Basic Trope: Heroes get stronger through the hardships they face, (or, if you're in a videogame, Level Grinding) while villains don't get strong enough to match.
- Straight: Emperor Evulz sends Doom Komodo after Prince Bob. Doom Komodo is at Level 27, while Bob is at Level 1, getting Bob into a Hopeless Boss Fight. Later on in Disc 2, Bob comes back with The Team of Alice, Emily, Charlie, and Dave, all in their mid-30s, while Doom Komodo is still at Level 27.
- Exaggerated:
- Doom Komodo is at Level 1, same as Bob, but uses an HP to One attack. He comes back later at Level 1, while the heroes have reached the Cap of Level 100 and got the best Mons.
- Doom Komodo has actually lost levels between fights.
- Doom Komodo is downgraded to a winnable Boss Battle from being completely unbeatable.
- Downplayed: Doom Komodo is a demi-god compared to Prince Bob during their first fight. When they have a rematch, Prince Bob has taken many levels in badass and brought his team while Doom Komodo has not, and as a result Prince Bob beats Doom Komodo, but it's still an extremely difficult fight that almost kills Prince Bob.
- Justified:
- Doom Komodo, just like the other enemies, can't increase in level, even though he's not one of the Mons.
- Alternatively, Doom Komodo is the toughest being in his ecological niche; he has no reason to believe the hero will improve so drastically, and no good sparring partners to up his own game.
- Or, Doom Komodo does try to level grind, it's just that due to some form of Anti-Grinding, he just can't grow fast enough to outrank the heroes by the time the heroes has come back better-leveled.
- Doom Komodo is a vampire who is incapable of any growth.
- Doom Komodo is someone that had already trained and reached his maximum potential, so even if he trains, he won't improve much.
- Inverted:
- The Sorting Algorithm of Evil is in play, but it's the heroes who remain static while their opponents steadily grow in power.
- Doom Komodo starts as a pathetically weak Braggart Boss not much stronger than the surrounding enemies. But he's fought multiple times, growing stronger with every fight. Doom Komodo ends up giving the heroes a serious run for their money at the end of the game, when he swipes Emperor Evulz's macguffin and becomes the Final Boss.
- The first fight against Doom Komodo is relatively fair. The second time around, he's literally become an absolute monster and changed his name to Doom Kaiju, resulting in either a one-sided battle that Bob's team barely escapes with their lives or a one-sided battle that ends with Bob's team dead.
- Subverted:
- Doom Komodo gets even stronger the third time around.
- Bob's party runs into Doom Komodo as a random encounter while the latter is level grinding.
Doom Komodo: "What? You didn't think you were the only one who gets stronger from fighting trash mobs, did you? I was going to spend my day fighting goblins, too, but now I think you might be worth more XP..."- Bob and the party have grinded up in preparation for taking on Doom Komodo (who's still the same level), but because they're Incompletely Trained they still lose.
- Doom Komodo has the same stats and moveset when encountered at a mid-30s level as when he's encountered at level 1... for his first phase. Then he stops playing around.
- Double Subverted:
- After Bob defeats a lot of the enemy's resources, Doom Komodo stays static between the third and final fights.
- Doom Komodo has exactly the same stats as a random encounter as he did in his last boss fight, which Bob's party won. When he inevitably loses again...
Doom Komodo: Err... that fight didn't count! Just you wait, I'll get you good next time! (Uhh, which way was the Peninsula of Power Leveling, again?) - Parodied: Doom Komodo is revealed to have been called back from his vacation for the second battle; he hasn't been training for the rematch.
- Zig Zagged: Level 50 Lamia is easily defeated by the level 65 heroes. However, she then becomes a level 80 One-Winged Angel, but then she sends down high XP minions and Alice and Bob Level Up to Level 90 and defeat Lamia in one swoop. Then she becomes a Level 95 Extra Winged Angel and defeats the heroes. Then Alice and Bob go off to find her and go into Level 100 and defeat her.
- Doom Komodo's growth is based upon how many innocents he kills. With a typical playthrough he tends to become an escalating threat as you usually prove incapable of defending both settlements. If you fail to do a good enough job you will be the one who can't keep up. However if you pull off a No Casualties Run he will stay at constant power and become a joke. The easiest way to do it is not building defenses but keeping him chasing a refugee convoy filled with children while agile scouts do enough scratch damage to limbs to cripple him and specifically /not/ killing the man eating monster.
- Averted:
- All major enemies scale in difficulty alongside the heroes' level grinding, so that they always prove challenging.
- Doom Komodo gets stronger for the rematch.
- Enforced: If the audience is not given some semi-plausible reason to believe that the heroes will beat the villain the second time around, they will simply give up hope and stop playing.
- Lampshaded: "In the three years since we first met, I've been fighting monsters and training for combat while you have been watching TV. Do you really think you're going to win this time?"
- Invoked: Emperor Evulz wants to test the potential of a given group to judge if they are worth assimilating. He builds a copy of Doom Komodo stronger than the current group and sets them lose - if they are able to advance enough to defeat them they passed.
- Exploited: Doom Komodo has a Xanatos Gambit going on - he drains the power of heroes that level grind and slaughters them. He skips straight to slaughtering the ones that don't level grind.
- Defied: Claidheamh plays Drill Sergeant Nasty and forces Doom Komodo to undergo Training from Hell.
- Discussed: "This Cannot Be!!" " If you hadn't been sitting around all this time practicing your Evil Laugh then it won't be."
- Conversed: "It's like the villains in this game just sit in their chairs, twiddling their thumbs, while the heroes grow stronger and stronger until they can hope to challenge them directly!"
- Implied: The villain avoids facing Bob after his defeat, instead throwing up seemingly insane defenses when the hero arrives, starting after the second battle where he manages to win.
- Deconstructed: Doom Komodo is easily defeated by the heroes because they've been getting stronger while he stays static.
- Reconstructed: Doom Komodo was so far ahead of the heroes that he either didn't bother to improve or had less room for improvement. He's still better than any one of the heroes so they Zerg Rush him.
- Plotted A Good Waste: The Empire has been in power for so long that their forces have grown complacent and overconfident; this is translated into gameplay by having most major villains never gain levels, while more Genre Savvy villians do scale to prove a greater threat to the party — and to players lulled into their own false sense of security by their own victories.
- Played For Laughs: The Psycho Rangers of Doom Komodo, Head Scientist Butcherstein, General Drake, Lamia, and Violet pops up several times, but retain their same laughably low levels throughout the entire game.
- Played For Drama: Bob only survives the first fight because Ichigo and Junpei save him. He makes sure to add Guest Star Party Members and adds Dave, Charlie, Alice, and Emily, not to mention the Training from Hell.
HERO strikes DOOM KOMODO for 487 damage!
DOOM KOMODO realizes that the Villain Forgot to Level Grind AND DIES!
DOOM KOMODO realizes that the Villain Forgot to Level Grind AND DIES!
