Earthdawn sort of does that. It's literally every AD&D trope manifested in game, with a somewhat rational reason why, down to the number of monster-filled dungeons.
PCs are Adepts, which have Circles of advancement (levels). All special abilities are Talents and one of the Talents is Durability (hit points). Many powers are Blood Magic, powered by life force (hit points) and there are in-game lore of Warriors who die at the end of a battle from Strain despite never having been struck.
There's no divinity assigning levels because ED is a "spend xp" system. You buy up Talents to reach the requirements of a new Circle. You could have a 100,000XP character who is a 1st Circle Warrior or a 6th Circle Warrior. The C6 will have more Talents giving them more options (likely increasing damage) but the C1 will have more Durability (hit points) and a better Weapons talent (hitting things). Attuning magic items uses a Talent so until you hit 4th Circle, no powerful doodads, just common stuff that works for everyone.
Talents are limited by Discipline but there are Skills anyone can get. There is some overlap between Skills and Talents (i.e. Ranged Weapon, Melee Weapon, Great Leap) but generally Talents are "broader" (apply to all weapons) or give a bigger result (jump distance in yards not feet) and also are cheaper than Skills. But Talents go away in no- magic zones so there's that. (I have seen the Archer use a sword while the Warrior used a bow in a magic-free area. It was like seeing a pair of MMA pros try to fight while doped up on valium)
As for NPCs, Elite NPCs have Disciplines. "Common" NPCs don't get Disciplines but they get XP and half magic, because everyone in ED has some magic. Everyone has only one kind of magic so people with farming half-magic are Farmers and people with soldier half-magic are Soldiers while people with discipline magic are Adepts. It's a bit of GM fuzziness but farmers and sailors have minor magical abilities. A farmer and common sailor could both sense the weather and possibly detect rock concealed by soil/sea.
In contrast a PC Elementalist (druid) can talk to the rock and ask it to move while a Sky Raider can make his ship fly over the rocks.
So the non-adept 100,000xp npc soldier will have Skills similar to the C1 Warrior's Talents but they will be a lower rank (they cost more) and won't have nearly as many hit points b/c there's no Durability skill...unless the GM decides this soldier's half-magic is Durability in which case whoopah!
As a general rule, "non-adepts" are similar to 4e "mooks" in that a mundane soldier can land solid hits and be a legitimate threat but they fold up quick if you hit them just right.
They also justify a multitude of dungeons full of traps. When magic got super powerful, demons (Horrors) can get into the world. Dumb ones eat forests. Smart ones torment sentient beings and consume misery. Many cities were turned into undead, eternally suffering. Others became even less recognizable, but no less dangerous, threats.
People built underground fortresses with layers of magical defenses to survive the thousand years of Horrors. Except some of them are still sealed up and not all of them survived. Some of the Horrors got so powerful they didn't have to go away when the magic weakened and are still lurking in those cities.
Of course, all those defenses were powerful magic so they are full of gems, gold, adamantine, etc and are valuable on their own. If you can survive dismantling them or the monsters within.
It's weird and complex and I loves it so.
