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As I explained already the difference isn't too high (last in this thread):
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1091980/discussions/0/600778161129574423/?tscn=1747241149
If your objective is to have a party of characters who level up at the same time, I actually prefer to rush to the mercenaries instead of Bryan.
But as said, no rushing is actually necessary, in fact I used it in less than half of my games. (Full disclosure, I don't like rushing to Bryan, as dissected in this quite voluminous thread: https://steamcommunity.com/app/1091980/discussions/0/3833172420316690547/ )
At least you have an original excuse for not finishing the game. Most players who make posts about stopping to play complain that it's simply too hard for them. I remember one guy was so hilarious he refused to learn how damage types and active abilities work, and was complaining that he was losing in the very first dungeon. At least you gave it a fair shot, it's a pity that you will miss on some of the fun stuff like this:
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3417370542
😉
If you never do any side content / areas / quests and just focus on the main story, the recruitable characters will be progressively higher and higher level than you are, until you get to the mercenaries, who will be level 16 compared to your level 10 or something protagonist.
If you do every bit of side content, the recruitable characters will be lower level than you are. Like, going into Kylearan's with a level 5 party makes level 8 Crux look high-level, but you can easily be level 10 at this point if you go around a bit in Skara Brae below. Then Crux looks low-level as he remains level 8 no matter how much XP your protagonist has.
I had one playthrough where I did always the maximum amount of content in each area and deprioritized the main quest (like how many typical RPG players play) and the recruitable characters were always at least 2-3 levels below me.
You have options, depending on how you prefer to play, you can tailor your experience.
EDIT: also the specific characters you have will only get stronger. That you will be able to access slightly higher level other characters at certain points doesn't mean you have to do anything about it. If you really like a character (good personality, or build, or just like them for whatever reason) there's no reason to replace them. They will get stronger and it's great fun to see them grow.
Case in point, fixating on XP and party level - without having played through the game to see what that actually means during the course of the game - feels like something you might bring from an excessive RPG background that just doesn't hold water in BT4.
Your build is going to be final around level 23 (20 if Baedish) and you'll only go for small incremental passive bonuses afterwards. Some builds have more moving parts but most good builds are done by that time.
From the point of view of experiencing the story, you are much better off using some of the recruitable characters - you have a lot of interesting dialogue, expressed in the form of banter between the characters, that shows how their relationship evolves and also gives you interesting tidbits about their past as well as some insight into the past events. For example The Green Lady, being a long-lived Elf, has seen some of the prior events personally. Fiona is an absolute delight to be around, her passion for learning other cultures songs triggers some very interesting discussions. There are some hilarious interactions - I loved the ones between Bryan and Lioslaith, for example, as well as a lot of interactions between Crux and some of the others.
My advice: forget everything you read about the game, and just play it, as it feels good. If a character looks fun, take them with you. There's also a lot of banter with some of the mercenary personalities (basically, Melody, the Mercenaries, and anyone you hire use one of the six mercenary personalities with slight variations between men and women; the recruitable characters have their unique personalities. But they also interact with eachother, for example there's a bunch of dialoge between Merlin/Melody and Bryan, and so forth.)
A friend shared a story with me once. I thought it was hilarious. He was learning to ski and he was afraid on a red slope. The instructor told him: "don't be afraid. there are no colours. snow is white." I was always too afraid to ever try skiing but this stuck with me.
Translated to BT4: red is just to tell you that there's something exciting there. Everything is possible if you know what you're doing. It's definitely possible to clear Skara Brae below (except for some areas that need a specific song or key to enter) before Kylearan's tower. It's possible to beat the giant on the main square. It's even possible to defeat all the guard patrols in Skara Brae during the Elven Wiles quest.
Now, as said, you don't have to worry about any of this on a first playthrough, just enjoy the game. But if you do come back for seconds, you can do some crazy stuff, all on Legendary difficulty of course.
Fiona doesn't have to be in your party, true, but you see that the first characters you find - on top of having their own personalities and banter and stuff - give you glimpses of some of the basic character builds you can create.
For example, the first two rogues your find... Wringneck is built as a thief, Sybale as an assassin. She has no thieving skills but she is great at killing stuff. They don´t fill the same role. If you take out Wringneck you'll either have to branch Sybale off to learn thieving like lockpicks and stuff (in which case you're probably better off just keeping Wringneck instead of her). Sybale makese most sense to keep if you want two rogues in your party.
The practitioners are the same: The Green Lady is a sorcerer, focusing on inflicting very flexible mental damage, Crux is a conjurer dagger mage, if your objective is to have mental damage dealing practitioners, he will be much worse than the Green Lady when you find him, even if he is higher level. Again, depending on what you want, you can keep one or the other or even both, but they do different things. You can respec, of course, but I'm assuming you want to use the characters the was they are.
The Mercenaries give you yet more build ideas, like you have Sir Grady who is a sniper thief rogue, Merlin is yet another differently built practitioner, and so forth.
Melody is a great first character because it's a Bard's Tale, after all 😀. She is Baedish, so fairly quick to develop, and having a Bard early on helps you get exposed to all four archetypes already during the tutorial.
That said you don't need any specific archetype in your party, in fact you can fairly freely pick and choose what you want. Enjoy Practitioners ? You can have more. 😉 We usually recommend having at least one of each Archetype especially on a first play-through just for diversity reasons, but literally anything is possible, as long as you know what you're doing.
Noooees! Don't do it! It's not worth to throw your life away for tha... Oh, wait. I thought you said "live" not "play"... My mistake!
;-)
What you said is pretty much what Kira, chilkoot and I have been debating numerous times since long ago. Kira even made some different tries and takes with it, and chil too, I believe. I didn't bother with it.
Yes, if it's purely about leveling as fast as possible, you're better off rushing to Brian and hiring mercenaries. But. It really doesn't matter all that much in the long run. You can read our conclusions on the other threads we made about it, but in essence, it gives you a short-term temporal "boost", but since leveling takes longer and longer the further you go, the "low levels" ones catch up to the "higher leveled" ones pretty soon. None of your players is going to ever get to lvl 30 to begin with, so I'm not sure why this is a detrimental issue. You'll be able to beat the enemies between lvl 15 and 20 a bit more easily, that's about it. It goes perfectly fine with your regular party as well, though.
So, granted the leveling-system isn't ideal, much like with Oblivion, but in contrast to that (or to many ARPG's too, to be honest) it really doesn't revolve around leveling, at least not on itself. The progress is mainly from getting extra opportunity and spell points, new gear/weapons, and skills. Unlocking the three ability rings is far more important. So I wouldn't be too focused on the lvl on itself, even though it *does* give an indication of you're relative strength, of course. But the progress will continue anyhow; you"ll keep getting stronger, and the weak ones faster than the stronger ones, so after a while, your group will have party-members that don't differ much anyhow. I think it's more important you choose partymembers you like - be it in chatter, skills or type.
Also, while Kira is right with what she says at the end, it's highly advised that you do take at least one of each archetype, and then you have some leeway of which type you want two (two bards or rogues or mages/etc.) until your 6 slots are full. That said, it's true you don't absolutely NEED to do this. I believe chilkoot tried with 6 bards and Kira with 6 mages or so? And it worked too. But, some things... like if you go without the archetype of rogue, you'll miss out on all chests and its loot - which is a bummer, imho.
Oh I did a lot of stuff. Six (different capstone class) Fighters, six (different) Practitioners, clearing Skara Brae below with Wringneck+Dalgliesh+TheGreenLady, and so forth, all on Legendary difficulty of course. I'm not bragging, it's just to illustrate what the game lets you get away with. I rotated out equipment on some plays and created multiple adventuring parties, clearing different parts of the game with different characters. I had a lot of time to do this, honestly, as I played the game a total of 8 times. (Can I say I "replayed it" 8 times ? Or would that imply playing it once and then replaying it 8 additional times for a total of 9 play-throughs ? Hmm... 🤔)
Thanks.
Well I'm sorry but I can't just have that mindset. Doing battles that I know are pointless makes it EVEN MORE boring, and battles are boring enough as they are. Even on the hardest difficulty, they're incredibly easy and just boring.
I ended up quitting, but not for the reasons I initially said, but because of how boring and repetitive combat is. I don't have to think and it literally makes me fall asleep.
Oh yeah. We are DEFINITELY playing completely different games. :)
Thanks.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but I just need games that are a little more challenging, make me think, maybe a little randomness thrown in. Every battle is exactly the same. Boring.
Game's just ripe for (re)exploration, with a fairly enjoyable gameplay loop that works surprisingly well even on replay, with some early fights that teach you the basics and some harder fights in the back half that challenge you. Though I guess you need to appreciate this specific blend of puzzles / exploration / combat to really appreciate this game.
Exploration is fine. Puzzles were fine up to a point, but they overdid it with the fairy golf stuff. Combat is just too much though. Every fight feels the same. Not much monster variety. No randomness. No challenge. It's like random encounters in other RPG's like say Dragon Quest or Final Fantasy, except they take 10 times longer for no reason. I don't mind BOSS fights being long and drawn out but EVERY SINGLE FIGHT? Just no. Ugh.
But I do get it won't be everyone's cup of tea. Some of the fights can be quite intensive. And to be fair, you WILL most likely need a snack and a drink for the long haul that is "The Legions of Baron Harkyn"!
Thanks.