Ah, yes. The issue no one is talking about is how the expected curve will work in the full game and that it's make or break for Larian to get this right.
In DoS 1&2, the final boss was L20 and it was assumed that you'd be 19-20 if you did the main storyline. However, min-max or completionist could be 22+.
That worked in those games because leveling up was a simple matter of gaining more attribute points and stats.
Larian is capping the game at a certain level and adding no further spells or abilities thereafter, so reaching "max" level before the very end of the game will be a poor experience for players.
If, for example, the max is L12 and you reach this with 20% of the game left, you will not be able to make your character any stronger or gain new abilities but still play out the story. And you will likely be overleveled for enemies balanced around a lower level than your party.
This makes a steamroll effect and something Swen mentioned was a failure of DoS 2.
It already feels bad in EA to see Max Level Reached and know that additional experience is not counting toward making your character better. This will be worse in the full game for those who do additional quests and more content than the main storyline.
There has always been an issue with how Larian does transition in level and power spike between act transition. They have to guess what the average party level would be because the enemies do not adjust to PC's level.
For experienced players, it's easy to always be +1 over the AI due to sidequests. I hope Larian doesn't mess up the experience curve for Act 2&3.
