History Main / LevelDrain

* Every single one of the early Moraff [=RPGs=] for DOS had enemies that could drain your levels if they hit you. Thankfully, this was usually not so horrible due to the fact that your stats increase over time due to finding items, and level draining doesn't drain these. In fact, it is actually advantageous to let yourself be drained back to a low level so that you can get much better max HP gains when leveling back up with your newly inflated stats. The worst enemies were the ones that could drain your ''stats''.

* ''{{Runescape}}'' has many monsters, especially quest monsters, who do the temporary sort of draining, and there's even 'disease' from special undead, which hits a random stat for 10 to 1 levels, and there are potions to restore levels and cure disease, as well as jewelery that takes the disease for you.
* ''KingdomOfLoathing'' features items, equipment, and familiars that can do this to monsters. On the other side, there are also items and equipment that can ''add'' levels to the enemy, in order to boost their power (and the ExperiencePoints paid out for defeating them). A few rare items can do this to your own statistics, too.
* In the early days of ''EverQuest'', you could fall into a "death loop"--If your spawn point was near a group of monsters, they'd keep killing you repeatedly. What made it even worse was that you'd spawn ''without your equipment'', making you even easier to kill. You could easily lose a level or more this way. As you can guess, this was a ScrappyMechanic.

** The Kirlian Buster returns in ''WildARMSXF'' as one of the earliest enemy Arts one can encounter. However, since the game is an SRPG and the spell's effect isn't permanent, the Kirlian Buster hardly poses any threat to the player. And the pathetic success rate of the spell itself doesn't really help.

* In ''KingdomHearts 358/2 Days'', one status ailment actually deleveled your character. It was only temporary, similar to ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyV''.

* All damage is like this in the flash game series ''BubbleTanks''. Then again, the game does provide an AntiFrustrationFeature where they provide you with experience-giving [[PinataEnemy Pinata Enemies]] should you get hit too often.

* In ''MakaiKingdom'', any enemy with a hammer/mallet can steal a level with every hit. Sure it's easy to get back, but it's downright frustrating in the early levels. Also, you do not have such an ability, even if you have the best mallet in the game, putting this somewhere between MyRulesAreNotYourRules and SecretAIMoves.

[[AC:ShootEmUps]]

* ''DungeonsAndDragons'', as you might expect, is the TropeMaker and TropeNamer. Under most circumstances, the only way to defend against level drain was by making a saving throw against it, or by using magic items or spells that protected you against the drain.

* ''VideoGame/{{Warcraft}} III: The Frozen Throne'' has Arthas periodically lose a level due to Illidan's attacks on the Frozen Throne.

* This is a major game mechanic in ''VideoGame/CaveStory''. You level up your weapons by collecting powerups that enemies drop, and getting injured by anything will lower your weapon level.

** It should be mentioned that one of these guns ([[MeaningfulName Nemesis]]) is much BETTER when it's unleveled, so anyone weilding it has to either actively dodge experience drops or invoke this trope

* Every single one of the early Moraff RPGs for DOS had enemies that could drain your levels if they hit you. Thankfully, this was usually not so horrible due to the fact that your stats increase over time due to finding items, and level draining doesn't drain these. In fact, it is actually advantageous to let yourself be drained back to a low level so that you can get much better max HP gains when leveling back up with your newly inflated stats. The worst enemies were the ones that could drain your ''stats''.

* DisgaeaDimension2 has an item called "Demon Buns" that take a level when consumed. They mostly come as vending machine trash and are worthless, but have a couple of uses. Since some Evilities come into effect when fighting enemies that are higher level than you, they offer a way to reduce your characters' levels on the fly. Using one on an ally also reduces your RelationshipValues with that character, which can be beneficial when paired with a particular Innocent.

* There were two kinds of Death monsters in ''{{Gauntlet}} Dark Legacy'': a Red Death which drained 1000 hit points, or a Black Death that would drain one level. Thankfully, the halo accessory meant you could drain from these Deaths, and draining from the Black Death would make your character gain a level, no matter how much XP they needed. This made LevelGrinding very quick.

* The original PC88/MSX version of ''{{Valis}}: The Phantasm Soldier'' uses the same mechanic as ''Cave Story'', where getting injured by anything will lower your weapon level.
* ''BlasterMaster'': Similar to the above cases, the human pilot loses his gun level when he gets damaged.
* ''ZeldaIITheAdventureOfLink:'' While not as far as stealing ''levels,'' there are enemies who can steal your XP with each hit (as well as doing traditional damage.)

* In the ''[[DotHack .hack//]]'' series, the power of Data Drain can result in an NPC character losing character levels and distorting into a very weak monster. Player characters hit with Data Drain can have their human player be digitized, imprisoning their mind in the game and placing their body into a coma.
** In ''[[DotHackGUGames .hack//G.U.]]'' and ''.hack//ROOTS'', the entity [[spoiler:Azure Kite]] Tri-Edge Data Drains the characters Shino and Haseo, sending the former into a coma and transforming the latter from a[[spoiler:n artificially]] high level character to first level with no inventory or member address list.

* ''BlasterMaster'': Similar to above cases, the human pilot loses his gun level when he gets damaged.

** It should be mentioned that one of these guns (MeaningfulName Nemesis) is much BETTER when it's unleveled, so anyone weilding it has to either actively dodge experience drops or invoke this trope

* Breath of Fire III has event-based max HP drains that can be reset:

* A certain monster in ''Disciples II'' did this and also brought the target down one Evolution Level.

But games have enemies which have the ability to take these levels away from a character to weaken them, usually attributed to draining the character's LifeEnergy. Due to undertones of {{necromancy}}, this ability generally only manifests in the undead, or in characters who've trained on the "evil" or "grey" ends of the CharacterAlignment spectrum.

* ''PokemonMysteryDungeon'' has Doom Seeds, which lower your level by one if you're hit by one... or eat it. [[spoiler: ''Explorers of Sky'' also added a Lookalike Item called the ''Dough'' Seed, with a very ''good'' effect (it causes ''tons'' of cash to spawn on the next floor when eaten)... Apparently to try to lure players into accidentally eating one of the Doom Seeds.]]

* ''BlasterMaster'', similarly, the human pilot loses his gun level when he gets damaged.

* In ''DemonsSouls'', there is the Soulsucker spell, which is used by one of the bosses in the game and can also be learned by the player. It has a slow casting time, but a hit from this will drain the player's Soul Level.
** Slow casting time (and telegraphs the entire cast), melee range, roots the caster in place and costs practically all their mana. If you get hit by this, you are probably TooStupidToLive

* In a strange example, ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyIX'', one area has monsters that don't do this directly, but do it to your weapons and then INVERT it on the lower level weapon. The way to beat them is to use your weakest weapons to do normal amounts of damage to them.

** Pathfinder finally eliminates the issue, by making almost all energy drain a temporary state. Failing the save to remove the negative level just meant you kept it for another day. There are some ways to get levels drained permanently (most notably from being rezzed by a Raise Dead spell) but even those can be removed by a (Greater) Restoration.