What is the common level cap in RPGs these days ?

Hello everyone,

the other day I saw this forum entry at the DDO forums :

I cannot find any data showing the process to advance beyond level 30. I am not showing any experience. Nothing on ddowiki or the forums. The forums have
specific info and nothing about advancing. I am not a big forum person.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea…evel-beyond-30

Apart from the fact that in DDO there exists a thing like an "Incarnation" and multiclassing as well, which surely makes the situation in DDO quite complex,

I was a bit astonished that someone apparingly thought that there must be more levels for a character than level 30.

I became curious, because level 30 as the level cap sounds pretty normal to me - but I haven't played many modern RPGs in the last years.

Which has led me to this question :

How many levels are common in RPGs these days ? What is the maximum of levels one can reach ?

Please telle me, and please add the name of the game, of course.
And if there are more complex things like multiclassing in a game, please explain that, too.

I'm just curious.

Alrik

DDO is mmo. Level cap in mmos tends to be pushed further with each "expansion".

Would'nt you have to specify a ruleset or setting, or something similar for this question to make sense? Are you specifically asking about D&D?

No, I'm just curious in general. I mean, where did this guy get the expectation to get more levels than 30 from ?

What do you mean where?
https://vanilla-wow.fandom.com/wiki/Level_cap

A level cap is the maximum level a player character can reach in a game. The base game of World of Warcraft has a hard cap of 60th level, so no characters can go above this level. Some games have a soft cap.

Those playing with the Burning Crusade have their level cap increased to 70.
Those playing with Wrath of the Lich King have their level cap increased to 80.
Those playing With Cataclysm have their level cap increased to 85.

That's how it works in mmos.

If DDO is Dungeons and Dragons Online then the base rule set would dictate that L 20 is max with any levels over pushing you to epic levels. As Joxer pointed out as a MMO the game doesn't even get warmed up until you max out the character level wise as it is all about the grind after you are maxed out.
Or such has been my experience with MMO'S.

Depends on the game. I don’t think there is a “common level cap”

For instance Original Baldur’s gate without expansion was between 7-8 depending on class and dark souls is 713 if i remember correctly.

It's all over the place in single player and multi-player games. I don't think I could even tell you one that's most popular. About all I could say is that multiples of 10 (including 10) are really popular.

Originally Posted by Alrik Fassbauer
No, I'm just curious in general. I mean, where did this guy get the expectation to get more levels than 30 from ?

Most likely the expectation of beyond-level-30 comes from the reality that there are many RPGs that allow you to level a character beyond level 30. I don't personally believe that's a good assumption, but for the more casual gamer, that reason would make a lot of sense.

Originally Posted by TheMadGamer
Most likely the expectation of beyond-level-30 comes from the reality that there are many RPGs that allow you to level a character beyond level 30. I don't personally believe that's a good assumption, but for the more casual gamer, that reason would make a lot of sense.

Yes, and this is why I just wanted to have a collection of level caps, not some discussion about it.

Facts? That's it? That's what Google is for! Let's see, Anthem is 30. World of Warcraft was 120 as of August of last year. Star Trek Online was 65 as of April of last year. Just do a little googling and page through the irrelevant stuff.

Yeah…it's a bit arbitrary. However, a tendency I see lately is that Single Player games are moving towards dropping a hard cap, so that leveling keeps being an element of progress till the end of the game.

Some of the last RPGs played. When I mention "no cap", that doesn't necessarily mean that there is no cap, but it means that you don't reach it by normally doing all available content without grinding.

Elex - no cap
Bards Tale 4 - no cap
Kingdom come Deliverance - no cap
Avernum 3 - no cap
Divinity OS2 - no cap
Avadon 3 - no cap
Fallout 4 - no cap

About the same size as a closet.

This is a bit misleading (imho) because may of these games have no grinding so there is an expected max level. So while the system might not declare a level cap there is an effective level cap.

Originally Posted by Kordanor
Yeah…it's a bit arbitrary. However, a tendency I see lately is that Single Player games are moving towards dropping a hard cap, so that leveling keeps being an element of progress till the end of the game.

Some of the last RPGs played. When I mention "no cap", that doesn't necessarily mean that there is no cap, but it means that you don't reach it by normally doing all available content without grinding.

Elex - no cap
Bards Tale 4 - no cap
Kingdom come Deliverance - no cap
Avernum 3 - no cap
Divinity OS2 - no cap
Avadon 3 - no cap
Fallout 4 - no cap

Pillars of Eternity : 14 (?)
Path of Exile: 100 (You'll likely never reach that. No multiclassing, since there are essentially no classes)
Pathfinder Kingmaker: 20 (multiclassing does not change that.)
Grim Dawn: 100 (at least with the ashes of malmouth expansion)
Vaporum: I think somewhere below 20. May change with more patches/updates.
The Witcher 3: 70 base game, 100 with expansions. I think.
Age of Decadence: Not applicable.

That's just a few. It's all over the place, but ~20 and ~100 are quite common.

Originally Posted by Cacheperl
Pillars of Eternity : 14 (?)

16 with expansions, 12 base game.
Pillars of Eternity 2 : 20.


Some games have super high level cap, but they are unreachable without "new game+", like The Witcher 3.

You even have games that increase the level cap with each new game+.
Like Heroes of Hammerwatch.

Originally Posted by you
This is a bit misleading (imho) because may of these games have no grinding so there is an expected max level. So while the system might not declare a level cap there is an effective level cap.

Yes and no. You are not forced to grind but in most of these games you can finish it with significantly different levels.

Bards Tale 4 and Divinity OS 2 are probably the ones with the most limited range.

All the other ones can be finished with extremely different max levels.

Thank you. That there are SP offline games with no cap is new to me (although not really surprising me, since I think that more and more SP games will try to emulate "The MMO Experience" …).
Though, I rather expected that from MMORPGs.

Excuse me… Even ancient FO2 had practically no cap (actually it's level 99, but you won't reach it normally - only when the game is finished and a certain item found).