Is this much an issue for games beyond 3.x D&D?

In the 0e/1e D&D games I played Magic Users were weaker than Fighters until you got to rarely played levels, but that was known early.While in theory Magic-Users became the most powerful characters (it even suggested so in the rules:

1974 - Dungeons & Dragons Book 1: Men & Magic,
(Page 6)

"Magic-Users: Top level magic-users are perhaps the most powerful characters in the game, but it is a long hard road to the top, and to begin with they are very weak, so survival is often the question, unless fighters protect the low-level magical types until they have worked up."...)

IIRC, in practice Mages were so weak that no one I knew played them long. We only did it when we rolled badly or (briefly) wanted a challenge, so I never saw any Mages past second level that weren't NPC's at my usual tables.I can very much remember how in 70's early 80's it was hard to get anyone to play a "Magic User" (even when the Intelligence score roll was higher their Strength), simply because at low levels they had the least they could do (and the lowest hit points).
Most everyone played "Fighting-Men" to start, but those few who played for "the long game" found that "Magic Users" vastly overpowered other classes at high levels. Thematically and for "world building" it made sense, magicians should be rare, and "the great and powerful Wizard" should be more fearsome then the "mighty Warrior". But as a game? Having separate classes each doing their unique thing is more fun, and always hanging in the back while another PC does everything isn't.....anyway, it was such a long slog before a Magic User PC became less weak than the other classes that if they survived to become poweful it seemed like a just reward in old D&D.

Unlike D&D, in Stormbringer, on the other hand, you became a Sorcerer when you had really lucky rolls (high POW), which made the other PC's sidekicks, which for a player was LAME! But a low POW caster was almost useless if they weren't a viable "mundane", unlike a high POW sorcerer which was OP compared to other PC's, but this was the result of random character creation not a players choice of how to fit "the group power level.

In 4e Pendragon (the only edition with caster PC's), waiting for the "stars to be right" made being a caster too dull to play anyway.

In Traveller, a Player could keep killing off PC's during creation until they got a more powerful PC, but that was tedious, and the power (skills really) difference wasn't that much.

You could make different "builds" with Champions point buy system, but character creation was a long "mini-game" (like custom car builds in Car Wars), and it's comic book superheroes setting really wasn't to my taste so I don't have much experience with it.

In Call of Cthullu every PC was "squishy".

Ringworld like Stormbringer had potential vast differences due to random rolls, but those weren't a matter of choice.

5e D&D seems pretty balanced at low levels, and every class is too OP at high levels, which makes me want to start at 1st level again regardless.

What games besides 3.x D&D, and point buy GURPS and HERO is it even necessary to care about "group power level"?

@Quertus, I have no interest in the "build mini-game", nor in playing a superpowered "god wizard", I just want to role-play a Fafhrd, Gray Mouser, Robin Hood, or Sinbad-like "guy with sword", and having to even think of "group power level" sounds like a chore.

Other than having so many tables, why would I want to play 3.x D&D?