Personally, I like that things get harder as I play through the game, I only wish the dev. had realized that you would have to level up to make them stronger, had they made them stronger as you gained the points required to level up, it would have been great, since then people couldn't make the game super easy by staying at level 1 the whole way. or, perhaps, if they had made leveling up not require sleep this time, since it breaks the whole concept of getting HARDER as you play. Most traditional RPGs get easier as you play while making things themselves harder to compensate. This is backwards to how a game should be, however generates a sense of accomplishment, which gets clouded in Oblivion, not longer is being a higher level the goal, having better moves, and being stronger, are. In other words, when you hit master in security, opening chests becomes easier, while fighting monsters got harder and harder, but you are rewarded with GETTING to fight monsters that you never saw before. There must be some way to combine these in a way that an RPG will make leveling both a gain in strength, but a ramp in difficulty over time.
Perhaps.
It is time to retire growth in stats, or significant growth in stats over time, and instead, rely on growth of skills. after all, a swordsman might be able to bench 100 lbs at the begining of a game and only be able to bench 400 by the end, which is realistic and super elevated, perhaps, a max growth to 1000 is fantasy realist. Therefore, if you begin a game with a str of 100 and numbers increase effect at a constant non-exponential rate, by the end of the game a str of 1000 could be gained, a 10 fold only increase.
While enemies don't gain new skills, only gain higher base stats, and even then, not nearly as quickly as you. Perhaps, they won't gain them at all, and the fact that they are small numbers in growth to begin with, means that the first enemy you face off with will still be a challenge if you don't use any skills later on at the end of the game if you meet them in a group of say 5, which isn't a rediculous thing to consider.
After all, when you get down to it, a world isn't really devided into such wildly huge strength differences. In reality, 1 average person with a sword could take out a bear, 1 average bear with a suit of armor could take out 100s of unarmed people. It isn't the strength that determins who wins, it is what they have to use that will really make the difference.
Even in the shallow and broken implimentation of this concept in Oblivion, you see that it isn't how many levels you are, but how well you can counter what the enemy has to attack you with. Which is why you don't face off against mages with spells that can immobilize you completely until it is rational to assume you might be able to resist or counter it in some way. A well balanced character will be able to, and it is that balance that you as a player strive to achive. No longer is just leveling up 10 levels going to solve your poor ability to apply strategy, only getting the right potions, spells, resistances, or advantages will see you through.
Levels become a plot device, and a way to give the player more to do and look at, rather than a way to balance difficulty.
Perhaps.
It is time to retire growth in stats, or significant growth in stats over time, and instead, rely on growth of skills. after all, a swordsman might be able to bench 100 lbs at the begining of a game and only be able to bench 400 by the end, which is realistic and super elevated, perhaps, a max growth to 1000 is fantasy realist. Therefore, if you begin a game with a str of 100 and numbers increase effect at a constant non-exponential rate, by the end of the game a str of 1000 could be gained, a 10 fold only increase.
While enemies don't gain new skills, only gain higher base stats, and even then, not nearly as quickly as you. Perhaps, they won't gain them at all, and the fact that they are small numbers in growth to begin with, means that the first enemy you face off with will still be a challenge if you don't use any skills later on at the end of the game if you meet them in a group of say 5, which isn't a rediculous thing to consider.
After all, when you get down to it, a world isn't really devided into such wildly huge strength differences. In reality, 1 average person with a sword could take out a bear, 1 average bear with a suit of armor could take out 100s of unarmed people. It isn't the strength that determins who wins, it is what they have to use that will really make the difference.
Even in the shallow and broken implimentation of this concept in Oblivion, you see that it isn't how many levels you are, but how well you can counter what the enemy has to attack you with. Which is why you don't face off against mages with spells that can immobilize you completely until it is rational to assume you might be able to resist or counter it in some way. A well balanced character will be able to, and it is that balance that you as a player strive to achive. No longer is just leveling up 10 levels going to solve your poor ability to apply strategy, only getting the right potions, spells, resistances, or advantages will see you through.
Levels become a plot device, and a way to give the player more to do and look at, rather than a way to balance difficulty.