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JoeKerr You're acting like it came out of nowhere, but it's been established for quite a long time now that some characters have abilities far beyond their level (such as Aki, as well as Granite using ice), and the reverse case shown in this chapter, where characters' abilities lag significantly behind their level, has also appeared before in Granite's fire magic.
It's been shown for a while that there are factors beyond pure level when it comes to someone's strength, and that this world isn't strictly and literally governed solely by standard jrpg rules. It's only based on them. Your trying to force it to adhere to them would subvert its entire world view.
And even setting that all aside, if you've never played a game that has a wide range in base stats and stat growths among characters, to the point where some are basically useless, then you haven't played many old games. Or pokemon. Not to mention, depending on how much customization there is, all the games where you can basically ruin a character with some bad level up choices.