Anyone else get stopped midway through level 4 with 1500xp till level 5? Anyone know if playing past this point is worth it? Will I still recieve xp / if this is the level cap will I be reiumbursed and not shafted?

This is the level cap for EA. You cannot complete the full game in EA.

Well, for EA so far. Level could increase as well content in time, if the the game gradually is updated until final version.
At least this is what I would expect, haven't seen anything official on this though.

Officially they stated that early access level cap is 4. Maybe that will change in the future, but I don't think so. DOS 2 EA was very similar, only chapter 1, and you couldn't get past some certain lvl.

I'm still only at lvl 2, but I'm OK with the cap. I would prefer to wait until the game is improved and ready for full release before I play the full campaign. In the meantime, I intend to try different builds and, hopefully, get to try out some new classes/subclasses released during EA.

Oh and to the OP, you're not getting shafted. It's EA, which is inherently a "purchase at your own risk" situation. Also, Larian has been very clear about what's on offer during early access.

I hope that they increase the level cap. right now the games pretty simple but that'll change, at the very least given their instance on having spells light the ground on fire etc they REAAAAAAAALY need to let us hit level 6 so they can get imput on well.. fireball

We'd only need to get to level 5 for fireball, but point taken.

I think level 4 is a really good level cap for EA currently. Its super easy to do all of the fights over-leveled Above Ground without actually trying, but once you get to

It's really just a good balance for testing encounters currently, and a spell like fireball would oversimplify a lot of them.

Should they take a different route than they did with DOS:2, and continue adding content, then yeah anything past where we are would hopefully start needing more tools than we have access to right now.

Hard disagree.

It's pretty clear that you can get to level 5 even doing just half of what Act 1 offers, I am pretty much level 5 XP-wise just by saving Druid Grove plus Underdark, without even touching the rest like Swamp, Gith, Inn, Gnolls and so on.

If the XP gain remains as it is you will see people leaving Act 1 as level 6 or near that out of their intended 10 levels total for a game, so that's a valid feedback there too that if getting to level 5 will invalidate everything in Act 1, then maybe it needs to be adjusted in some way, as in more level 5 encounters further in on less XP tossed around.

Other than that - I think it's ok for Larian to toss players a bone there fun-wise. Level 5 is a big power boost, you get to see new spells, new abilities and so on. This EA will last a LOOOOOONG time, I bet easy 2 years, so I do hope 2-3 months down the road they will unlock level 5 and maybe even do us a solid and make some sort of Arena or some such so we can slam some random NPC encounters while we wait for actual release for 2 years.

EA is capped at 4. Main game campaign will probably cap somewhere around 10. Not sure if there will be support included for higher levels, but the multiplayer menu suggests that there will be, in addition to either custom campaign modules or other campaigns through DLC or expansions.

As encounters stand currently I'd rather see them nerf XP gain a bit and make it a "if you do pretty much literally everything, you can get to level 5 before you leave Act 1" kinda deal.

For EA Fun I'd love to play around with level 3 spells, dont get me wrong, but being level 5 by the time of the goblins boss fights would be hilarious, and would honestly trivialize a lot of the Underdark. I like that it feels legitimately dangerous currently.

I possibly wouldn't mind if XP for most things was halved from what I'm reading. Only made it to level 3 so far, but it's really not that hard to get there from fighting your way into the Druid Grove and doing the first little dungeon and killing the bandits.

I'd rather have to really explore to get to level 4 or 5 in act 1 than rocket ahead.

Based on their implementation of spells so far, I really really want to QA the level 3 spells in early access too.

D&D rules for 5e is level 20 unless I read it wrong, which should be wrong, however, there are only a specific amount of encounters / quests which yeild exp that there is a cap somewhere. I totally disagree with this. There are too many games trying to "balance" this to keep the game "Competitive or challenging" that they forget some people just want that powerful wizard or rogue to mow down stuff. I think if a person wants to cheat, they are only cheating themselves out of their own experience with the game, or they actually like buring down things. I say leave the cap to endless almost like old school D&D and let players choose for themselves. After all aren't we accommodating for the players? Are you going to tell a customer, "No you don't need a super sized fry"? nope! "Are you sure you want a 32oz drink instead of a 16oz drink? NOPE! leave those decisions to the players. If it's multiplayer I can understand the restraint, and should due so appropriately.

I really just want 5e spells to go away and bring back some 2e like BG2, or no later than 3.5e, because the whole 5e is lazy, easy, and way tooo simple.

I maxed out my xp cap at level 4. I had more than enough xp to hit level 5 but it instead says "MAX LEVEL REACHED" when I would have dinged over to 5.

I wish this as well, the spell system in BG2 was just incredible with all the things you could do.

What, two years until the full release?!! Gosh, at that point I wonder if they should do away with the concept of a "full release" and just make all the content incrementally released. Yes, yes ... perpetual dwelling within the mists of unknowing over several years.

I don't mind the level cap as such, but it feels like it should be rather 6 or maybe even 8, considering the content available in EA. I mean my current play I hit level 3 when I met Nettie in the Grove, and I hadn't really done anything other than clear the crash site and the ruins. Feels like you'll hit the level cap with maybe half of the EA content still unexplored which is both a bit annoying for players and I also can't imagine that's a very useful metric for gathering data to improve the game.

They want act 2 to begin with a bang; you hit 5 when u get off of boat and have tons of shiny new skills and spells to play with since it is quite the leap for a lot of classes

This is perfectly fine and I fully expect them to drop xp gain down a little bit as you could definitely hit 5 without the cap which would trivialize whatever remaining content you have in Act 1 which just isn’t fun.

I’m more curious as to how they will handle solo characters since XP is the same with or without a full party but there are certain fights I don’t think will remotely be possible with everyone focusing strictly on you and your one pet/familiar.

I could be wrong tho and it’s next up on my play throughs.