This is revisionist history. Old school D&D explicitly had balanced encounters, and called them dungeon levels. Each level lower you had progressively more difficult encounters. Challenge ratings were introduced in 3rd Edition along with the 'Back to the Dungeon' motto, and just tied it to party...
I have a game idea where players take on roles of regular people who wake up one day and they are full fledge cartoons, but I'm trying to figure on a mechanic that both allows a person to do some high end Chuck Jones/Tex Avery stunts like instant teleport, pulling out a battleship from their...