I'd prefer no level cap at all, or if it must be done then a soft cap like Wasteland 2. Although I consider myself a WRPG guy, I have a big soft spot for JRPGs like Disgaea where you can amass hundreds of levels.

It depends on the system, but I'm kinda ballparking 70 as someone who used to grind out 100 levels (and max EVs) in Pokemon.

What's the point of 9999 levels in Disgeaa if the stat differences are so little as to allow such a meaningless number of levels? You may as well crack open Progress Quest at that point.

In most games, there's a logical plateau of levels where you've learned all the skills you need/want, and don't need further stat increases or the gains are such that there are power up items which would provision much better towards that. In many games, your abilities are completely irrelevant of your actual number, as there are even leveling subsystems.

I dunno what the level cap in TOME 4 is, now that I think about it, but it's such an example where you'll long exhaust any semblance of usable skillpoints and even statpoints before hitting the level cap.

And the Avernum remakes are hardcapped at 30, if I recall, with a maximum of skillpoints to spend too.

Well, at sufficiently high levels, the difference between levels may be small, but you're not getting those levels one at a time. You can easily gain dozens of levels with a single action (that kills multiple enemies, since unfortunately only kills get you XP), or even hundreds if you're a level 1 character with a powerful weapon using Winged Slayer (which you have because you reincarnated after learning it) on Cave of Ordeals 3.

In later games in the series, I hear that you can go from level 1 to 4-digit levels.

Then again, the whole level system feels meaningless once you realize that the way to get high stats is to levelup your equipment instead; such powerful equipment is why a level 1 character can one-shot Cave of Ordeals 3.

By the way, random Disgaea fact: Level 99 enemies give a lot of XP. In fact, for an enemy that isn't level 99 to give that much XP, the enemy would have to be over level 300. On the other hand, enemies that are level 100 or just above that give rather poor XP when compared to those just below 99. (This quirk also applies to other N1 RPGs (the ones developed by N1's Japanese branch, not other games by that company).


That's one reason I would rather play the "originals", where you can get as many skill-point boosting potions as you want. In Avernum 1 and 2, you just need to buy out the shopkeeper's inventory, and the inventory will restock, and there's someone who sells those potions. In Avernum 3, it's possible to make those potions, though the required recipe is treated as an artifact in terms of rarity (in other words, getting it requires a special quest).

Earlier Dragon Quest games, particularly 3 and 4, do that (though 40 is around when you'd beat the game, though I've casually beaten DQ3's remakes at lower levels, before learning the spell that heals the entire party).

So, you'd say that a game like Cookie Clicker is disrespectful to the player due to not having any cap on cookies or other things you get in the game?

(There is a point in Cookie Clicker where you run out of good ways to boost cookie production, so things slow to a craw with your cookie production no longer seeing exponential growth.)

"when you run out of ways to boost" would be the equivalent of level limits. If the things that remain to "get" after that take outrageously long then, yes, that's particularly disrespectful of the player. (Then again, clicker-type games tend to be designed intentionally to waste the player's time in very disrespectful ways.)

As a side note, I recently learned about CivClicker, and I've found that it doesn't waste the player's time, or at least not nearly to the same extent. (Well, assuming you're not trying to go for that Neverclick achievement.) It is a much shorter and intense experience than something like Cookie Clicker.

Incidentally, I would argue that long cutscenes (particularly unskippable ones), long animations, and lengthy segments with no place to save are disrespectful of the player's time. (Maybe this thread of discussion deserves its own topic on the forum?)

(With that said, I *did* just program a PyBadge LC to act like an autoclicker to help with CivClicker a little.)

The actual number depends on the experience calculations behind it, but level caps are VERY important in my opinion to encourage two things: 1) characters being limited in expertise and defined in a role, and 2) replaying the game someday and seeing new and different things. If your goal is to get 100 in every stat and complete every quest with the same character then we are diametrically opposed in what we want from an RPG.

The calculations can feel off though if you level up too fast compared to the content on offer. I recently played The Outer Worlds' expansion and despite raising the level cap from 30 to 33 I hit the cap again halfway through the DLC, despite not even doing much side content. I don't think the cap should have been higher really, I think it should have been balanced better around the content on offer.

Just the two things I want to avoid. So what you want. I most definitely want to complete everything with one character in one playthrough and would much prefer to max it too, though the basic idea is a power trip, to become godlike in power by the end, which can also be done with a specialist but only if the game allows it and doesn't expect other roles to do well in every situation. And definitely don't replay.

No level cap.
When I hit the maximum 40 level of Kingdoms of Amalur 8 regions before the end, it was a death knell for my enjoyment of that game. I just rushed past the enemies, did quests ASAP ignoring enemies and loot and just went straight for the end, because there was no point delaying.

Everyone can ridicule Skyrim for horrid game design, but a single character run will NEVER get boring due to infinite leveling.

Level limits don't necessarily have anything to do with that; it only starts to matter if you have something like skill points whose acquisition is tied to level advancement in some way.

In Final Fantasy 4, leveling up to level 99 (reloading levels past 70 for the stat boosts you want, which is a pain) may allow the mages to do decent physical damage, but the fighters in the party are still going to do more, and Rosa is still going to be your main healer endgame. (The DS remake doesn't change this fundamentally; levels past 70 are based on equipped augments instead of being random, and characters get some new abilities, but Rosa will still be your main healer (though Rydia gets a couple new options, which is nice if Rosa is busy (which is why you get Rosa double cast if you can)), and Rydia your main offensive caster.)

In Final Fantasy 5, on the other hand, you'll likely be around level 40 (out of 99) by end game, but with patience you can master every job at that level. In fact, if you know what you're doing, it's even possible to master every job with an average level of 2! (FF5 is interesting in that characters have a clearly defined role based off their job and secondary ability, but you can easily change those outside of battle.)

Have you played PoE2? I found it really disappointing when after maybe 2/3 of the game you hit the sky. I would have been fine with "no skillpoints from here", but hitpoints, mana-pool? Something? It was a problem with the first game too, but there was really "end in sight" when it happened. But in PoE2 (with DLC) they expect you to go after really powerful things with no way to improve your party.

Incidentally, I think I would actually prefer it if stats like HP/MP would cap out before maxing your skills, rather than the other way around.

Yes, I know many have your preferences, that's why I said that. We're just on different sides of what we want from these types of games. I'm more a Fallout/Arcanum/Morrowind/Deus Ex type guy... I want to find a role for my character and stick to it, from stealthy assassins to charming knights or whatever. If you can get 100 in every skill and do every quest, you're "gaming" it more than I like.

What if you can get 100 in every skill, but doing so is impractical and unlikely to happen just by doing every quest?

Sure, good point. Morrowind would actually fall into the camp and was a bad example for me to use. However yeah, you'd have to play that game for 200 hours to max everything. I guess that would be a fair compromise for everyone, make a "soft" level cap where you max one playstyle but if you want to keep going and going you could eventually grind out 100%.

Developers do love to abuse completionists haha.

I'll have to slightly disagree.

I got a Skyrim character, level 240, most skills at 999. I have enough perks to get everything activated, and actually make a couple legendary skills to get rid of a couple unwanted perks.

Managed to get enchanting so well i am getting something like 50,000,000% boosted XP. (Restart stealth, sneak for 15 seconds, at 999 again for sneaking, restart illusion, one casting of invisibility or other and it's over 100). Only a handful of skills actually seem to take forever to actually raise.

Also got infinite money, so there's almost no point in picking anything up anymore, or buying/selling; And other than finishing the quests i have going, or finding new content i missed. The character seems close to a god and otherwise unbeatable. And even unaltered weapons do 400 damage and armor is like 700 per piece. (Hell even unarmed i do like 1,400 in claw attacks)

Though it took a good while (and lots of grand souls) before i broke past the barrier when i could enchant things crazily like that. Actually the enchantments aren't usable after a certain point and i only do XP/Gold/Soulgem charging enchantments, or fixed ones like muffle on walking. (Or go with a really weak enchanting boost to get a mere 20,000 extra in life/stamina/mana)

Certainly killing everything like crazy is still fun, but i think i went past the plateu. Though aside from highly boosted stats i suppose if i take all my XP boosting items off, and reset all skills it might be sorta a challenge for a while.