some people love to grind in RPGs so they can be overpowered for the challenges to come. This is not always the best thing to do, however. Some games are smart enough to ensure that players cannot repeatedly destroy cannon fodder to over-level.

Sometimes, RPGs punish players for leveling up too much. The reasons for this are different depending on the game. It can be at the behest of the developers or a result of the game’s various systems interacting with each other. The games below offer an advantage for staying at a lower level.

1 Final Fantasy 8

Level Scaling Makes Enemies Harder Than They Need To Be

Final Fantasy 8 was not the first title in the long-running series to change up the leveling system, but it was the first to have all enemies scale to the player’s level. The advantage in battle does not come from simply being at a high level. Players have to engage with the Draw system to power up their characters.

It is an interesting idea, but it oddly ends up being more of a grind than just leveling up. At least in the remaster players can speed up the game time to make drawing from enemies feel less like a chore. It is a neat idea to avoid traditional level grinding, but it has its own faults. To further encourage the Draw system to get more powerful as opposed to leveling up, the enemies do not only directly scale to the party’s level but become notably harder at higher levels.

Never Level Up And Become Obscenely Powerful

The Elder Scrolls series has always used level scaling. Skyrim has it too but it is more evenly balanced to offer a smooth challenge early on and into higher levels. Oblivion, however, is more unwieldy with its level scaling.

Enemies increase in strength and health based on the player’s level to the point where their strength and health far outweigh the main character’s. Alternatively, players can also do an extreme run where they stay at level one and increase their skills through other means, becoming far more powerful than the other enemies who remain at level one.

3 Dark Souls

Stay At A Low Level For The Sake Of PVP

It may seem like the only reason to stay at a low level in Dark Souls is for the absurd challenge. However, plenty of players find a reason to stay at a low level through the PVP modes. Some players will stay at a low level but earn significantly stronger gear to give themselves a huge advantage when invading other players.

For those who like engaging with the PVP modes, this is certainly a sound strategy and a way to annoy newcomers who are going through the game for the first time and are still at the start of the adventure.

4 The Witcher 3

Just To Keep Getting Experience For Side Quests

The Witcher 3 is gigantic. There are more side quests and secrets off the beaten path than most players will ever care to uncover. The game seems to know this and caps experience points if Geralt is over the recommended level.

While some players might be relieved by this, others might be mad at not getting rewarded for doing the quests. For the latter players, be sure to be at a low enough level to make quests still give proper experience when moving forward with the main story. There is no way to be at a low enough level to make every side quest give experience points, but it will let one do more quests than simply killing random enemies.

5 Dragon Quest 7

Leveling Up Too Much Messes Up The Class System

Dragon Quest has a lot of traditional JRPG mechanics, but it has one system that encourages players to avoid grinding. Classes level up in Dragon Age 7 based on how many battles the party engages in. Once the player reaches a certain level, the battles will stop counting toward the class level in the area.

Since regular experience points keep coming in, this can create a nasty chain effect that prevents classes from properly developing. Dragon Quest 7 is not an easy game either, so people might grind out of necessity only to shoot themselves in the foot later on in the journey.

6 Disco Elysium

Having Few Points In Certain Attributes Is All A Part Of The Story

Disco Elysium is a funny example just because of how different of an RPG it is compared to everything else. The game has no combat so leveling and stat placement has nothing to do with living through tough encounters.

Purposefully having low stats in some areas here is just a way to experience the game differently. This can be just as beneficial as it is humorous and interesting. Because of this, players are not encouraged to become strong or smart in the traditional RPG way.

7 Tactics Ogre: Knights Of Lodis

Keep The Main Character At A Lower Level Than The Party

Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together gets the spotlight as the cult classic turn-based strategy game. A lesser-known prequel to the seminal RPG came out on the Game Boy Advance too. Enemies and bosses in Tactics Ogre: Knights of Lodis scale to the protagonist’s level.

It is easy to keep the main character, named Alphonse Loeher, out of combat and at a lower level than the rest of the party. Do this and the bosses and their enemies will be approximately at the hero’s level while the rest of the party will be significantly over-leveled, making the game a cakewalk.