*don't scale the figure

When I say don't scale the figure I mean it's not necessary to work comfortably on the model. You can zoom in on a single poly inside a models head with the dot key. And the brushes work fine at default scale, unlike in say Zbrush or Mudbox where scaling the model up is absolutely necessary for the brushes to even work (in particular mudbox where you have to scale up 3000×)

Scaling parts of the model with the editing tools is fine however, particularly useful with proportional editing active ( basically soft falloff, similar to the alt magnet selections you might know of in wings but much more "modern") very useful for morphing.