History Main / LeakedExperience

** ''VideoGame/TalesOfXillia'' has a strange example that's [[GoodBadBugs probably a bug.]] During Solo Challenges in the Arena, the other party members are still considered "active" despite the fact they don't show up in the fight, so they receive full Exp. This can be abused for [[PeninsulaOfPowerLeveling easy grinding]] by equipping all the "inactive" members with Dark Seals, which double Exp gain at the cost of inflicting massive stat penalties... which doesn't mean anything to characters who aren't actually fighting. (Dark Seals normally won't work unless the holder participates fully in battle, but [[LoopholeAbuse since non-partcipants are still considered "active" in the Arena...]])

** ''VideoGame/TalesOfXillia'' has a strange example that's [[GoodBadBugs probably a bug.]] During Solo Challenges in the Arena, the other party members are still considered "active" despite the fact they don't show up in the fight, so they recieve full Exp. This can be abused for [[PeninsulaOfPowerLeveling easy grinding]] by equipping all the "inactive" members with Dark Seals, which double Exp gain at the cost of inflicting massive stat penalties... which doesn't mean anything to characters who aren't actually fighting. (Dark Seals normally won't work unless the holder participates fully in battle, but [[LoopholeAbuse since non-partcipants are still considered "active" in the Arena...]])

* In the remake of ''VideoGame/PokemonMysteryDungeonRescueTeam'', all recruited Pokémon receive any EXP that the active party gains.

* In ''VideoGame/SaveTheLight'', party members waiting back in Steven's house still gain XP even when not battling, but will level up slower than your active members. When you switch them in, they'll have accumulated Skill Points for you to use on stat upgrades.

** With the advent of Double Battles, a specific strategy involves having a high-level Pokémon use [[ActionBomb Explosion]] while the low-level teammate uses Protect to evade all attacks -- for any opponent that gets KO on that turn, the low-level teammate receives ''all'' the experience.

* In ''VideoGame/SaveTheLight'', party members waiting back in Steven's house still gain XP even when not battling. When you switch them in, they're around the same level as the team and have accumulated Skill Points for you to use on stat upgrades.

[[folder:ActionAdventure]]

* ''VideoGame/{{Quester}}'' has the Live Camera accessory. When equipped upon a member of your active party, it broadcasts a video of your battles back to all of your Questers who are back at your base, enabling them to learn from watching your fights.

* In ''VideoGame/CityOfHeroes'', a lower-level character can "sidekick" (for heroes) or "lackey" (for villains) to a higher-level character, temporarily becoming the equivalent of one level lower than their mentor as long as they're within 200 yards of the latter. More directly, almost all experience earned by any character on a team will also be gained by each of the team's other members, as long as they're already roughly the same level.
** Issue 13, takes this a step further with a sort of permanent sidekicking ability: two players become, essentially, a duo, and they are always getting experience. If one character is logged out for three months, during which the other character gains twenty levels, then the first character comes back to find they've gained twenty levels. However, not leveling together means that the duo earns ''half'' as much XP as a normal solo character, meaning this is not for powerlevelling.
** Issue 16 takes it even '''further'''. One of the biggest features in it is "Super-[=SideKicking=]", which means that ''everyone'' on the team is Sidekicked to either the team leader or the mission holder.
** Near the end of the game, it might even be considered either an inversion or a distillation - if a higher-level player joins a lower-level group, they earn experience proportionate to their level -- and retain some of their higher-level skills (and almost ALL of their enhancements) to compensate for the power drop. If a lower-level player joins a higher-level group, though, they're likely to still be startlingly ineffective in comparison to the rest. The obvious solution, disregarding [[LevelGrinding specially-crafted missions,]] is to [[{{Munchkin}} join lower-level groups to... er...]] [[BlatantLies help new players.]]
* You wouldn't expect this trope to show up in an MMORPG, but a new ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'' recruitment deal lets you level up your lower level characters one level for every two levels your recruitee gains.

* ''VideoGame/GranadoEspada / Sword of the New World'' lets you ''control'' LeakedExperience via "Experience Cards". While completing a quest in most [=MMOs=] gives you direct EXP gain, ''GE'' instead gives you consumable items which grant experience to whichever characters you feed them to. Yes, character'''s''': this game lets you own up to 6 characters and deploy up to 3 of them in your active party. But your LazyBackup do not accrue normal-style LeakedExperience, so at that point it's your decision whether to use the Cards to catch them up, or just keep power-leveling your main party.

* The British Army in the ''VideoGame/CompanyOfHeroes'' expansion ''Opposing Fronts'' relies exclusively on Leaked Experience. Their main-line combat units cannot accumulate experience in combat like the Americans, nor even buy it like the Wehrmacht; Instead the British have officers, who are rubbish at combat (and quite vulnerable to boot) but gain experience from being ''near'' combat. Eventually the officers go up in rank, and begin to radiate powerful auras that gives bonuses to any nearby friendly combat units.

* ''VideoGame/DungeonCrawl'', being a single player game, plays this trope in a rather unusual way - everything your summons, minions or followers kill, grant only one half XP to you. Summoned creatures return back where they came from after a handful of turns, and undead minions don't last long enough - but orcish followers of a priest of Beogh apparently take some part of the leaked XP and become stronger, so if you care about a lowly orc long enough, he can raise in ranks all the way up to a rather fearsome orc warlord.

** Inactive characters in ''VideoGame/LufiaCurseOfTheSinistrals'' gain 50% experience. Dekar can gain a Title that gives him 100% experience even when he is not the active character.

* In ''VideoGame/FireEmblem'', characters gain more experience if the enemy's level is higher than theirs. Therefore, a key strategy is to have stronger characters weaken, but not kill, an enemy, then let the weak character get the kill (and the lion's share of the experience). There is usually one character per game that has fantastic growth rates, but requires mucho babysitting to be a useful character.
** ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemGaiden Gaiden]]'' and ''[[VideoGameRemake Echoes: Shadow of Valentia]]'' are the only games where any units that participate in a battle will receive bonus experience based on a pool. The pool is accumulated based on how many times the unit entered combat and deal damage and the experience will be added to each unit at the end of battle.
** ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemPathOfRadiance Path of Radiance]]'' and ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemRadiantDawn Radiant Dawn]]'' have Bonus EXP that is awarded after battle for completing a map quickly, surviving {{NPC}}s and other stuff. You can award it to any of your characters however you see fit and even keep it for later.
*** It is worth noting, however, that in ''Radiant Dawn'' Bonus EXP is limited in its uses. Characters who use it to level up will gain exactly three stat increases per level, unless they've already maxed out so many stats that increasing three is impossible. Depending on how many stats the character in question has already capped, using bonus EXP can either be a huge boon or a handicap. Given that most low-level characters wind up much better if you level them the old fashioned way instead of Bonus EXP'ing them to a high level, this isn't a true replacement for babysitting. (None of this applies to ''Path of Radiance'', where Bonus EXP is equally as effective as regular combat EXP.)
*** However, using this as LeakedExperience for your Laguz characters in ''Radiant Dawn'' is an excellent strategy. Because their stat caps are so low (Laguz stats double while transformed), feeding almost any Laguz character a healthy diet of Bonus XP is practically guaranteed to max all their stats. Laguz XP gains in combat are poor compared to Beorc, especially in the beginning, making this at least one case where the leaked experience is ''superior'' to the regular kind.
** In ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening Awakening]]'' and ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemFates Fates]]'', if a Pair-Up team attacks and lands a hit on an enemy, both characters gain EXP, with the lead character gaining the full amount and the partner earning a smaller portion as long as the enemy wasn't defeated before they have a chance to do their follow-up attack.
* In ''VideoGame/LaPucelle: Tactics'', a way to level up weak allies is to make a combo attack with a high-level character. If the said high-level character has a sufficiently high Speed stat, it will attack first, kill the enemy, and share the experience with as many as three adjacent allies, making it possible for a character to gain dozens of levels by observation.

*** One particular mission in ''Disgaea'' pits you against ten level 75 monsters in a HopelessBossFight that ends in a BigDamnHeroes moment. The vassals that come to support you are all more than capable of defeating the monsters on their own, but with a bit of luck you can bring in a Warrior or Brawler to steal a killing blow and rack up about ten levels. Subsequent attempts at that mission replace the monsters with a single level 40 Fafnir, which is actually easily doable at that point and is good for power-leveling using combo attacks.
*** An even earlier mission covers the whole area in an invincibility [[GeoEffects Geo Effect]] save one square. In ''Disgaea'' you can [[FastballSpecial throw monsters into each other]], which stacks their levels. The monsters in that area can be combined into a single, level 117 monster. Repeat - there is ''one square'' in the whole map that does not have a permanent invincibility effect...

* ''VideoGame/{{Gladius}}'' gives the lion's share of XP to the team members who actually took part in a battle, but also awards a fraction of the XP to the others, meaning that even if you don't actively use a member they will be slowly gaining levels in the background, to ensure that you're not caught out in some of the more draconian entry requirements.
* At the end of every battle in ''Farland Saga'', you get a bonus pile of EXP that can be distributed among your party members as you wish.
* The ''VideoGame/SuperRobotWars'' franchise has a unique variation on this, where upgrades will transfer from a character's robot to their MidSeasonUpgrade (for example, Anime/MazingerZ's upgrades will transfer to Anime/Mazinkaiser while [[Anime/MobileSuitGundam the original Gundam]]'s will transfer to the [[Anime/MobileSuitGundamCharsCounterattack Nu Gundam]]) so the player doesn't have to spend all their money getting it to the same level. Sometimes upgrades will transfer to tangentially related machines and secret units as well.
* In ''VideoGame/FellSealArbitersMark'', units that don’t participate in a battle will still gain some AP for their current class (and any other class that they’ve unlocked) as long as another unit of the same class took part in the battle. Lower-level units also gain significantly more experience when using actions on higher-level ones during battle.
* ''VideoGame/Disgaea6DefianceOfDestiny'' gives everyone who was deployed in the battle experience. Some characters are given awards for that battle for random things, such as most damage or throwing done, that give additional EXP. It also has the Juice Bar, which is used to distribute extra EXP or Mana from battles to any character, for a fee. The stored EXP can also be used to increase stats, level Class Masteries, or increase Squad levels.

* ''VideoGame/WarThunder'' an air combat game from a different company with similar concept has the same feature, which instead is applied to the progress in a chosen nation - however, the player is required to [[BribingYourWayToVictory spend special gold points bought with real money]] to use it.

-->'''Crystal:''' ''[playing a game of cards]'' Sweet! Starshine gained another level!\\

* ''VideoGame/AbyssCrossing'': The player initially starts with two party members, but two more join before the first Astra dungeon in order to form a full party of four. Once they get on the boat to Black Island, four more party members will join, bringing the headcount to eight. Fortunately, the game gives full EXP to all reserve party members

** ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' was were especially kind in this regard. All characters gained experience equally, regardless of whom you took along on missions. The player just had a backlog of skill points to use up every time when they swapped in a new character. This also applied to newly recruited characters, who had all of the skill points they would have had if they'd been with you from the start.

** The entire ''Franchise/MassEffect'' series has only one character level for the entire player squad, meaning that any characters you decide to use later or haven't used while you gained levels merely need to have their talents chosen, assuming you didn't choose the computer to allocate points automatically. Also, all squad members act as if they've been with you all along, talking about events as though they were present at the time, even though they clearly were not--having your entire party around would really have helped in a lot of situations.
** ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins'' plays the modern incarnation of this trope straight, by enforcing that the companions are never more than one level below the PlayerCharacter: whenever you level up, any companion who is now two or more levels below you gains a level for free the next time you return to the camp, regardless of whether they have ever been in your active party.
** All companions in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeII'' gain experience at the same time, even ones not currently in the party at the time. Some have lower initial XP when they join the party, but most of the time everyone will be at the same level.

* ''VideoGame/KnightBewitched2'': Reserve party members get full EXP. However, characters leave the party for plot reasons don't get any EXP, though they do return at a reasonable level for the current challenges.
* Creator/{{Obsidian|Entertainment}}'s ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic II'' and ''VideoGame/NeverwinterNights2'' followed the same convention as the original ''KOTOR''.
* In the ''Franchise/{{Pokemon}}'' series, any Pokémon sent out into battle receives a share of Exp regardless of whether they participate further. Placing a low-level Pokémon on the front line and swapping it out for a stronger one is a known strategy called "switch training", although it costs the player one turn to do so.
** The first generation had the "Exp.All" key item that split half the battle experience between all party Pokémon. ''VideoGame/PokemonGoldAndSilver'' swapped it for the "Exp. Share" hold item, which is equipped on a single Pokémon and gives them (and only them) half the battle's experience, should they not participate. This remained until ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'', where every Pokémon that participates in a battle gets full experience; Exp. Share also became a key item once again, giving every Pokémon that doesn't participate in battle half of the experience received and making the aforementioned turn-wasting method unnecessary outside of a SelfImposedChallenge. And come ''VideoGame/PokemonLetsGoPikachuAndLetsGoEevee'' and ''VideoGame/PokemonSwordAndShield'', "Exp. Share" no longer existed as an item; the aforementioned system became an ingrained game mechanic that couldn't be toggled on or off.
** With the advent of Double Battles, a specific strategy involves having a high-level Pokémon use [[ActionBomb Explosion]] while the low-level teammate uses Protect to evade all attacks -- for any opponent that gets KO on that turn, the low-level teammate receives ''all'' the experience.
* In the DS ''VideoGame/DigimonWorld'' games, your party is composed of three frontline digimon and three support digimon that don't attack and can't be attacked unless switched to the frontline. However, after every battle the exp provided by the enemies is applied for everyone, even the support party. Due to the stat raising mechanics, you can convert an Agumon, leave it on the support line and let it become a maxed Black War Greymon even if it never actually attacks anyone. Weird, if you think about it for a moment.
* In ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'', all party members gain experience (even those which are not in your party, but rather waiting for you in the [[PlaceBeyondTime End of Time]]), but only "in play" characters get tech points; also, a given pair or trio of characters must fight a combat scene together at least once, after all the relevant individual Techs are unlocked, to use a new [[CombinationAttack Combo Tech]].
* ''VideoGame/XMenLegends''
** The game does this, because it would be flat-out impossible if they didn't; there are enough characters that it would suck the fun right out if you had to level them all individually, and there are many times when a certain character is needed over others, often right after they're introduced.
** The second game nearly fully averts this though. There are still leak, but only very little, result in inactive character being many levels behind. GuideDangIt for someone who didn't get characters that has might, levitate, bridge building.
* ''VideoGame/RogueGalaxy'' plays it straight, with inactive party members getting a sizable percentage of the XP the active party gets.
* ''VideoGame/ValkyrieProfile'' does it both ways, depending on the difficulty level. On easy or normal, new party members are scaled to your level. On hard, everyone starts at level 1.
** Except Freya, who starts at level 2. And whose stats mirror those of her Easy/Normal self. Because she's Freya.
** Ironically, [[NonIndicativeDifficulty on Hard you can make people much stronger]], due to skills. Funny how that works.
** There's also the EXP Orb, which lets you pool Story Experience to redistribute however you want among the characters, which helps if some of them miss out on a big EXP boost that, say, a boss fight will bring about.
* ''VideoGame/SepterraCore'' has perhaps the nicest possible iteration of this. Not only does everyone share experience equally, regardless of who is being used (mercifully, since only three people fight at a time, and one has to be Maya), but "everyone" also includes those whom you haven't recruited yet. In a sense, the entire party has one experience progression (though characters level at different rates).
** For clarity, the total experience is a value that is tracked for the party. Every character has the exact same number of experience points no matter what. However, each character has a different amount of experience points needed to reach each level, so the characters are going to level at different rates despite having the exact same total number of experience points.

* ''VideoGame/PrayerOfTheFaithless'': When there are more than three party members, the three that are in the active party at the end of battle get full EXP while the reserve members get half EXP. However, the player spends most of the game controlling two three-person parties separately, so this feature isn't used until the endgame [[spoiler:when they have to fight Gauron's first form. In the Tired and Judged routes, the party consists of the five surviving characters, meaning the player will be able to continue using this feature in the Tower of Sinners. In contrast, the Resolve and Love routes, only have Aeyr and Mia in the party, leaving this feature unused for the Tower of Sinners.]]
* Done in the ''VideoGame/TalesSeries'', with a catch: "bonus" experience achieved due to using certain moves will not be carried over to your non-active party members, and their abilities' usage (which needs to be at a set amount in order to unlock stronger/different abilities) will obviously not be affected.
** In ''VideoGame/TalesOfPhantasia'' you start with a character, Chester, which will be lost for a long time afterwards. When you finally meet him again, you other team members will be way ahead of him and he is pretty useless. To make up for it, he gains Level at an incredible rate, making him level about two or three times as fast as the others. This way he can quite easily reach the highest ranks, while the others fall behind. And in remake versions, you'll occasionally get cutscenes in which he trains himself while everyone else is sleeping, catching his levels up to the rest of the party.
*** The remake also features an OptionalPartyMember, Suzu, that can gain a lot of experience to catch up to the rest of the party through an only mildly difficult "trial".
** ''VideoGame/TalesOfSymphonia'' plays this straight, but its sequel, ''[[VideoGame/TalesOfSymphoniaDawnOfTheNewWorld Dawn of the New World]]'', throws it all out the window. Characters from the previous game appear at a fixed level and do not gain experience. The monsters you capture, however, always start at level 1 (no matter how high level they were in the fight!) but level ridiculously quickly compared to human characters.. but then when they evolve, back to level 1. Though they retain a percentage of the stats they had in their last evolution, and evolution lines loop; so by continually leveling and evolving a critter, it became stronger and stronger and stronger.
** In ''VideoGame/TalesOfTheAbyss'', non-active characters gain ''ONE'' experience point after each battle. Makes you wonder why they even bothered.
** ''VideoGame/TalesOfGraces'' gives non-combatants 60% EXP from battles, and this can be increased with skills. This becomes unintentionally hilarious when it turns out the max bonus increase for every character (save one) is +50 percentage points. That's right: It's possible for characters not fighting to gain ''more EXP than the characters who are!''
** ''VideoGame/TalesOfXillia'' has a strange example that's [[GoodBadBugs probably a bug.]] During Solo Challenges in the Arena, the other party members are still considered "active" despite the fact they don't show up in the fight, so they recieve full Exp. This can be abused for [[PeninsulaOfPowerLeveling easy grinding]] by equipping all the "inactive" members with Dark Seals, which double Exp gain at the cost of inflicting massive stat penalties... which doesn't mean anything to characters who aren't actually fighting. (Dark Seals normally won't work unless the holder participates fully in battle, but [[LoopholeAbuse since non-partcipants are still considered "active" in the Arena...]])
* In the ''VideoGame/TrailsSeries'', the higher the level a character is at, the less experience they receive, making it very difficult to obtain in later parts of the games. However, this results in members who’re severely lacking to catch up to the lead, with all members eventually having equal levels all around. It was designed in a way where players wouldn’t feel the need to grind.

* The ''[[VideoGame/DotHackGUGames .hack//]]'' games also use this, as characters you don't play with for a while gain levels to close to your new level. Justified as the other characters are people playing an MMORPG, and presumably, they still play the MMO when not in your party. Absent party members that aren't currently playing the game in story however (typically people who are comatose, or Mistral when she stops playing in Vol 3 and most of Vol 4 due to her real life situation) won't level.
* Unpleasantly averted in ''VideoGame/LostOdyssey''. Characters not in the active party receive no experience or any other character advancement in the form of Skill Points. Due to a heavy dose of LetsSplitUpGang, this can make certain parts of the game brutally difficult, if not almost impossible. Oddly enough, the game also tries to avoid CantCatchUp syndrome; characters that are in use level up in very few fights, sometimes leveling up every single battle for a while up to an arbitrary maximum determined by the area you're in, at which point all experience gains quickly dwindle to near nothing. For characters who are level dependent on their skills, this allows fairly quick catching up. For other characters reliant on other ways to advance, it's still just down to LevelGrinding.
* ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIV'' [=DS=] has both character swapping and leaked experience.
** In ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVI'', characters in the wagon still gain experience, even if your active party is somewhere the wagon can't even enter.
** Played straight in ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVII'' when one of your party members leaves [[spoiler:to care for her sick father]]. When she returns to the party later in the game she is still at the same level she was when she left while the rest of the party is a good 10-12 levels ahead of her by now. This is made especially annoying since you are almost immediately forced to fight the [[ThatOneBoss The Fire Elemental]] afterwards.
** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIX'' averts this by distributing a bigger share of the experience to the highest level characters, a method inherently biased against classes that require more experience to level up.
** In ''VideoGame/DragonQuestMonstersJoker'', your active party gets full experience, and not only does your backup party gets a portion as leaked experience, but so does every monster you have in storage.
* In the original ''VideoGame/{{Persona 1}}'', characters rejoined the party after the prologue at the main character's level, making it much more efficient to concentrate on leveling him up before returning to the school and starting the game proper.
* In ''VideoGame/{{Persona 5}}'', unused party members don't get experience, at least at the start. However, ranking up Mishima's Confidant allows them to get a fraction of the experience gained. At max rank, it allows everyone in the party to get the same amount of experience.

* Ignored, played with, averted, and then played completely straight throughout the ''VideoGame/{{Fallout}}'' series:
** Companions in ''VideoGame/Fallout1'' don't level up, period.
** ''VideoGame/Fallout2'' and ''VideoGame/{{Fallout Tactics|BrotherhoodOfSteel}}'' simply apply the listed experience to each member of the party. There is no penalty to the player's earned XP for sharing it with others. Characters will only level up when in the player's active party, but the companions in ''Fallout 2'' actually use a smaller, truncated level system than the player--each companion only has four or five "levels," and both a sound and some floating dialogue will indicate when a companion has leveled up. They don't get Perks like the player does, but gain bonuses to the SPECIAL (primary stats) instead.
** ''VideoGame/{{Fallout Tactics|BrotherhoodOfSteel}}'' averts this trope. While it applies XP like the previous title, all companions are fully customizable and do not level up from their spawn stats except by being active in the player's party.
** ''VideoGame/Fallout3'' and ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas'' play this trope completely straight. A companion's level is directly tied to the player's, regardless of whether they've been best friends since level 5, are only just meeting at level 30, or haven't been seen for 10 levels. A few companions did not originally work this way, but have been patched.
*** The exceptions being [[GeniusBruiser Fawkes]], [[RobotBuddy RL-3]], and [[TeamPet Dogmeat]] with the ''Fallout 3'' add-on ''Broken Steel''. The game classifies them as creatures instead of people, and some GoodBadBugs moved the decimal point, making them ''ten times'' the player's level at all times.
* ''VideoGame/GoldenSun: The Lost Age'' gives the lion's share to the active party, but the inactive characters still get half experience.
** This format is continued in VideoGame/GoldenSunDarkDawn. Characters quickly catch up if they join at a lower level.
* ''VideoGame/DigitalDevilSaga'' partially uses this. Inactive characters automatically gain skill points, but not experience. This actually isn't too bad, as skill points are far more annoying to farm and there's a fairly easily unlocked skill that grants half XP when sidelined. New characters are also equal to the average level of the current party when they first join.
* Averted in one character's case in ''VideoGame/MegaManXCommandMission''. When Steel Massimo joins your party (which would have been between Level 5-10 by now), he's at Level 1. Justified as [[spoiler: he's basically a inexperienced newbie wearing the real Steel Massimo's armor.]]
** The same goes for Cinnamon, who also starts at Level 1, but has never fought a day in her life. Thankfully, she levels up quick hanging in reserve.
* Averted completely in ''VideoGame/StarOceanTillTheEndOfTime'', to the point where characters can end up so far behind the main party they are more or less useless. This is implemented so you can send two (or three, if you recruited her) level 1 characters out against the final boss for a BraggingRightsReward. It's very annoying otherwise, of course, since levels go up to 255.

* ''VideoGame/PhantasyStarIV'' would leak experience to all characters that have been in, but since left, the party equal to the amount of experience each in-party character received. So if one in-party character dies, not only do the in-party characters get more experience, but the out of party characters get more experience as well.[[labelnote:Example]]With a five character party (having met four other party members previously) finishing a battle that earns a total of 500 XP, each in-party character gets 500/5=100 XP, and all out of party characters get 100 XP as well. 100* 4=400 XP leaked, total earned real+ leaked 500+ 400=900 XP. If one character dies and instead you earn 500/4=125 XP for each living character, each out of party character will get 125 XP. 125* 4=500 XP leaked, total earned real+ leaked 500+ 500=1000 XP. So you can earn more total XP if some of the active characters are dead. No, it doesn't make sense.[[/labelnote]] There is one point in the game were the main character, Chaz, temporarily goes through a short dungeon alone. This makes an excellent place to level up because not only does Chaz get a ton of experience from fighting alone, but each member of the rest of the party gets the same amount of XP from just standing around doing nothing at the dungeon entrance.
* ''VideoGame/EternalSonata'' has unused party members gain a fraction of experience gained by active party members. Also, in the [[BonusDungeon Mysterious Unison]]? Yeah, you'll probably be babysitting [[spoiler:Claves]] a lot if you want [[spoiler:her]] to be useful.
* Non-party characters in ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfDragoon'' gain half the experience each party member gains[[labelnote:*]]If an enemy killed grants three thousand exp and two party members are alive when it's defeated, they gain one and a half thousand each and non-party characters gain seven hundred fifty each[[/labelnote]]. What they don't get is the attack experience or spirit points needed to level up your [[ActionCommands Additions]] and [[SuperMode Dragoon levels]] respectively.
* In ''VideoGame/FossilFighters'', you can carry five vivosaurs at a time, but only use three at a time in battle. All of them still gain experience regardless of whether they were used in the battle, which is very useful for levelling up weaker vivosaurs.

* ''VideoGame/AgarestSenki 2'' plays this trope straight. Party members who leave you (usually the non last generation protagonist and [[LoveInterest his love interests]] won't be at your level, but they can catch up pretty quickly anyway. Same thing with ''VideoGame/CrossEdge''.
* Characters in ''VideoGame/EtrianOdysseyIIITheDrownedCity'' can learn the "Combat Study" Common Skill, which gives benched characters EXP from the main party's battles (to the tune of 1% per skill level, up to 10% at [=Lv10=]). You can also use your backup party to turn in completed Quests and Missions, netting them the reward without actually contributing to the effort.
* ''VideoGame/MountAndBlade'' has a skill called Training, where experience is leaked to all lower-level characters at the end of each day. If enough people in the party possess this skill, one can raise a very competent army out of nothing in barely half a week.
* In ''VideoGame/TheLastRemnant'', characters gain exp both for levels (which raises their stats) and the individual skills/arts they use. Team members (except for generic soldiers) that participate in a battle only gain exp for the arts they used in that battle, but benched party members gain exp in whatever arts that the main character Rush used in the battle. Thus, the fastest way to raise your team's skill levels is to have Rush fight battles on his own. However, this only affects the abilities they can use, and doesn't work for raising a character's stats.
* ''VideoGame/RadiantArc'': Reserve party members get full EXP, which is fortunate because there are 12 playable characters and 6 party member slots.
* ''VideoGame/RadiantHistoria'' is weird about this. New characters join at reasonable levels. Characters in the party but not actually fighting get a sizable fraction of the experience. But characters that are out of the party entirely for plot reasons get ''nothing''. So a character that joins the party and then gets separated for a while ends up significantly below everyone else.

* ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles1'' has inactive characters gain 90% of the XP, AP, and SP the main party earn from battle. There are skills that can be learned to remove these penalties.
* ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles2'' simply grants the full sum of EXP, WP and SP from battle to all party members regardless of participation.
* ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles3'' doesn't need this for the main party, who are all active and present at all times, but gives [[GuestStarPartyMember Heroes]] a full allocation of EXP (the only form of progression they even need) while they're not in the party. This doesn't make a lot of sense and sticks out in a game otherwise obsessed with GameplayAndStoryIntegration, but it's [[AcceptableBreaksFromReality pretty much the only way]] to keep Heroes relevent.
* ''VideoGame/TheLastStory'' completely averts this, resulting in characters that are absent from the party for a while ending up as much as fifteen levels behind when they rejoin. Fortunately, the game's focus on tactical combat and Zael's key skill of [[DrawAggro forcing enemy attention onto him]] make it easy to train up the difference.
* Every surviving character in the ''VideoGame/EpicBattleFantasy'' series gains experience from battle. Even if he or she is switched out, in the fourth installment.
* All party members in ''VideoGame/ChildOfLight'' will receive experience points after a battle. They do not seem to get any experience penalty either.
* An accessory in ''VideoGame/LegendOfMana'' grants you the ability to share experience gained when equipped. You can also craft the effect onto weapons or armor, but [[GuideDangIt good luck figuring out how to do that]].
* Anyone recruited party members not active in your nine-person party in ''VideoGame/LufiaTheLegendReturns'' still gain experience, albeit at a reduced rate.

* In ''VideoGame/LastScenario'', party members that didn't take part in a battle get experience with a penalty so little it would take lots of grinding to see them lag behind.
* ''VideoGame/CthulhuSavesTheWorld'' gives equal experience bonus to all party members, whether they particitaped in a battle or not. This means you don't need to fiddle with your party setup until you really need it.
* ''VideoGame/RakenzarnTales'' initially only gave 50% EXP to reserve party members, but that was later bumped up to 100%, most likely to avoid the sheer tedium of leveling every single one of the ninety planned party members. Version 3 of the game also implemented the "new recruit is the same level as the lead" system to further help this along.
* ''VideoGame/{{Lunarosse}}'' gives somewhere around 75% EXP to reserve members. As a result, [[CantDropTheHero Channing]] will hit Lv. 99 well before anyone else.
* Like ''Super Mario RPG'' listed above, ''VideoGame/PennyArcadeAdventures'' will grant experience to anyone not in the party or even those who were knocked out in combat.
* ''VideoGame/RakenzarnFrontierStory'' grants full XP to all party members regardless if they're in combat or not. Handy for building-up low level classes. New recruits will also join at the same level as Makoto, but only at the level of his currently equipped Primary Class, so hope you don't trigger a recruitment cutscene while you were building up that class you forgot about.
* In ''VideoGame/ExistArchive'', you can choose up to three characters besides the main character to take into the field out of eleven[[spoiler: fourteen in NewGamePlus]] characters. Thankfully, characters that you don't bring with you will gain at least enough experience back at base to keep up the party, if not as much as the characters you bring with you.
* The ''VideoGame/BoxxyQuest'' series: Different in each game:
** ''VideoGame/BoxxyQuestTheShiftedSpires'': Everyone in the party get full experience points, even if they're not the four who fought.
** ''VideoGame/BoxxyQuestTheGatheringStorm'': The four party members present at the end of a battle get full experience points. Everyone else in the party gets half, even if some of them participated earlier in the fight.
* ''VideoGame/RuinaFairyTaleOfTheForgottenRuins'': Only EXP from events are leaked to inactive party members, but EXP from the battles themselves aren't.

** Played straight in ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVII'' when one of your party members leaves [[spoiler: to care for her sick father]]. When she returns to the party later in the game she is still at the same level she was when she left while the rest of the party is a good 10-12 levels ahead of her by now. This is made especially annoying since you are almost immediately forced to fight the [[ThatOneBoss The Fire Elemental]] afterwards.

** In ''VideoGame/DragonQuestMonsters: Joker'', your active party gets full experience, and not only does your backup party gets a portion as leaked experience, but so does every monster you have in storage.

* After plowing through 11 missions as Nero in ''VideoGame/DevilMayCry4'', you are given control of Dante, and with him, the exact same amount of [[TechPoints Proud Souls]] Nero managed to accumulate, allowing you to immediately unlock a bunch of Dante's abilities. This applies to level replays as well: if one manages to get some Proud Souls, the other will receive the same amount.

* The ''Yggdrasil'' video game in ''[[LightNovel/Overlord2012 Overlord]]'' let players gain extra experience points for helping stronger players. Ainz suspects that the gods the Slane Theocracy worships might be ''Yggdrasil'' players [[TrappedInAnotherWorld transported to the New World]] and the citizens might be leveling up faster by helping their gods.

* While most of the characters in ''VideoGame/EarthBound1994'' joined at reasonable levels, Paula joins the party at level 1 at a point in the game where the main character is likely level 15. The only assistance the player is given is the fact that Paula comes with a Teddy Bear, an item that serves as an attack target for enemies in battle, which might keep her from getting attacked long enough for her to gain a few levels.
** The third character also starts at level 1, but you control him solo through his part of the journey, and, assuming you fight every enemy you encounter along the way, his level will be roughly equal to Ness and Paula's by the time he actually meets them.
** The fourth character to join begins at level 1 as well, during a "Meanwhile..." sequence in which you control him solo during his zen final exam half a world away. The trope is given a halfway nod, though, when the spiritual breakthrough his exam is meant to confer manifests by pouring a load of experience into his empty coffers. He immediately jumps to just high enough of a level to obtain all of his primary psionic abilities (which are gained RPG-traditionally, no more than one per gained level), but still a good ten or twenty below the party's average at that point. This results in an unusual partial LeakedExperience effect, where a certain amount of [[CantCatchUp the antithesis]] also occurs when the player jumps right into the next full-party battle and finds the new guy still sporting definite weak-link traits.

* In ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaPortraitOfRuin'', the only ''Castlevania'' game where you control a pair of characters together, [[BlackMagicianGirl Charlotte]] and [[WhipItGood Jonathan]], in addition to sharing Life and {{Mana}} meters, level in tandem, whether both of them are there or not.

** In [[VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI the first game]], the fastest way to reach the level cap was to fight [[BonusBoss Sephiroth]] over and over. Even though only Sora fought in the fight, Donald and Goofy leveled too.