With monster scaling as is in D4 I don’t really understand why there is a level system in the game after all.
To unlock skills? This is already done by other means apart from leveling, like the renown system.
You could potentially remove the level system after all and replace everything with renown in the end.
I feel the level scaling just totally undermines the level system of an ARPG.
I like the usual way of a level system more, where monsters scale with progressing through the game and while entering new areas.
When you level-up you get stronger and the monsters in that area you are in at that moment, stay at the same level.
So you have this time window until you reach an area with stronger monsters, in which you can feel the increase in power gained by this level-up.
In D4, monsters directly scale up to your level but also so does gear that drops from that monsters.
As a result, when you level up, you directly feel weaker, because your gear is outdated for that level.
So you need to find gear again, that makes you stronger. That means that the level scaling even more outlines that power mainly comes from gear alone and not from the character himself.
In the recent betas, I felt like leveling up is a bad thing.
You want to finish the story without doing any side quests and keeping your level as low as possible to make it easier.
You will reach certain areas at some point with minimum level monsters that are higher than your level.
This is the only moment you actually have to level up, … but not too much only just as much as you can handle.
I wouldn’t mind to have level scaling to be an option in the end game. That you can empower certain zones/dungeons or whatever if you like so (like TZ in D2).
But during a playthrough, while leveling up your character, it feels very very bad to me.
Also the scaling within a group is also super strange but that’s another topic.