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| 3 | %% This page has been alphabetized. Please add new examples in the correct order. Thanks! |
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| 10 | In [[RolePlayingGame RPGs]] and games with RPGElements, there are often locations that are prime for quickly gathering experience (and, sometimes, [[MoneyGrinding other]] [[ItemFarming resources]] as well). This can be due to a number of factors: |
| 11 | |
| 12 | * It contains enemies well beyond what you [[LevelScaling should be encountering]], with commensurate rewards. |
| 13 | * It is very close to a source of healing (a SavePoint, a TraumaInn, etc.) allowing you to marathon battles without lengthy backtracking (or using up all of your {{Mana}}/items) to heal. |
| 14 | * A GuestStarPartyMember has joined you and gives you enough power to defeat what you ordinarily couldn't handle (or a weak RequiredPartyMember leaves). |
| 15 | * You possess ATasteOfPower or something AwesomeButTemporary that gives you extra power to take out stronger foes. |
| 16 | * An area so overloaded with various types of MetalSlime that you're bound to take out a couple by attrition alone. |
| 17 | * It's extraordinarily easy to take advantage of ElementalRockPaperScissors in this area. |
| 18 | * Otherwise formidable, the local enemies are weak to a [[KryptoniteFactor crippling status debuff]] that [[UselessUsefulSpell rarely works]] anywhere else. |
| 19 | * An area where you can get incredibly useful items, either by VideoGameStealing, RandomDrops, or findable in abundance while just walking around. |
| 20 | |
| 21 | This is far from an exhaustive list and many of these examples can occur in tandem depending on the nature of the game. For example, the area may have a ton of Metal Slimes who are vulnerable to a status effect that the party can learn nearby. |
| 22 | |
| 23 | Naturally, these areas quickly become popular, as players quickly stock up in these locales on experience (and usually [[MoneySpider money]], although that's usually secondary to the main goal). Some of these areas are accessible via SequenceBreaking; the experience and rewards offered are standard for when they are ''supposed to be'' encountered, but players have found a shortcut to get to them earlier. |
| 24 | |
| 25 | Some Peninsulas need not be a specific physical location in a game world -- a ''Temporal'' Peninsula of Power Leveling is a specific timeframe during which it is conducive to gaining experience -- be it a specific part of the story where a GuestStarPartyMember joins you (or a weak RequiredPartyMember leaves), a time period where you possess a TasteOfPower or something AwesomeButTemporary, or perhaps during the area before a boss (often a LoadBearingBoss) falls, or even a specific repeatable fight that is only available for a limited time (in the long term). These specific types of areas are very conducive to power leveling, but have one thing in common -- after a certain story event, they become [[PermanentlyMissableContent inaccessible]]. |
| 26 | |
| 27 | If available early in the game, it may cross over with DiscOneNuke. |
| 28 | |
| 29 | Due to how popular these become, many attract a FanNickname if not explicitly named in the game itself. |
| 30 | |
| 31 | See also InfiniteOneUps, MetalSlime. |
| 32 | ---- |
| 33 | !!Examples: |
| 34 | |
| 35 | [[index]] |
| 36 | * ''[[PeninsulaOfPowerLeveling/FinalFantasy Final Fantasy]]'' |
| 37 | * ''[[PeninsulaOfPowerLeveling/{{Pokemon}} Pokémon]]'' |
| 38 | [[/index]] |
| 39 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 40 | |
| 41 | [[folder:Action Game]] |
| 42 | * ''Demon Stalkers: The Raid On Doomfane'' is a clone of the first Gauntlet game and has the same game mechanics. So there's no experience to earn and all improvements is done through eating a lot of food while avoiding damage from enemies and time (this can cause your maximum health to improve) and finding power ups (some of these can permanently improve your stats). Before you fight the Demon Lord, there's a hidden room which is full of powerups of the permanent kind and lots of the best food in the game. So your character will have all their stats and health boosted to an incredible degree. |
| 43 | * ''VideoGame/{{Gauntlet}}'': In the console version of Gauntlet Legends, the first level has weak enemies and plenty of food and this can be replayed for level grinding. Besides earning experience, all that food will be keep you at maximum health in a game where you're always losing health per second. |
| 44 | * In 10tons's ''Tesla vs. Lovecraft'', of all things the "peninsula" is the final level. It's the only level where there's infinite respawning enemies and a large number of them will be [[DemonicSpiders Spawn of Dagon]] which give a good amount of experience. So long as you don't activate the Time Scopes and can survive the initial rush, you can keep killing servitors and just grow more powerful until you finally decide to deal with Lovecraft. |
| 45 | [[/folder]] |
| 46 | |
| 47 | [[folder:Action Adventure]] |
| 48 | * ''Videogame/BloodstainedRitualOfTheNight'' |
| 49 | ** One particular area in the late-game has a platform that has two giant mortes, two giant toads, a marbas, a silver wolfman and an abyssal guardian. Dashing through the area while swinging the [[DeathOfAThousandCuts Rhava Velar]] then resetting the monsters by leaving through the doorway on the right is one of the quickest ways to accumulate experience, all the enemies except the giant mortes also drop items that are useful for late-game ItemCrafting, and a safe room 2 screens away provides saving and healing. |
| 50 | ** Another place for Miriam is the lair of the Master Carpenter, an optional boss that respawns. This boss is easily stymied with the Invert shard and it can summon up to 3 Archdemons that'll be easy experience for Miriam at this point. Just keep going in and out of this room, killing the Master Carpenter for fast levelling up. For other characters, the easiest respawning optional boss is the Millionaire's Bane who's lair is really close to a save/healing room. |
| 51 | * ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaAriaOfSorrow'' has an interesting one. There's a hallway in the Arena that has two Red Minotaurs, a Werejaguar, and a Killer Mantle. Normally, killing Red Minotaurs is tedious and risky, especially at low levels. But if you have the Killer Mantle's soul, you can switch an enemy's HP and MP. This can kill a Red Minotaur and grant you 1000 EXP in a single hit. |
| 52 | * ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaCircleOfTheMoon'' has two. After you've beaten Camilla, go back to the hidden room Underground Warehouse. Lilith will be added as a new enemy in just that room, and she grants 20,000 EXP per kill. However, she can be a real pain to take down due to how much better mobility and damage output she has. Instead, try going to the hallway beneath the uppermost save point in the Observation Tower. It has two Dullahans right next to the door, each of which grants 2,200 EXP per kill. This doesn't sound like much, but you can kill them and reset the room very quickly, and you're close to a save room. If you also use a DSS combo to get a 20% stat boost, you can outpace the Lilith leveling method. |
| 53 | * ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaHarmonyOfDissonance'' has a room full of skeletons in tanks in Castle A's Skeleton Cavern. These enemies are called Skeleton Glass, and once they burst out of the tank they're not much more dangerous than [[TheGoomba regular skeletons]], and [[OneHitKill go down as fast]]. But their experience drop, while not the best, is pretty high up there. |
| 54 | * ''VideoGame/CastlevaniaSymphonyOfTheNight'': |
| 55 | ** The game has a nearly unbeatable enemy located in the Royal Chapel called a Spiked Ball. Despite not being an enemy so much as a piece of weaponry perched on top of a Bone Pillar [[IdiotBall on top of a long set of stairs]] that just happens to be lying in one particular spot and which does massive amounts of CollisionDamage, you can destroy it if you stand as close as possible to it, equip a fist weapon, and hold the attack button for a minute or two. It's a piece of cake to gain 10 levels in this room if you so desire. |
| 56 | ** Once you reach the inverted castle's Marble Corridor, you encounter the game's BossInMookClothing the Guardians. While ridiculously powerful, their attacks can be easily telegraphed and avoided. Since they are the highest-level non-boss enemies in the game, they fork over absurd amounts of experience when killed, and a drop chance for a decent two-handed sword as well as a rare chance for the best set-stat armor in the game (second only to the Walk Armor when all of both castles are explored). |
| 57 | ** In the Sega Saturn version you can reach the Cursed Prison relatively early on via the Marble Gallery. The ghosts just inside are well above your level and can do a lot of damage if you're not careful, but they give 291 experience apiece - well above anything you've fought up to this point, and enough to let you farm out several easy levels early in the game. The Bible subweapon helps greatly with this, and it's located only a short way in from the left entrance. |
| 58 | * In '' VideoGame/DustAnElysianTail'', the Sorrowing Meadow is filled to the brim with weak respawning bees and zombies, which you can easily wipe out with a combination of Fidget's lightning and your sword-spin attack. One screen in particular has a hive visible as soon as you enter from the left side, letting you pop in, fry it with lightning, pop back out and in to respawn it, and repeat. The subsequent combo bonuses will grant you tons of XP, letting you max out your level in about an hour and affording you an easy way to complete the 1000—hit combo sidequest. |
| 59 | * In ''Franchise/TheLegendOfZelda'' series: |
| 60 | ** ''VideoGame/ZeldaIITheAdventureOfLink'': |
| 61 | *** There are plenty of good places to grind for experience late in the game, but one of the better ones you can access earlier on is the large prairie across the eastern sea. The Tektites you find there are only vulnerable to the Fire spell, but they give 50 experience points each, go down with a reasonable amount of hits, and every sixth one you kill drops the best goodies; either a red potion or a 200-point XP bag. What's more, the town of Nabooru is just a few paces away, so your life and magic can both be refilled in a snap. |
| 62 | *** The Skulls in the first dungeon are a great source of experience. They take a little while to kill (50 blows at level 1) but they drop either 50 or 200 XP and are completely immobile while being attacked. You can often get two or three at once to speed things up, then leave the screen to get them to return. |
| 63 | ** In ''VideoGame/HyruleWarriors'', the Master Quest adventure map squares with "rack up enemy kills" are ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin, you have a set amount of time to murder as much as possible including some bosses, and the game constantly throws magic jars at you to maintain Focus Spirit mode (which, after 40 or 50 kills depending on the character, doubles XP gain) for a very long time. Getting good at these maps can get you around 5-10 levels every go on average depending on whether you have a weapon that increases EXP gained and/or are using the mixture that increases it further, and one of the final squares on the map (the one in the bottom left corner) is both late game and one of these, making it phenomenal for powerlevelling lower leveled warriors. |
| 64 | * In ''VideoGame/LEGOStarWars: Film/TheForceAwakens'' you get to Takodana Castle fairly early on and you can head on over and kill poor Grummgar (the big guy whose girlfriend calls the First Order in the film) for a considerable amount of studs, and since he's not an enemy but an NPC he'll almost immediately respawn. Rinse and repeat, and you will have ''tons'' of studs in no time at all even if you're not using any of the Stud Multiplier cheats. Note that this only works until you purchase Grummgar as a playable character, so make sure you have all the money you need before you do. |
| 65 | * ''VideoGame/LostJudgment'' has Ijin Street in Ijincho, just due east of Northern Isezaki Road. Enemies here will spawn very frequently and most encounters here, especially in the later game, will net you upwards of 2,000 SP or more depending on your playstyle and if you bought the Battle Bonus upgrades (which nets you more SP for every encounter). |
| 66 | ** Building on this, one can also farm money extremely fast by abusing the Gambling Den on the southeast corner of town. Just buy a 10-10-1 Charm at the homeless camp on the west end of town for 30,000 SP, play an expert round of Oicho-Kabu and use it to win around 22,000 points instantly. Trade those in for Platinum Plates and sell them at the local pawnshop for an easy 4 million yen. Repeat as desired. |
| 67 | * ''VideoGame/MegaManLegends'' |
| 68 | ** The first game had small reaverbot enemies called [[http://www.legends-station.com/?page=mml1/rvr-miroc Mirocs]] that appeared fairly early in the game, moved slowly, had only a weak physical attack, and died in only a few hits, yet dropped ''ridiculous'' Zenny (the game's currency) for that point in the game. In about an hour of gameplay you could farm enough money from them to fully upgrade the [[MoreDakka Machine Buster arm]], which became a DiskOneNuke for most of the game that tears most bosses apart in ''minutes''. |
| 69 | ** Once you've acquired a class A license (after defeating the Marlwolf), your next stop is Cardon Ruins. Just inside you'll be in a large room with three Jakko nests; with a modest upgrade to your buster's Range (the Sniper Unit works wonderfully), you can safely shoot these from afar until they explode into a ridiculous amount of refractor shards, suck them up with the Vacuum Arm, exit the ruins via the elevator, and repeat as necessary. You'll earn about 10,000 zenny per trip, which take roughly one minute apiece. With only about an hour of farming you can easily top off your health bar, buy several upgrades for the energy canteen, purchase the Omega Kevlar Jacket and fully upgrade the Machine Buster and Powered Buster, largely trivializing the rest of the game. |
| 70 | ** Ladies and gentlemen, the [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTHtdf9v9jw Gorubesshu Army]] trick. Enemies actually spawn into the game as you draw close to their room, in order to save system resources. Due to a [[GoodBadBugs coding error]], you can trigger way more enemies to spawn in that room than was actually intended by running back and forth in the little hallway (at about the 1 minute mark of the linked video), and then swoop in and kill all of them for ''outright ludicrous'' amounts of zenny. You can do it as many times as you like, if it ever stops working just leave and re-enter the ruins to reset it, and it takes about a half-hour of doing this to ''fully upgrade the Shining Laser and Active Buster.'' |
| 71 | ** In ''Legends 2'', there is a large enemy called the Golden Miroc in the Pokte Caverns that drops 10,000 Zenny per kill with an S License, can be killed with a single throw from the [[LethalJokeItem Lifter]] (or using the lock-on-rapid-fire bug), and, unlike almost all other enemies in the game, respawns when you leave and come back to the room it's in. Because doing this can net a skilled player equipped with a fully-upgraded Vacuum Arm around 50,000 Zenny per ''minute'', money grinding this guy for an hour or two will allow you to upgrade most of your weapons to a point where the rest of the game becomes trivial at best. The enemy set he appears with is somewhat uncommon, but you can spot it easily enough as soon as you come off the elevator - if you see a fake chest enemy in the very first room, that's it. |
| 72 | ** In the Manda Ruins early on in the game you will meet clamp like enemies in a long corridor who shoot at you, if you have the Rocket Launcher they fall easily and drop decent loot in addition to energy for the weapon. They also respawn like the above example. |
| 73 | * In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil5'', stage 3-1 has a few easy treasures and a free rocket launcher to grab, with little to no combat required. You can easily pop in, grab those, quit out and and sell the goods for a significant chunk of change; roughly $10,000 every three minutes. This makes powering up your favorite weapons a rather trivial task. |
| 74 | * In ''VideoGame/{{Sundered}}'', each of the three regions has areas designated as Endless Hordes zones, where the player character will be constantly attacked by endlessly-spawning enemies until she leaves the zone. A player who can make it from one end of an Endless Hordes zone to the other will rack up a lot of [[ExperiencePoints Shards]] from killing enemies, and may be rewarded with a Perk at the far exit. |
| 75 | * ''{{VideoGame/Ys}} III'' players will pass through a courtyard in the Ilvern Ruins where Fazul, owl-like monsters, continuously dive at you from the skies. In this game, you can hold Up + Attack to rapidly stab above Adol's head and skewer these enemies in groups. Damage is unavoidable, but with the Power Ring active, you'll earn levels and money at a breakneck pace. Just remember to save enough health (or a cheap healing herb) to escape afterward. Did we mention this is the ''second'' area in the game? |
| 76 | * It's generally agreed that the best leveling spot in ''VideoGame/MuramasaTheDemonBlade'' is the Hida Cave of Evil, which has wave after wave of Yuki-Onna. While they are powerful they are fairly fragile, and each wave comes out bunched up, letting all of them be taken out at once, giving around 15k souls in a bout 20-20 seconds. |
| 77 | * Hanging around the Troy system in ''VideoGame/WingCommanderPrivateer'' and taking random missions to knock off Retros and Pirates for around 2400-4500 credits apiece isn't exactly glorious, but it's a relatively quick and efficient way to save up cash for a better ship. Goes surprisingly fast too - most of them die to only 2-4 IFF Missiles, which you can carry 20 of at a time once you purchase a second launcher. |
| 78 | [[/folder]] |
| 79 | |
| 80 | [[folder:Art Game]] |
| 81 | * In ''VideoGame/YumeNikki'', killing [=NPCs=] can give you money, which can be used to buy drinks that increase your health, and there are several locations good for grinding. Sky Garden has an NPC that always drops 100 yen; however, it is hard to catch, because it teleports away when you touch it. One of Famicom worlds has a room with goblins which drop money with 1/4 chance instead of normal 1/8, and a big goblin who drops 200 yen with 1/2 chance (this is the only NPC that drop other amount of money than 100 yen). In the Number World there is a room completely filled with [=NPCs=]. The joke is that the game doesn't have any enemies that can damage you, and ''health is completely useless.'' |
| 82 | [[/folder]] |
| 83 | |
| 84 | [[folder:Card Battle Game]] |
| 85 | * ''VideoGame/MetalGearAcid2'' there is a short level atop a moving train with only a handful of robot opponents. Using Stinger/FIM type weapons, you can attack these opponents even at the far end of the level, taking the target and any of the robots on the immediate squares out in one shot. This means you can complete the level in about three moves with the robots not even getting a turn. This makes the level very good for grinding for new cards. |
| 86 | ** The Arena Mode also qualifies, since it rotates only a handful of bosses (Liquid Snake, Revolver Ocelot, Vamp, Fortune, The End, The Boss, Teliko and Venus), each of whom have very predicable AI and strategy even on Hard and Extreme mode (with Venus, you even know the contents of her hand at all times). Once you've learned these and built a deck to fit around them, you can beat even Extreme mode characters with minimal effort, way before your characters should be able to, and grind for cards while raking in the points. And there's no penalty for losing. |
| 87 | * In ''VideoGame/YugiohTheSacredCards'', The easiest way to get your level up quickly in the final levels is to stack your deck with Shadow and Fiend monsters when it comes time to duel Ishizu, curbstomp her Light and Dream monsters for 30 deck points and a rare card, then lose to Kaiba on purpose. When you return to the museum you have to start over with Ishizu again, giving you 30 deck points each time. |
| 88 | * In ''VideoGame/YuGiOhGXSpiritCaller'' you're normally forced to return to your dorm after nightfall, but during story events you can stay out as long as you don't complete the event. This allows you as much time as you want to level grind, collect spirits, etc. |
| 89 | [[/folder]] |
| 90 | |
| 91 | [[folder:Fighting Game]] |
| 92 | * Even ''VideoGame/DissidiaFinalFantasy'' has one of these; the Exdeath Trick. Equip a character with as many EXP boosting accessories as possible and the non-auto summoning Magic Pot summon and fight a level 100 Exdeath in Quick Battle. Due to his poor AI and the effects of the summon (lets you copy opponent's Brave), it's rather easy to beat him, netting you tons of experience. |
| 93 | ** It's even easier if you fight the Exdeath from the Omega friend card. He uses the Barbariccia summon, which swaps your bravery with his when you use any summon. It's essentially the same trick as with Magic Pot, but with the added benefit of being able to use almost any manual summon and not having to wait for Magic Pot to recharge. |
| 94 | ** And you can get even ''easier'' XP once you've unlocked Gabranth (The ''FFXII'' character). His special attacks don't do any damage, just make him stand still and charge up his EX gauge. If you set his AI to cautious, he won't attack you directly, so as long as you keep at him, stopping him from charging up his gauge, he won't do any damage to you, even at level 100, at which point you'll be getting up to '''80+''' levels with the proper bonuses per kill with a low-level character. |
| 95 | ** The ability to create custom rules in ''Duodecim'' adds to the fun. By setting the respawn and absorbtion rate of the EX Gauge and EX Cores and equipping "Force to Courage" (which converts all the absorbed EX Force to Bravery), Cores will instantly spawn and you can raise your Bravery to the maximum and possibly killing your opponent in one shot, without the need of Manual Magick Pot. |
| 96 | ** But wait! [[GameBreaker It gets even easier!]] You can set Bravery Bonus to -100 in Custom Rules, and the game will start awarding total bravery to the lower-leveled character in any fight. Thus if you use adjusted-to-level-1 character against lv 100 character, your bravery will [[OneHitKill start at 9999]] or close to it! Combine this with impotent characters like Gabranth and "Minimal" A.I., and you'll get a [[BlatantLies honest-to-Cosmos]] max-level character roster in no time! And you can alter PSP system clock so that it's always your Bonus Day, making the progress even faster! |
| 97 | [[/folder]] |
| 98 | |
| 99 | [[folder:First- and Third-Person Shooters]] |
| 100 | * Since ''VideoGame/{{Borderlands}}'' and its sequel ''VideoGame/{{Borderlands 2}}'' have RPG elements, there are several areas in the game which allow players to take advantage of the opportunity to grind levels and loot chests. |
| 101 | ** The Rust Commons West area in the first game is the most prominent one in the mid-game zone. It has numerous (often unshielded) enemies which can also be run over with your vehicle. There are also several lootable chests within relatively easy access of the fast-travel station, and a hidden 'developer chest' with better-than-average chances to spawn good weapons that resets every time you save, exit, and reload the game. |
| 102 | ** The same can be said of Lynchwood in ''Borderlands 2'', which has huge lines of sight and a slew of fairly straightforward bandit enemies, making it perfect for a sniper on the go. It also doesn't hurt that it has vending machines available mere steps from the best early sniping vantage points. Finally, it is loaded to the gills with no less than ''fourteen'' weapon chests and item lockers. |
| 103 | ** ''Borderlands 3'' has Lectra City in early game, which is chock full of weapon and ammo chests as well as enemies. Doing this area's side quests before proceeding with the main quest is a great way to quickly rise up to the rest of the main quest. |
| 104 | ** The Slaughter Shaft in ''Borderlands 3'' is a Circle of Slaughter-type arena that can be repeated, unlike its equivalents in ''Borderlands 2''. What makes this area stand above the other Circles of Slaughter (the Cistern of Slaughter and Slaughterstar 3000) is the incredibly high Legendary-tier drop rates from the bandit enemies compared to their equivalents, as well as how easier it is in general, with the enemies being ground-based and not too HP-spongy, and the end boss being a massive BreatherBoss. |
| 105 | ** The ''Borderlands 3'' expansion, ''Moxxi's Heist of the Handsome Jackpot'' has the Scraptrap Nest, a two-stage boss fight with a WolfpackBoss in the first half. You can farm for XP by killing the Nest, then running out when Scraptrap Prime appears. After a few seconds, he'll despawn, then you can go back in to respawn the Nest. Even better, turning on the ''Revenge of the Cartels'' event makes some scraptraps spawn as Cartel agents who can summon lieutenants on death, giving you a shot at powerful ''Cartels'' legendaries as well. |
| 106 | * The "Loot Cave" in ''VideoGame/{{Destiny}}''. Many players, in order to level up quickly and acquire powerful weapons and items, would simply fire their guns into the cave for a period of time, then go in and pick up all the loot. Bungie eventually patched it, only for players to discover ''another'' Loot Cave. |
| 107 | * ''VideoGame/Splatoon3'''s main campaign gates progression with [[CashGate Power Eggs]], which you are rewarded with through playing the levels or exploring the overworld. However, if you ever find yourself running low and want to restock on them quick, you'll want to visit "What Caused the Big Bang? YOU!", Mission 8 in Site 1. Like most levels, it rewards 300 eggs for every subsequent completion after the first, but what makes it stand out for farming is that it can be cleared in less than 10 seconds per run since all it needs you to do is to snipe a balloon in the center of a rotating sphere. Play the level enough times, and you'll master the timing to the extent that you'll be spending more time on the ''loading screens'' than the actual level, and stockpile enough eggs that you could ignore everything sans the boss stages if you really wanted to. |
| 108 | [[/folder]] |
| 109 | |
| 110 | [[folder:Hack And Slash]] |
| 111 | * ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}'': |
| 112 | ** The first floor of the Lecture Building has a classroom containing a large number of Slime Scholars which give over 10k blood echoes in total when killed, and also drop Quicksilver Bullets pretty frequently. Since Quicksilver Bullets are one of the two items you're most likely to want to farm echoes in order to buy (the other being Blood Vials), this works out rather well. |
| 113 | ** The undisputed king of blood echo farming is a Chalice Dungeon lovingly [[FanNickname nicknamed]] the "Cum Dungeon" (since the glyph used to access it is "cummmfpk"). Simply take a few steps away from the lantern, and you will start to see ''something'' take a ''lot'' of damage very quickly, giving you a fat 83k echoes once it dies. That something is an NPC Hunter enemy who just so happens to spawn directly in the path of a PendulumOfDeath. Normally the pendulum would knock him away after one hit. However, you happen to be ''just'' far enough away for his ''hitbox'' to load, but not his ''model''. The game can't play any of his animations without a model to animate, so he can't get knocked away, and his disembodied hitbox just stays in one spot getting carved up until he dies. If you were to take even a few more steps beyond the point where you start seeing him take damage, then he would fully load in and get knocked away as expected. |
| 114 | * ''VideoGame/DarkSouls'': |
| 115 | ** The Darkroot Garden can be reached early in the game, and if you get [[CashGate 20,000 soul]] to purchase the emblem that opens the gate, it can easily be accessed from a bonfire. Go in and exploit the AI of the enemies there, and you can gain a massive amount of souls (as seen [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MBH9R1UsZaQ here]]). |
| 116 | ** There is an underground cavern in the Tomb of Giants area, just before you encounter the boss Gravelord Nito, where small skeletons respawn without needing to visit a bonfire whenever you walk into the water at the bottom of the cavern. The skeletons are easy to kill (although because this is ''Dark Souls'' they can still pose a danger if you're not careful and they mob you) and, while they don't drop a lot of souls on their own, you can fight so many of them at once it racks up quickly. Even better, they're one of the very few enemies in the game to also drop Humanity, so this is an excellent place to grind especially if you're trying to gain ranks in the Chaos Servant covenant. |
| 117 | * ''VideoGame/DarkSoulsII'': |
| 118 | ** Heide's Tower of Flame is good for grabbing levels in the early game, as long as you get the hang of fighting Old Knights: their powerful but slow attacks are generally fairly predictable, they're easy to circle-strafe, and without using a Bonfire Ascetic to increase they're worth a cool 400 souls apiece, the highest non-boss reward you've likely seen so early in the game. For bonus points, most of them are pretty easy to kite down to the starting area, right next to the bonfire, so even if a fight ''does'' go sideways, your collected souls will be easy to recover. It's not an unlimited supply of souls (when not in the Company of Champions covenants in the [=SotFS=] version), because enemies in ''II'' normally stop respawning after they die 15 times or so, but that still means that you can make thousands of souls simply by doing some relatively easy fights until the things you're fighting stop appearing. Just for extra fun, if you can save up 10,000 souls and spend them at Merchant Hag Melentia in one sitting, you can then get the Covetous Silver Serpent Ring +1 off her by talking to her without leaving the interaction menu; this will add a cool 20% to all souls gained from killing enemies, meaning that Old Knights are now worth nearly 500 souls apiece. |
| 119 | ** Late-game soul farming consists pretty much entirely of fighting the Giant Lord over and over again by burning Bonfire Ascetics in the Place Unbenknownst bonfire. Not only does this respawn the boss, it also respawns all the items in the surrounding area... which includes a Bonfire Ascetic. It also bumps the difficulty of that area up one NewGamePlus cycle each time, but the game stops getting harder after NG+7 and he's still a pretty easy boss even at max difficulty. Not only does this get you the hefty amount of souls you would expect from ''any'' boss at NG+7, much less a late-game one, you also get his boss soul every time as well. |
| 120 | * ''VideoGame/DarkSoulsIII'' has its own: |
| 121 | ** As soon as you gain the ability to consistently kill Lothric Knights, the area around the Vordt of the Boreal Valley bonfire is worth about 2000 souls per lap if you get the elite knight in one corner. As a bonus, Lothric Knight weapons and armour sell for 300-500 souls apiece at the Shrine Handmaiden's shop, further speeding it up. This will fall off in the later game, though. |
| 122 | ** The Lothric Castle bonfire has a Lothric Knight right next to it, who, when you're equipped with all the soul-boosting items, is worth nearly 6000 souls by himself. Lothric Knights within the castle are also the only enemies to drop Sunlight Medals, so you will also be farming this knight if you want to rank up in the Warriors of Sunlight covenant without playing online. |
| 123 | ** Going up the stairs near the [[spoiler:Anor Londo]] bonfire can be worth 17000 souls with the right gear. The enemies here also drop an otherwise online-only covenant item, so if you want to rank up in the [[spoiler:Blades of the Darkmoon]], this here's your spot. |
| 124 | ** The Dragon-Kin Mausoleum at Archdragon Peak has a Man-Serpent mage who will summon a [[VideoGame/DarkSoulsII Drakeblood Knight]] to fight you. Killing the knight just causes the mage to immediately summon him back again, allowing you to farm him for as long as you want without even needing to rest at the bonfire, which is just one room away if you ever slip up and he manages to kill you. It goes without saying that you should leave the mage alone while you do this (don't worry, he'll never attack you as long as you don't go after him). The mage also has a rare random chance to summon [[VideoGame/DarkSoulsI Havel the Rock]] instead of the knight, who is ''significantly'' harder to kill. You're probably better off running back to rest if that happens (though you do get his greatshield for killing him once). |
| 125 | ** The parts of Farron Keep ''not'' [[BubblegloopSwamp covered in toxic shit and swamp water]] offer some pretty quick soul-grabbing opportunities, as long as you feel confident in your ability to finish off Darkwraiths. |
| 126 | ** Yhorm the Giant's bonfire is nice and close to some clerics and gargoyles, as long as you don't aggro them all at once. |
| 127 | * ''VideoGame/DemonsSouls'': |
| 128 | ** In the last section of the Shrine of Storms, the player will have to deal with three Reapers who summon armies of Shadowlurkers to guard them...but once you reach the bonfire after the third Reaper, you can simply go through the area in reverse and kill the Reaper first (and all the Shadowlurkers with it) and get huge amounts of souls very quickly. |
| 129 | ** Once you defeat the same area's last boss the Storm King, [[FlunkyBoss his Storm Beasts]] will continue to respawn in the arena where the Storm Ruler's SwordBeam can easily kill them all in less than a minute. They provide enough souls for a level up or more per trip until well past level 50. |
| 130 | * ''VideoGame/DevilMayCry3DantesAwakening'': You receive a lot of experience points for your Styles whenever you defeat a boss. This makes Mission 18 the best place to level grind because it's a stage where you [[BossRush fight most of the previous bosses]]. |
| 131 | * In ''VideoGame/DiabloII'', the first area of the 5th act in the expansion pack used to be a great place to level grind thanks to relatively easy monsters who gave exp like candy. Pretty sure it got fixed in a patch later on though. |
| 132 | ** The general peninsulas for ''Diablo II'' are something along the lines of: |
| 133 | *** Tristram for 1-15 |
| 134 | *** Tomb runs for 15-20 |
| 135 | *** Cow level for 20-25 |
| 136 | *** Baal Runs on varying difficulty modes for 25 on. |
| 137 | ** Getting a [[GoodBadBug Bug Rush]] to Act 4 in Hell Mode at level 24+ can get you to level 65+ in mere ''minutes.'' |
| 138 | ** There's also an [[AscendedGlitch Ascended Glitch]] that lets you equip items to gain stats, which lets you equip even better items. Given the proper (extremely hard to find, due to Rare Item drop rates/combinations, forging, and the other ways of getting gear in the game) you can equip just about any item in the game by using this feature. |
| 139 | * ''VideoGame/EldenRing'': |
| 140 | ** A teleporter in the north of Limgrave, the starting area, leads to a plain in the depths of the much higher-level Caelid that is crawling with [[DepravedDwarf Vulgar Militia]]. While their attacks are quite deadly, they're easily backstabbed, it's entirely possible to [[CycleOfHurting stagger and stance-break them to death]], and they drop a juicy 1094 runes apiece. |
| 141 | ** Close to the above farming spot is the MageTower Lenne's Rise. The path leading up to it is protected by a magical trap which summons [[IndyEscape a giant metal ball that rolls down the hill to crush you]]. The ball counts as an enemy, and since it rolls directly towards you after being summoned, you can bait it into rolling off a cliff, awarding you about 1900 runes. Although if it dies off-camera, you don't get the runes for some reason. |
| 142 | ** Accessible through a sidequest available after defeating Godrick, the Palace Approach Ledge-Road grace site in Mohgwyn Palace is in close proximity to not one but ''two'' prime rune farms. First, directly to the north is a huge group of huddling, non-hostile Albinaurics, which each drop 2044 runes (though they're pretty tough and are watched over by some hostile guards, making this most viable if you have a strong [=AoE=] attack at your disposal). Second, below the cliffside to the west roams a powerful bird enemy. With a well-placed arrow, you can lure it into attempting to charge you... and dashing straight into a pit, plummeting to its immediate death and dropping ''11048'' runes. |
| 143 | ** The Eternal City of Noskarella is swarming with Mimmic Tears, who give 445 Runes per kill. A run from the Site of Grace up the stairs to the miniboss room, taking detours to get each mob along the way nets around 20,000-and-change runes each time, as they spawn in a group of around ''thirty'' (although you should turn back here, as the aforementioned miniboss is not just pretty difficult, but respawns). Taking the other fork down the river grants around 30,000-and-a-bit; meaning cleaning it out gives you over 50,000 runes; as much as some Shardbearer bosses for considerably less effort. Just be careful of the Nox Maidens (whipsword or flail-weilding {{Dark Action Girl}}s who hit like trucks), especially the antriders. It's also snowed in with Tear Husks, which, while they only sell for 10 Runes each, endlessly respawn. |
| 144 | ** The Mohgwyn Dynasty Mausoleum. It's a very high-level area (scaling tier 18) that you can reach when you're still in Liurnia (scaling tier 7) if you progress Varre's questline (otherwise you'd need to wait until the Consecrated Snowfields) and has a few tricks for easy farming, such as using a wide aoe weapon art (traditionally the Sacred Relic Sword's Wave of Gold) to kill a bunch of resting Albinaurics, or using a ranged attack to hit a Blistered Giant Crow on a ledge and waiting for it to [[ArtificialStupidity run itself off the cliff looking for you]]. |
| 145 | * The first two ''Videogame/GodOfWar'' games have a quest to obtain an item that turns your enemies to stone. Right after getting it, they will task you with turning a number of enemies into [[TakenForGranite granite]] while providing you with unlimited supply of enemies ''and'' magic until you do the deed. You can rack infinite number of XP orbs from combos (the enemies themselves stop giving them rather quickly) if you'll keep killing them with Poseidon's/Cronos' Rage instead. |
| 146 | * In ''VideoGame/PathOfExile'', post-game grinding is most commonly done with two sources: The Coward's Trial unique map puts you in a [[MultiMookMelee gauntlet of enemies]] containing up to 8 different types of monsters in a small arena, making them very efficient for XP farming. Enriched Breachstones have a hefty XP and pack size multiplier and the way leading up to the boss is packed with enemies. Players regularly share these maps with each other in a rotation, even skipping the Breach bosses to not reduce the XP:time ratio. |
| 147 | [[/folder]] |
| 148 | |
| 149 | [[folder:MMORPG]] |
| 150 | * Due to how leveling is handled in ''VideoGame/AceOnline / Air Rivals'', there are only several maps where each class goes to: A-Gears usually settle in Alioth, while higher level ones prefer Lumein Volcano. B-Gears prefer Dimension Corridor "wall", or when not available, Island Dream or again, Alioth. Defense M-Gears can also grind in Alioth or sharegrind with B-Gears in Dimension Corridor or Chaos. For I-Gears however, there's only one map: CMM (short for Chaos Mission Map). The catch? Due to the intense PVP-based gaming that ''Ace Online' is, Alioth and CMM are perpetually open to both nations, meaning that while it is usually a no-fire zone, wars often break out to determine "ownership" of said maps. Island Dream and Dimension Corridor likewise has an "open" version as well. |
| 151 | ** The maps above primarily satisfy the "very weak and numerous" rule. Otherwise, these maps wouldn't be as popular; each map enemy's exp reward vs. toughness is inherently progressing lower and lower (that is, enemies get tougher while yielding dismally low exp in return) as players advance in maps, so these grindmaps make up for it by sheer numbers of mobs even though the exp reward becomes more and more useless as level progresses. For instance, a level 8x I-Gear would take 2-3 kills in Chaos Mission Map to bring his/her exp bar up by 0.01! |
| 152 | * ''VideoGame/CityOfHeroes'' has Peregrine Island, while ''VideoGame/CityOfVillains'' has Grandville, both being the highest-level zones. Briefly, there was a lot of powerlevelling in the starter zones due to a bug. |
| 153 | * ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsOnline'' has a few, but of particular note is the Alik'r Desert, where either trains of [[OurZombiesAreDifferent Ra-Netu]] are built up before being slaughtered, or trains of players take advantage of all 3 of the region's dolmens being close to wayshrines, farming them as they teleport from dolmen to dolmen. |
| 154 | * If an EXP camp is described as a "insert-word-here-burn" in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXI'', chances are you're going to get a ''lot'' of EXP. Because of the way the game's evolved, it's increasingly rare to find "standard" experience parties anymore, as everyone prefers to abuse the following types of EXP. |
| 155 | ** The most common type, melee burns (otherwise known as TP burns), do nothing but slaughter birds at a mind-boggling pace. They abuse the fact that colibri birds parrot spells cast on them...but are otherwise very weak and have laughable normal attacks, so melee characters can mow them down effortlessly. |
| 156 | ** Manaburns involve five Black Mages and one level synced leech frying crabs and fish on Qufim Island at a similar pace. Other locations that don't involve level sync include killing tigers in Vunkerl Inlet or ghosts in the past version of Xarcabard, but they all basically involve many mages liquefying a mob in a round or two. |
| 157 | *** Furthermore, ''many'' areas count for solo Black Mages, as beastmaster mobs won't attack you for attacking their pet if they don't see you doing so. A Black Mage can simply pull the pet away while the master's back is turned. Alternatively, killing the pet in one spell will never cause the master to attack you, even if he's looking right at his pet. |
| 158 | ** Finally, there are Astral burns (or "SMN burns") in Korroloka Tunnel, in which a max-level player draws/links half the tunnel into following and attacking him, at which point a party of Summoners use Astral Flow and kill every mob instantly while level synced to a low-level leech. It's a very blatant abuse of the level sync system (meant to allow friends of disparate levels to party together), but it's widely and routinely abused so much that Square can't reasonably ban anyone over it. |
| 159 | *** People will even pay (in-game) money to leech SMN burn exp. A fair number of players get rich by allowing others to leech their way to max level this way, and players who level this way are stereotyped as having, well, [[BribingYourWayToVictory bribed their way to victory]], and are looked down upon for it. |
| 160 | ** The zones from the ''Vision of Abyssea'' and ''Scars of Abyssea'' micro-expansions were built to be areas where players could acquire huge amounts of XP that make all of the above methods look slow in comparison. This was designed as part of a massive send-off as the playerbase, in theory, moved en mass to ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'', but, well... |
| 161 | * The "intended" way to LevelGrind in ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyXIV'' is to run all your [[PlayEveryDay daily roulettes]], then the highest-level available dungeon. However, due to the [[DamagerHealerTank strict party composition rules]] not matching the playerbase's actual demographics, queue times for this can get quite lengthy for DPS players. Deep Dungeons give less EXP per run, but since they ignore the party composition rules, the queues are nearly instant, resulting in significantly faster EXP gains per hour for DPS players. |
| 162 | * [[Website/GaiaOnline zOMG!]]: Due to experience being an item-drop, most boss instances can be repeatedly farmed for "Charge Orbs" if you have a full party, but the Saw Mill is the most popular due to its accessibility, simplicity, and [[MoneySpider gold payout]]. |
| 163 | * ''VideoGame/GranblueFantasy'': |
| 164 | ** There are Angel Halo quests which pit the players against easy-to-kill enemies, and they drop dozens of treasure chests containing lots of EXP fodders, which further increase the levels of the players' characters, weapons, or summons. |
| 165 | ** The Weekend Sliming quests serves as one for players who are easily able to deal Non-Elemental Damage, the entry cost is equivalent to the Angel Halo, but the enemies in Weekend Slimes can provide up to a ten thousand experience points or coins per run. |
| 166 | * In ''VideoGame/KingdomOfLoathing'', several of the areas in Spookyraven Manor work this way, with different areas tuned to different stats. This is especially useful with Clovers later on - a properly-equipped player (with a lot of funds) can reach level 15 easily through them, without a single combat. For players in a long [[ExtendedGameplay aftercore]] who've outgrown this area, anyplace with LevelScaling monsters is the next choice, such as the [=GameInformPowerDailyPro=] Dungeon. For players seeking to reach the AbsurdlyHighLevelCap, The Mansion of Dr. Weirdeaux is the only option. |
| 167 | * For about a day, there was a quest in ''VideoGame/StarWarsGalaxies'' which got you half a level for every completion. This quest was repeatable, but it was intended that the opposing faction (Rebel or Imperial) was supposed to stop you. Fortunately for the Rebels, the Imperial players didn't feel like it. This made it possible for the Rebel players to continuously complete the quest, allowing for very quick leveling. Many players were literally able to jump 70+ levels in that one day (a feat which should have taken weeks or months normally). |
| 168 | * Lion Heart Castle/Lion King Castle (Usually abbreviated as LHC, regardless of region) in ''VideoGame/MapleStory''. It is one of several Party-Play zones in the game that gives extra experience if more people are in your party. During 2X events (where the experience given by monsters is doubled) it's not uncommon to find almost every map with at least one party grinding. Killing one mob can give hundreds of thousands of experience, which you'll need at higher levels. |
| 169 | * ''Old-School VideoGame/RuneScape'' has Lava Dragon Isle, which is the only area in the game with the titular Lava Dragons, which are a formidible combat level 252 (for comparison, the "final boss" of Free-to-Play OSRS is Elvarg at level 82), but very frequently make high-valued drops-- an average of ''16,000'' gp per dragon killed over time-- and can be safe-spotted from a distance even with low-level Ranged or Magic builds. Very profitable! The catch? They're only found in the high-level Wilderness, where you can't teleport out easily, and are very likely to be intercepted by Player-Killers who frequent the area to find vulnerable prey. Though if you come in at incredibly low combat levels, you will actually be below the minimum combat level for high-level PKers to target. |
| 170 | * Each island in ''VideoGame/{{Temtem}}'' has a shrine containing fully-evolved Temtem whose levels are much higher than anything else you'd find in the wild. |
| 171 | * Hydron, Sedna is the de facto leveling spot in ''VideoGame/{{Warframe}}'', as it’s a mid/late-game endless Defense mission. It’s so popular that you can easily get full squads for leveling at almost any time of day on any platform. However, there are a few other noteworthy spots such as Helene, Saturn. |
| 172 | ** Elite Sanctuary Onslaught has somewhat surpassed Hydron. You can't level warframes there, though, as the mission requires you to equip a max-rank frame. Even regular Sanctuary Onslaught is excellent for all-around leveling, however, especially with event boosters, but Elite is ''exceptional'' for leveling non-frame stuff you can bring into it (weapons, companions, amps, etc). |
| 173 | * In ''VideoGame/WorldOfWarcraft'' random dungeon groups are often viewed as one of the best ways to quickly grind levels and gain gear. The combination of experience from mobs, quests, and the completion bonus are significant and the drops are generally superior to average quest rewards at the same level. |
| 174 | ** Deepholm is a preferred location for power-leveling to 85 by using locations with fast-respawning enemies and [=NPCs=] willing to help kill them. |
| 175 | ** During ''Legion'', players quickly discovered a cave in the Highmountain area that was filled with monsters that gave good XP, respawned quickly, and were neutral to the players so that if you were careful, you wouldn't pull more than you could handle. For the first few months after the expansion opened, the matchmaking tool was full of players making 5-person groups to farm more effectively. |
| 176 | [[/folder]] |
| 177 | |
| 178 | [[folder:Platform Game]] |
| 179 | * ''VideoGame/HenryHatsworthInThePuzzlingAdventure'' contains another example. Purchasing all the upgrades [[ForcedLevelGrinding pretty much requires money grinding]] (or a NewGamePlus), but [[AntiGrinding the end-of-level treasure chests contain less treasure on repeat visits.]] However, there is one treasure chest in 5-4 (the first part of Weasalby's Mansion) that contains a ''huge'' amount of gems, and respawns every time you enter the level. [[GuideDangIt Provided you know where to find the chest]], you can easily amass over 5000 money for each pass through the level. |
| 180 | * ''Franchise/MegaMan'' |
| 181 | ** In ''VideoGame/MegaManX1'', right at the beginning of Armored Armadillo's stage, there is a bat enemy that gives an extra life 90% of the time when it dies and respawns indefinitely. It's easy to spot, as it's a UniqueEnemy (it's the one that looks like it came from ''VideoGame/MegaMan7''). You're not supposed to see it though since [[MinecartMadness you should normally be riding on a minecart at ten times the speed of light]]. |
| 182 | ** Using a charged Silk Shot inside secret rooms in ''VideoGame/MegaManX2'' would attract invisible energy and weapon capsules, easily filling up the subtanks. |
| 183 | ** In ''VideoGame/MegaManX6'', once you beat Nightmare Zero and High Max in any of the {{Brutal Bonus Level}}s, a third visit would have you face Dynamo, a LegacyBossBattle from ''VideoGame/MegaManX5''. He can be fought as many times as the players wants, and each defeat would yield 200 Nightmare Souls. With one Nightmare Area (Infinity Mijinion) being short in comparison to the others, it will be quick and easy to farm Nightmare Souls and reach the Cap. |
| 184 | ** Intermissions are minigames in ''VideoGame/MegaManX8'' that allowed fast Metal farming for HundredPercentCompletion in the R&D shop. The Troia Base simulation is easily the best of these intermissions, as it's not an EndlessGame or a MultiMookMelee, but rather a repeat of the BossRush, with each boss yielding Metals (the value depends on how fast you defeat that Maverick). |
| 185 | ** In ''VideoGame/MegaManXDiVE'', you can replay conquered levels and make purchases. Just before you reach the 1st boss Maoh the Giant, you should have enough money to buy a [[PurpleIsPowerful purple-tier]] weapon like the [[GatlingGood Gatling Gun]]. Upgrade it and easily kill Maoh. Maoh and most bosses will drop chips of themselves which augment your weapons, by replaying Maoh's level you can fully upgrade the Maoh chip and after maxing it out, any further Maoh chips you get can be sole for 50 Zenny each. So you can then save up and buy a gold-tier weapon and continue to gain levels. With enough experience, you can unlock the Events such as the Zenny event where lowest tier will net you 60,000 Zenny if you earn an S rating. |
| 186 | ** ''VideoGame/MegaManZero1'' |
| 187 | *** Zero has to level up his weapons in order to upgrade that weapon and unlock new abilities. This can be achieved as early as Aztec Falcon's stage. After finishing the mission, return to the area, home to Totem Cannons. Attacking these Cannons repeatedly (since they regenerate infinitely on the spot) would level up Zero's skills with no penalty. |
| 188 | *** The Abandoned Laboratory (introductory stage) area works very well for this, too, due to [[MookMaker spiders that constantly spawn from their nests]]. It can't be used to level every weapon, however - the mission that gets you the Triple Rod ends with the area self-destructing, after which you can't return. |
| 189 | *** After the "Occupy Factory" mission, subsequent revisits would allow you to collect E-Crystals in various rooms. It's a better alternative to farming the crystals from normal enemy drops, as long as you brave the platforming. |
| 190 | * In each ''Franchise/RatchetAndClank'' game you can find an area that's great for collecting bolts, EXP and/or Raritanium: |
| 191 | ** ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClank2002'': You need a bug to get to it, but if you can walk along the race track in Blackwater City and have the Taunter equipped, you can stand underneath a pile of boxes and let the bolts rain down on you, although it takes a while. Still the easiest way to get the [[InfinityPlusOneSword RYNO]]. |
| 192 | ** ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankGoingCommando'': The two deserts on Tabora and Grelbin, if you're willing to fight the [[DemonicSpiders YETIs]] on the latter. Not only are they great for getting bolts by selling the desert crystals and moonstones, they have lots of enemies that you can clear out. Great for upgrading your weapons, especially the ones you unlock later such as the Hoverbomb Gun. Tabora is especially good on Challenge Mode due to the bolt multiplier you'll unlock by that point, and both sandboxes are even better in [[NewGamePlus Challenge Mode]] due to the bolts you receive for giving them to the New Age Mystic being multiplied by ''10''! That's 10,000 per Crystal for 900,000 total, and 30,000 per Moonstone for 2,280,000 total! |
| 193 | ** ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankUpYourArsenal'': |
| 194 | *** The sewer stage of Aquatos serves the same function as Tabora and Grelbin except that half the map is locked away until you get the gravity boots. The Quack-o-Ray is incredibly useful here as it can morph most of the enemies there in an instant, you'll be forced to encounter literally hundreds of them as you hunt for Sewer Crystals, and the weapon has unlimited ammo. |
| 195 | *** It also has Annihilation Nation which offers huge cash prizes and good EXP drops early on. |
| 196 | *** Koros has enemies that give an abnormally high amount of XP compared to the levels before and after it. This is fortunate as the game doesn't have nearly enough levels to allow you to upgrade all the weapons fully without grinding. |
| 197 | ** ''VideoGame/RatchetDeadlocked'' has the "Endzone" challenge, in which you have to keep [[ZergRush a bunch of anklebiters]] from entering a zone at one end of the playing field. If you have a well-upgraded Leviathan Flail or Quasar Turret Launcher with the [[ChainLightning Shock Mod]], in Challenge Mode [[http://clips.twitch.tv/MoistSpikyDiscKappa you can easily earn so many bolts that the amount you're getting exceeds what you already have by a mile]]. |
| 198 | ** ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankFutureToolsOfDestruction'': |
| 199 | *** For getting bolts, Mukow not only has an arena, but the pathway to enter the arena as well, which is the best for Challenge Mode. Just run through it a couple of times, jump into the water and you should have millions of bolts by the end. You can also get some good Raritanium drops if you have those upgrades unlocked. |
| 200 | *** For Raritanium you can either go through the Gyrocycle course on Rykan V then jump to your death - the crystals respawn - or you can go exploring around Sargasso with a weapon with Raritanium drop upgrades, such as the Mag-Net Launcher. |
| 201 | ** ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankFutureACrackInTime'': |
| 202 | *** Morklon, the penultimate level of the game, is very similar to Koros: all of the Agorian enemies give huge amounts of XP that allow you to upgrade your weapons to the max before the final boss if you repeat the level a few times before freeing Zahn Gribnak. |
| 203 | *** The enemies on the moons in the Corvus Sector are identical to those on Morklon. If a player is clever enough, they can skip all the enemies in the final level, get the [[{{BFG}} RYNO V]], then kill the enemies there and those in the Corvus Sector to fully level up the weapon before the game is over! And if you're going to go up against [[{{Superboss}} Vorselon]] on Hardcore difficulty, [[ThatOneBoss you'll certainly need it]]... |
| 204 | ** The second vendor of Rilgar in ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClank2016'' is on top of a balcony of sorts; down are a large number of Amoeboids, that keep respawning as long as you don't jump down, allowing you to grind most ranged weapons ''and'' refill ammo when needed. This won't happen until you've already beaten the level once however. There's even a GoodBadBug that allows you to multiply the amount of enemies.[[note]]Snipe the two spawn points furthest from the balcony; for whatever reason, the game believes you've killed any Amoeboid you cut in two. Beware, this can cause actual slowdown.[[/note]] |
| 205 | * In the DLC for ''VideoGame/SonicUnleashed'', the usual art/music/video collectables and medals aren't hidden in the downloadable stages, meaning that secret areas instead opt to reward players with rings, lives, or, on the night stages, EXP crystals. Windmill Isle Act 1-2 and Jungle Joyride Act 1-2 in particular are both very generous with EXP if you defeat every enemy and smash every breakable object along the way to the goal, resulting in around 30 full bars of EXP to spend per visit (note that the typical full-length story-mandatory stages tend to only give out about 10 bars of EXP on average). |
| 206 | * A rare PlatformGame example, in ''VideoGame/SuperMarioGalaxy'': Bubble Blast Galaxy is a paradise of Star Bits, and dying and retrying a few tens of times there you can collect up to 9999 to [[spoiler:[[CosmeticAward turn the coconuts into watermelons]]]]. |
| 207 | * In ''VideoGame/SuperMarioWorld'' you can grab the gray P-switch in Vanilla Secret 2, backtrack to the first section of the stage with all the bouncing Koopas, and hit the switch to turn them all into gray coins. Running back to the start and scooping up all the coins will quickly earn you upwards of 60 1-ups per trip. |
| 208 | [[/folder]] |
| 209 | |
| 210 | [[folder:Puzzle Game]] |
| 211 | * The bog paradise stage in ''VideoGame/ElementalStory'' gives a lot of experience, but players need to use metal coins to access them. |
| 212 | [[/folder]] |
| 213 | |
| 214 | [[folder:Realtime Strategy]] |
| 215 | * The [[KnightInShiningArmor Knight faction]] in ''Videogame/WarlordsBattlecry 3'' has several upgrades that make LevelGrinding much faster when playing as them. Crusade increases the XP earned from kills by +1 and can be researched up to five times for a grand total of 6XP per kill, Order of the Grail doubles the experience a hero earns from completing quests, and Knight's Quest lets you pick up to 4 enemy types and awards a large XP bonus to any of your soldiers who slay one of them. |
| 216 | [[/folder]] |
| 217 | |
| 218 | [[folder:Role Playing Game]] |
| 219 | * ''VideoGame/{{Alphadia}}'' opens access to several end-game dungeons as soon as the party obtains its ship. While the characters are barred from going very far inside- either by locked doors or the party commenting they have no business there- there's still enough room to move back and forth to encounter the monsters inside. |
| 220 | * ''VideoGame/AlphadiaGenesis'' has one island where the random encounter enemies are of the MetalSlime variety and accessories that always guarantee a critical hit. Throw in Corone's experience-boosting skill and the experience-boosting formation and it's entirely possible for the party to reach maximum level in half an hour. |
| 221 | * The portal sidequest in ''Videogame/ArcanumOfSteamworksAndMagickObscura''. The portal is spewing monsters into the forest around Blackroot, and you're encouraged to disable it from a safe distance with either a magickal trap or a scroll of magick dispersal. But if your character is powerful enough, or you have a good selection of followers, you can bait the monsters into attacking you, kill them, and the portal will spawn more (though it will eventually run out). The monsters in question aren't usually encountered until TheVeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon, and can be a good source of XP early on. |
| 222 | * ''VideoGame/AsdivineHearts'' has two overworld maps. Both of them contain one island each of nothing but MetalSlime enemies, and the first one becomes available 1/3 of the way through the game, making it entirely possible to gain enough levels to deliver a CurbStompBattle to nearly every remaining random encounter in the main game! |
| 223 | * ''Franchise/BaldursGate'': |
| 224 | ** In the [[VideoGame/BaldursGate first installment]], you have the Pirate's cave. Every time you rest in the cave, you'll be attacked by Flesh Golems. |
| 225 | ** Right after starting the game, one can run away from Imoen and head straight to the area east of the Temple. There are a lot of basilisks here; normally bad news as they can petrify you for an immediate game over. However, there is also a ghoul named Korax who will immediately be put under a Dire Charm as soon as you talk to him. Ghouls are innately immune to petrification, so you can exploit this to lead him around the map, killing basilisks and greater basilisks (and their 'owner' Mutamin) for a couple thousand experience a pop and gain four or five levels before you even begin the game proper. This works even better in the Enhanced Edition as freshly recruited allies will begin with enough experience to match your protagonist's level (up to a max of level five). Korax will eventually snap out of it and attack you as well, though, so don't linger too long! |
| 226 | ** There's a notorious one in ''VideoGame/BaldursGateIIThroneOfBhaal'', in which you reach the ramparts of a city that's being attacked by giants. By equipping infinite-ammunition bows, setting those with them to attack automatically, and telling anyone without one not to attack, you can reach the level cap ''without even being at your computer''. |
| 227 | * In ''VideoGame/BeyondTheBeyond'', about halfway through the game, you gain access to Leave Village. In the mountains to the west you can fight enemies you normally would fight near the end of the game. |
| 228 | * ''VideoGame/BravelySecond'' features a series of small islands between Eternia and Eisen that, while unreachable by sailing due to a lack of shoals, can be landed on once [[spoiler: your ship, the Rubadub, becomes an airship in Chapter 4.]] While there's nothing of real importance on the islands, they are considered part of [[spoiler: the Caldisla Region]], which is hidden and inaccessible until Chapter 6 and will spawn enemies of an according level. Combined with the chain battle system, a well-prepared party can burn through Experience and Job levels very quickly, and being on the overworld makes safety saves and retreat for healing a breeze. |
| 229 | * ''VideoGame/BravelyDefaultII'': |
| 230 | ** The Jaws of Judgement, a dungeon available from Chapter 3 onwards. There's a chance that the enemy groups the party faces will include big wiki-wikis, MetalSlime enemies that give large amounts of JP and have a chance of dropping EXP and JP orbs. The regular enemies in the dungeon alos drop [[RareCandy booster buns]] that can be used to permanently boost your party's MP, aim and crit chance stats. |
| 231 | ** The volcano dungeon near Holograd, available after chapter 5, for similar ewasons to the above - [[MetalSlime metal wiki-wikis]] and enemies that drop [[RareCandy booster buns]] for HP, speed and evasion. |
| 232 | * ''Franchise/BreathOfFire'' games in general split the XP earned amongst your group members. Any time a group member is isolated because of plot reasons, a good LevelGrinding spot is found nearby. |
| 233 | ** ''VideoGame/{{Breath of Fire|I}}'' |
| 234 | *** After [[spoiler:the debacle having to do with the Time machine]], Ryu is isolated by himself. Normally you walk straight North into a town to be re-united with your group. Instead, you can use items that prevent battles, and backtrack to a nearby town where you can gain 5x-8x the XP per battle to push Ryu's levels insanely high very quickly. |
| 235 | *** An island to the north and was notable, on the map, for having a tower on it that was part of the endgame dungeon run prior to Obelisk. It had both Ryu's most powerful weapon, and the massive Gold Slimes which you could grind until you were absurdly leveled. |
| 236 | *** The Gold Slimes apparently underwent evolution between the first and second games, as they exist on Monster Island in 2, but shrunk down to the size of the E. Sludges you encounter in the [=HomeTown=] area, and are now called K. Sludges. It's almost a MUST to have G.Drgn/Kaiser to drop on these suckers, because they come 3 in a group, 1000 HP per Sludge, hit hard, don't take much damage otherwise, AND can effectively cast Death. |
| 237 | ** ''VideoGame/BreathOfFireII'' |
| 238 | *** Early in the game before you try to break the spell on Jean, there's a signpost Southeast of [=SimaFort=]. If you wander around the squares just south of the sign, you find orange crabs that are incredibly powerful, but die very fast to Thunder spells. Once Nina learns S.Boom, she kills them all in one shot and goes before them and they give 2x the XP anything else in the area does. |
| 239 | *** Monster Island far to the north, home to a pair of cameo appearances and Skull Island-issue ''giant'' versions of the game's cannon fodder monsters; needless to say, this is a great place to level grind before facing the final dungeon. Another common level grinding location is Nightrider Island to the south, named for a rare enemy encountered on the island (although this fan name may be affected by the upcoming fan retranslation project, which restores "N. Rider" to the original name of "Ragnarider"). |
| 240 | ** ''VideoGame/BreathOfFireIII'' |
| 241 | *** Ryu first goes to Mt. Myrneg after he's been separated from Rei and Teepo. There, he can find Tar Man enemies, who are extremely powerful for the area...but can be trivially frozen with the Frost spell you can learn from Mygas. These give Ryu a lot of experience. |
| 242 | *** Mt. Zublo. The Lavamen there can be quickly upgraded to BossInMookClothing status by repeatedly using fire attacks. A properly-prepared party ''can'' survive the battle, and earn an outrageous experience reward. |
| 243 | ** ''VideoGame/BreathOfFireIV'': |
| 244 | *** The first time you have to go into the Great Plains, Ryu has to go alone. There's a Temple-like area where Nut Troops appear. If you knew this ahead of time, you might have had Ryu learn the Burn spell. Take Ryu there with a bunch of cheap Healing Herbs and Burn all the Nut Troops there until you run out of AP. Easy XP that isn't cut by group members; the XP you get here is far better than anywhere else. But, again, only Ryu levels up in this way. Still, high level Ryu beats low level Ryu. |
| 245 | *** In Sinchon, there are Bot enemies that "malfunction" when hit with combos, then after a few turns they will recover. Just hit them with level 1 combos, wait until they recover, heal them when necessary, rinse and repeat. Each time they "recover" their experience yield gets multiplied. |
| 246 | ** ''VideoGame/BreathOfFireDragonQuarter'': Halfway through the game is a [[SequentialBoss three-stage]] gauntlet. There's a save point before those battles, so make sure to save here. Use the Dragon transformation to steamroll all three battles in quick succession; the faster you finish, the greater the Party XP reward. Choose to "Give Up" the game, then select the SOL: Restore. Game starts over, and you return to your last saved file...but with your items intact, and your Party XP carried over, but ''not'' your D-Counter percentage (which will be the same as when you made the save). Rinse and repeat as much as you want, then distribute the Party XP until your party are at high enough levels to demolish those same bosses (and maybe even some of the later ones) much faster than Ryu as a Dragon would. |
| 247 | * ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'': |
| 248 | ** You can visit 65,000,000 BC as soon as you access the End of Time, several dungeons before you actually need to go there. There lies the Dactyl's Nest, an area that's traversed during your second visit. The enemies there give three times the typical amount of experience that battles in the next storyline dungeon do, at only a mild increase in difficulty. |
| 249 | ** There's also the Nu in the Hunting Range. It can't kill you, but you can kill it for lots of TechPoints. |
| 250 | ** Magus's fortress has a chamber (right-hand path from entryway) before the room where Flea was fought that has three groups that drop 413 experience each (which is decent), but each one also often drops a Mid-Ether (restores 30 magic points in battle), 720 gold (which is nice), and give 11 Tech Points for icing on the cake. |
| 251 | ** While taken aboard the Blackbird, you can encounter mooks which, despite posing a minimal threat, still give more experience than their challenging recolors from the Ocean Palace. |
| 252 | ** There's a respawning Rubble on an island near the Mountain of Woe. This enemy gives 1000 EXP and 100 Tech Points, which means easy grinding. The only downside is that after a certain point in the story, the Mountain of Woe becomes unavailable. |
| 253 | ** On the Black Omen, there is a hall which puts you against three enemies every time you walk through it, two of which (the Sidekicks) will give you massive amounts of Tech Points, but distract you from the middle enemy which has a very strong attack, and they leave if you beat it first. However, once you're strong enough to beat them all before they can attack, the place becomes an easy area to get enough TP to get all Abilities. Better yet, if you obtain enough Red Mail armor to outfit your party, this trio becomes utterly harmless because its only attack is fire-based. |
| 254 | *** Also on the Black Omen, there's a room that generates six alien-type enemies not seen anywhere else in the game. Four of these enemies can have Magic Capsules Charmed off of them. What makes this truly excellent is that these enemies have no attacks whatsoever except an instant-death counter...that only triggers after a ''physical attack''. Thus you can charm 4 Magic Capsules, escape, leave the area, come back, charm another 2 Capsules, rinse and repeat until every character's Magic stat is maxed out. The only downside is that once you ''do'' kill these enemies, they don't come back. ''[[PermanentlyMissableContent Ever]]''. |
| 255 | ** Finally, Mother Brain's fortress starts with a conveyor belt which has five sets of enemies, which reward a total combined EXP of roughly 10,000, far greater than any other location in the entire game. It also gives a decent amount of Tech Points. A garbage chute at the end of the belt allows you to travel back to the beginning and reset the enemies, making it the perfect location to grind up to level 99 (or **). |
| 256 | *** Even better, by this point you should have at least one Golden Stud (even more if you've made a side-trip to the Black Omen and Charmed some more). This nifty accessory reduces MP costs by a whopping 75%. At this point, "grinding" more or less devolves into "Have a character spam an all-enemy hitting Tech, stopping at an Enertron when your MP gets low". |
| 257 | * In ''VideoGame/DarkCloud'', you can find "back floor keys" themed to each dungeon in the game that let you visit their back floors - these are filled with much more dangerous monsters, but also considerably better treasures than the dungeon normally provides. Normally these are only available as uncommon random drops, but in Queens you can actually purchase them at Ruty's shop. Using these to farm the back floor of B16 in the Shipwreck will net you a gem or two on almost every visit; Gems provide by far the biggest stat gains when slotted into equipment, so with only a few hours of work you can easily upgrade all six characters' weapons to their ultimate forms and have plenty of spare anti-enemy/elemental points on them to wipe out any foes you face. |
| 258 | * ''VideoGame/DigitalDevilSaga'' features the Titania Tunnels, located in the Manipura Waterways. There you'll encounter nothing but groups of Titanias, whose attacks can easily be reflected to inflict them with fear, making them easy to devour. Not only does this get you a ton of Atma Points quickly, but Titanias also drop extremely valuable ''ShopFodder'' so you can keep buying more abilities. Making this slightly risky is Arahabaki, a ''BossInMookClothing'' that makes the real bosses look like pansies. They have a chance of showing up as reinforcements in virtually any battle in these waterways, and they always appear in groups of two. But if you have Cocytus, you can take them out fairly easily. |
| 259 | ** A less risky but somewhat less rewarding variant of this appears in a secret corridor of the Brutes' Base in Ajna, where the only enemy that appears is Horus. This aerial enemy is weak against Gun and Death, which makes for easy killing if you have the Dead End ammo that inflicts petrification[[note]]and even easier if you're in NewGamePlus and can have party members always initiate battle without transforming if you wish.[[/note]]. On top of that, they drop items that permanently increase your party members' Magic stats, as well as revival gems that fully restore any party member's HP on revival. It is, however, gated off by {{Orochi}}, which may or may not prove challenging to defeat. [[spoiler:The area also contains a key item that is required to unlock a {{superboss}}, which means completionists will be paying at least one visit here anyway.]] |
| 260 | * ''Franchise/DragonQuest'': |
| 261 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestI'': |
| 262 | *** The Rimuldar Islands, particularly the south island, the Grave of Garin, the area around the town of Cantlin, and the lower levels of the Dragonlord's castle (although the enemies here are the rather tough EliteMooks). |
| 263 | *** On the western most continent, at the very southern tip of the western side (due south of [[spoiler:Hawkness, the ghost town where Loto/Erdrick's Armor is found]]) is a strip of hilly land that has a high rate of MetalSlime encounters, mixed in with other high exp monsters. But since you cross two bridges to get there, it can be dangerous. In the original Dragon Warrior/Quest, RandomEncounters became exponentially more difficult with each bridge crossed. |
| 264 | *** There's also a strip at the edge of Rimuldar where you can encounter the enemy set from the Cantlin area. |
| 265 | *** The game is full of these. Besides the famous coast of Rimuldar, there is the "Scorpion's Nest", a row of hills southwest of Tantegel with enemies from the Mountain Cave region, and a strip of land northeast of Hauksness with enemies from the Dragonlord's island. [=DQ1=] even has reverse [=PoPs=] - areas with much weaker monsters than you should be fighting (the mouth of the Mountain Cave, a strip northwest of Hauksness, the entrance to the Dragonlord's island, and a huge area of hills southeast of Cantlin). |
| 266 | *** All of this is because the enemy encounters on the overworld are set according to a large 8x8 square grid, rather than by the shapes and borders of the various landmasses. Seen [[https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/91pmuVxx7XL._AC_SL1500_.jpg here]] and [[https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/nes/563408-dragon-warrior/map/5948?raw=1 here]]. |
| 267 | ** In ''VideoGame/DragonQuestII'', the bottom part of the island of Osterfair is home to groups of ''eight'' Metal Slimes, and certain floors of the Cave to Rhone can be farmed for Metal Babbles. |
| 268 | ** In ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIII'', east of Kanave/Kazave, there is a small section where you can fight high experience enemies normally found across the river near the Dragon Queen's castle. |
| 269 | *** On the top floor of the Tower of Transcendence, walking across the rope there frequently pits you against groups of 1-8 Metal Slimes, which per series tradition grant absurd amounts of experience if you manage to kill them before they flee. There seems to be some logic coded in that prevents you from damaging more than one at a time (making whips and boomerangs useless), but even getting lucky and taking out one or two with normal attacks (or the Poison Needle) grants much higher experience than you'd get from normal fights at that stage. This makes for a perfect spot to boost your allies' levels so you can class-change at the nearby Alltrades Abbey. |
| 270 | *** Late on in the game Metal Babbles are commonly seen near Rimuldar, in the first floor of Baramos's castle and the top floor of the tower near Kol, but are even more annoying to defeat than Metal Slimes (6 HP, 150 speed, 90% chance to flee each turn). Still, if you can manage to take even one down, they give just over 10,000 XP per character, which is nothing to sneeze at. The aforementioned poison needle still works, as does a combination of Puff/Bedragon and Agility or a decently leveled Fighter (whose chances of landing a critical improve with their level). Falcon Swords also come in handy as they hit twice per turn. |
| 271 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIV'': In the NES version, the very first room in the Royal Crypt, before going downstairs. Not only are there Metal Babbles, experience gained from battles in the first room is given to the party members in the wagon as well. |
| 272 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVI'' has one applicable to improving jobs -- while most areas have a {{Cap}} that, should your levels pass it, make it so you cannot improve your jobs in the areas in question, the Spiegelspire does not. As such, you can always return there and wail on mid-game enemies when your power well exceeds what you need to plow through them and improve jobs at your leisure, and the Zoom spell allows the party to travel there anytime when outdoors in the Dream World. Particularly useful as mastering jobs gives stat bonuses and access to multiple powerful attacks that don't cost anything to use and do a fixed amount of damage on multiple enemies that you can use regardless of your current job. The well in real-world Somnia is a more traditional example, as it contains enemies of a far higher level than can be found nearby. |
| 273 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVII'' has a forest area north of Krage (aka Grondal in the 3DS version). While there you fight nothing but slimes of all kinds, including Metal Slimes, Metal King Slimes, Metal Babbles, and Gold Slimes. Best place in the game for money and experience. Even better is the fact every fight, even those against normal slimes, gives you Job Points no matter your level. No better place to max out everything you want in the game. |
| 274 | *** The 3DS version of the game has a new feature called Traveller's Tablets. By inviting disguised monsters to the Haven you earn these as gifts, and they allow you to access mini-dungeons via the underground pedestal with one-off prizes in the form of stat-boosting Super Seeds. The thing about their dungeons, though, is that they'll have a vocation level cap significantly higher than the areas available at the time you find them, and the ones you start getting about the midpoint of the game have no cap at all, so they're excellent for leveling up your Vocations. Enemies within them also have a much higher chance of dropping Monster Hearts than they normally would; while most of these aren't particularly useful, they do sell for a pretty good chunk of change. After a point you'll also get the ability to craft your own Tablets, and custom-made ones never have a level cap on them, so... have fun! |
| 275 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVIII'': |
| 276 | *** The Slime Plateau-- while not as filled with Metal Slimes as the aforementioned Metal Menagerie (but with no time limit), it has three different varieties that are all common encounters. You're almost guaranteed to take down a few sooner or later. |
| 277 | *** There is a small island in the southwest corner of the world (not visible on the map) where Liquid Metal Slimes appear fairly frequently (alongside Mimics, Canniboxes and plain Slimes). Pretty decent spot to gain some levels once you get access to the ship. |
| 278 | *** The Dragon Graveyard, contains [[MetalSlime Metal King Slimes]]. These often appear with a Beelzebuzz or two, whose "Kerplunk" spell kills the bug but revives all other monsters. Find a battle with a MKS and several friends, then slay the slime once and wait for it to revive - once for each Beelzebuzz. You can win over 120,000 EXP in the luckiest encounters, along with several shots at the ultra-rare items MKS carry. |
| 279 | *** Once you gain the power of flight you can reach the small plateau on the south edge of the desert where the Dragon's Graveyard lies. During the night hours Liquid Metal Slimes appear extremely frequently in groups ranging from 1-8. They're relatively easy to kill with Lightning Thrust on the Hero, Executioner on Yangus and (in the 3DS version) Morrie's POWER Pummel and Red's Blade Cascade, earning you over 10,000 XP a pop. Gold Golems also show up very frequently during the daytime, making it a good place to farm cash too. Probably the quickest and most efficient grinding spot in the game for those resources. |
| 280 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestIX'': |
| 281 | *** It has its own Slime Plateau near the starting town, with Metal Slimes, Metal Medleys, and Liquid Metal Slimes being fairly common encounters. The catch is that the player doesn't get the ability to fly up there until ''after'' the main story is completed, though with the large amount of post-game content this still ends up being quite useful. |
| 282 | *** About halfway through the story you come to the Bad Cave. Metal Medleys frequently spawn in the first basement level and give ~2500 experience per party member. Bring one or two party members armed with instant kill, guaranteed crit and/or multi-hitting abilities and you'll rake in enough experience to gain 10+ levels in very short order. |
| 283 | *** Not long after that comes the Bowhole, the third floor of which randomly spawns Liquid Metal Slimes. If you go the platform near the stairs leading down to the boss room, touch the lower left, upper left and top-right corners in that order and then wait, enemies will continually spawn in the bottom-left and then walk offscreen and despawn. You can just stand there until an LMS appears and then rush in to kill it. With only a couple hours of work you can easily boost your levels into the mid 40s and be well-prepared to sweep the rest of the story battles. |
| 284 | *** The game's randomly-generated grotto system means there's a chance that some floors will contain Metal Slimes, and possibly nothing but Metal King Slimes. [[https://dragon-quest.org/wiki/Masayuki_map A Japanese player found one such map]], renamed Masayuki's map in his honor. |
| 285 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestXI'' has an equivalent to ''VIII'''s Slime Plateau in the form of Insula Orientalis, whose enemies consist entirely of various slimes. Later on, the Other Side, the Royal Library, and Mount Huji have noticeably elevated chances of encountering metal monsters compared to other areas. In the 3DS and ''Definitive Edition'' rereleases, the Tickington sidequest features the Masayuki map as one of the locations representing ''Dragon Quest IX'', and completing the quests there adds a number of postgame enemies and Metal King Slimes to the previously empty sixth floor. These enemies can drop powerful equipment long before it could be gotten in a normal playthrough, including the strongest claw weapon that doesn't require crafting. Also introduced in this version is the Pillar of Pegasus, representing ''Dragon Quest VI'', which contains a Mimic that respawns each time the player leaves Tickington and returns. The Mimic drops a [[RareCandy Seed of Skill]] each time it's slain, allowing the player to quickly farm all 73 they need to max out each character's skill grid. |
| 286 | *** The Pep Skill Electro Light (with Hero, Sylvando and Jade) has a 50/50 chance to summon either level-scaled Metal Slimes or robots. Swapping each member out as they hit Pep status, saving, and then entering a fight and using Electro Light (reloading if you don't get Slimes) is a relatively fast and easy way to gain some levels every half hour or so. Especially if you use skills like Critical Claim, Thunder Thrust or Lightning Thrust that are guaranteed criticals if they land; crits bypass the slimes' infamously high Defense. This goes even faster in Act 3, where Pep Pips can be purchased at Cobblestone or the Octagonia Casino (the latter of which has a very abusable roulette table) and the Hero gets a skill that instantly puts him in Pep. |
| 287 | ** The Metal Menagerie in ''VideoGame/DragonQuestMonstersJoker''. As you can guess by the MeaningfulName, it's populated solely by [[MetalSlime Metal Slimes]]. As a way to limit how much this can be abused, though, it can only be visited after performing a task, and then for only 150 seconds at a time. |
| 288 | ** ''VideoGame/DragonQuestMonstersJoker2'' has a few -- a part of the second to last dungeon has a guaranteed Liquid Metal Slime (the in between monster between {{Metal Slime}}s and Metal King slimes) and randomly spawns others nearby. Still better is the random Dark World BonusDungeon -- each room has a random family of monsters that only appear, which changes upon entering and leaving. However, going into Tag mode and immediately exiting it causes the monsters to shuffle but ''not'' the family -- meaning in a Slime room you can keep shuffling until you find [[MetalSlime Metal Kaizer Slimes]] -- the next step up from Metal Kings. In addition, the Metal Menagerie makes a comeback (and much earlier in the game, too), and there is a bonus dungeon version of it -- finishing a simple find the exit bonus game in the Dark World (trivial if you have a map) sends you to the Light World, a copy of the tutorial zone filled to the brim with Metal Kings that you can stay in for ''30 minutes''. |
| 289 | ** If it has a name with Lord in it, ''VideoGame/DragonQuestMonsters 2'' has it. ???-type monsters that you can't catch, but you can kill for experience.On the subject of twinking, if you have a friend and you breed monsters together a lot, you can breed two Goopi for a [=MudDoll=] each, [[BrotherSisterIncest breed two MudDoll for a Golem each, and breed two Golem for a StoneMan each]]. Similarly, you can breed two Metaly for a Metabble, [[BrotherSisterIncest breed two Metabble for a MetalKing, two MetalKing for a GoldSlime, and two GoldSlime for a GranSlime]]. And two [=DragonKid=] for a Dragon and [[BrotherSisterIncest two Dragons for a GreatDrak]]. |
| 290 | * ''VideoGame/DragonSinker'': |
| 291 | ** Once you can cross the sea, you can visit the island containing the final boss, full of monsters that are far more powerful than you. However, by training the Revenant and Dancer classes, you can become extremely difficult to kill, allowing you to take these enemies down for massive experience gain with just a little bit of luck. |
| 292 | ** The sequel, ''Dragon Lapis'', occasionally has optional areas marked by danger signs, containing enemies dramatically stronger than the regular ones. If you can find a way to take them down, though, they give much more experience. |
| 293 | * In ''VideoGame/DragonView'' after you go through Galas Pass, you can elect not to proceed with the plot right away and instead go northeast, past the Lake Cave to the swamp area. The enemies here are quite tough to kill - they take dozens of hits and can kill you in only two - but they can only attack by jumping toward you and are easy to sidestep. Using the Hauza you can easily whittle down their health and kill them, gaining 1200+ experience a pop and several easy levels, which greatly simplifies the next couple of dungeons. |
| 294 | * The SNES version of ''VideoGame/{{Drakkhen}}'' has a coffin in Haaggkhen's castle that, when touched, will spawn a rather easy-to-kill zombie enemy. The coffin itself also respawns infinitely, so it's an easy enough job to just outfit your party with bows, park a character on top of it, hold Down so you don't move away from where the coffin spawns, and pew-pew zombies to death until your entire party hits level 10, trivializing the rest of the game. |
| 295 | * Mount Itoi in ''VideoGame/EarthBoundBeginnings''-- once you've found EVE, who can effortlessly wipe out all the ridiculously powerful monsters in the area. |
| 296 | ** There's also two eastmost reachable spaces of land around the south bridge that police officers are blocking where you can fight things like Mad Cars for good EXP. |
| 297 | ** That pitch-black train tunnel contains very tough enemies that are normally found later in the game, [[BeefGate just to make sure you don't get to the next area without paying]]. By abusing Offense Up and Defense Up correctly (both of which are ''very'' inexpensive spells), however, you can turn this area into a level-grinding treadmill, as a few enemies here give up to 200 experience points. [[TotalPartyKill If you don't know what you're doing, though...]] |
| 298 | * You're pretty much actively encouraged to use each My Sanctuary in ''VideoGame/{{EarthBound|1994}}'' once you beat its boss in this fashion -- all the [[PreexistingEncounters enemies visible on the map]] run away from you, regardless of their comparative strength to yours, making it very easy to get surprise attacks (and thus easier victories) on them all, plus you can get healed for free. |
| 299 | ** Throughout the game there's several enemies which will summon more enemies after a turn or 2, sometimes summoning more of themselves, such as the Happy Happy Cultists. This means that it's all too easy to whittle down the HP of the summoner so it can be taken out in one hit, defend until it summons another enemy, then take out the summoned enemy and repeat as long as desired to easily and quickly gain massive amounts of experience and thus jump several levels in a single battle. |
| 300 | ** Another trick is to get a [[https://starmen.net/mother2/guides/scarabatrick/ Master Criminal Worm to continually respawn in Scaraba]]; they give a lot of XP when killed and (unless you're severely underleveled) will always run away from you, making it easy to get a surprise attack and an automatic victory. |
| 301 | * The area (looks like a valley) between Redding and San Francisco in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 2}}''. The hardest enemies in the game would show up- floaters, aliens, centaurs, fire geckos, but, if you could handle them (if you had enough characters with combat armor/power armor and good guns), you could level after at most 4-5 encounters, even at extremely high levels. |
| 302 | * ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyLegendIII'' has one due to a minor reversed SequenceBreak. By picking up the final Talon weapon and then retracing your steps, it's possible to install and use the weapon in the global map ''without'' the random encounters being upgraded -- allowing the Talon to [[CurbStompBattle kill every monster you meet]]. |
| 303 | * Several exist in ''VideoGame/GirlsFrontline'', but 0-2 is the most popular out of them all, due to being unlocked rather early as well as optimal for dolls at level 80-100, which require exponentially more EXP to level up than at lower levels. Not only that, since the optimal leveling route also grants S Rank victory, it's pretty common to obtain 3-star or rarer dolls from running the map, who then can be retired for cores. |
| 304 | * All three games in the ''VideoGame/GoldenSun'' series have examples resulting both from bugs similar to the TropeNamer and from enemies that are easy to grind: |
| 305 | ** ''VideoGame/GoldenSun1'' has two encounter-based areas. The first one is just east of the Bilibin Barricade: The left edge of the mountains in the southern divet before the bridge will spawn encounters from near Xian, including Moles that drop the useful Bramble Seed attack item. The second is just north of Kalay: running against the shore of the Karagol Sea loads the encounters from the Tolbi area on the other side of the sea. These enemies aren't too difficult for a properly leveled party even at this earlier point, but the amount of experience they give is plenty enough to make them extremely useful for grinding when you first arrive. [[spoiler:And since the upcoming fight with the Kraken is rough enough as is, you'll need all the advantage you can get.]] |
| 306 | ** ''VideoGame/GoldenSunTheLostAge'' has an area north of Kibombo that loads the encounters near Magma Rock, the penultimate dungeon in the game. It also has the rear chamber of the Islet Cave, a short corridor that leads to a {{superboss}} (probably the easiest of the game's four superbosses, but still plenty challenging). Said corridor is home to the [[MetalSlime Wonder Bird]], the most powerful member of the Phoenix [[UndergroundMonkey family of monsters]], which gives enormous EXP gains, can revive its allies, and occasionally appears in pairs. As an extra motivation, one of the other enemies in this area RandomlyDrops the Tisiphone Edge, the strongest Light Blade and therefore Jenna's and Ivan's best weapon, and another drops the best circlet, the Berserker Band. Of course, you have to be about a third of the way through the final dungeon before you can access this area, so you're really only power-leveling to take on the FinalBoss and the last {{superboss}} or two or for battling your friends, but it's still a fairly quick way to level up if your party is much below level 50. |
| 307 | ** ''VideoGame/GoldenSunDarkDawn'' has Rat Warriors appearing in a forest southeast of Kaocho, which normally don't appear until you dock in nearby Tonfon much later in the game. Tonfon itself has one as well, where walking along the edge of the Endless Wall north of town gives you encounters from atop the wall, which is supposed to be the way to the final dungeon. For endgame grinding, the game gives out a [[SuspiciousVideoGameGenerosity very sweet deal]] right before the FinalBoss. After viewing the cutscene in which [[spoiler:Arcanus/Alex appears to double-cross Blados and Chalis]], the area surrounding the Apollo Lens becomes filled with [[spoiler:Tuaparang warriors]], appearing in groups of 2 or 3. They're notably easier than the shadow enemies you faced on the way up to Apollo Sanctum, yet give out a massive 13720 experience points apiece ''and'' are guaranteed to drop a Water of Life, the series' revival item. With two of ''Lost Age'''s most notorious {{superboss}}es returning for this game, it might not be a bad idea to overlevel well past the point needed to trivialize the final boss... |
| 308 | * ''VideoGame/{{Gothic}} II'': The battering ram near the wall of the Old Camp. You can walk on it, but the surrounding orcs can't. However, you can still reach them with your weapons. Cue the player running around the entire Orc encampment, [[FishingForMooks luring small groups of orcs near the ram]] and slaughtering them. |
| 309 | * In ''VideoGame/Grandia1'', there's easy way to get your Water spell levels to 99; In Mt. Typhoon, run around on the poisonous puddles to lose your HP and then heal yourself afterwards to gain easy experience. |
| 310 | * Each region of ''Hero of Aethric'' contains a fixed number of bosses, with a new random boss quickly spawned when one is killed. As a result, in very small regions like Great Athantia East, it's possible to spawn a new boss just by killing one and taking a few steps, over and over. Bosses can easily give twenty times the experience of regular monsters, making them worthwhile to farm even when the player vastly outlevels them, and they give special loot, too. |
| 311 | * ''VideoGame/IcewindDale'': A good place is Dragon's Eye, level 3. Resting will trigger a chance to respawn monsters that are easily beaten for thousands of XP points. |
| 312 | * ''Franchise/KingdomHearts'': |
| 313 | ** Early on in ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsI'', there is an area in [[WesternAnimation/{{Aladdin}} Agrabah]] that spawns four Black Fungus 25% of the time. Defeating them will get [=96exp=] each, making them useful for grinding early on despite their tendecy to turn invincible half the time. This is combined with the palace entrance in the 1.5 version, which has a 75% chance of spawning 12 pots. Destroying the 11 real pots while avoiding the Pot Scorpion (unbeatable without Aeroga) nets [=155exp=][[labelnote:hint]]the scorpion cannot be moved while disgused as a pot[[/labelnote]]. |
| 314 | *** Unlike later games, doing the tournaments in [[WesternAnimation/{{Hercules}} Olympus Coliseum]] allows you to obtain experience, making them very useful for level grinding before Hollow Bastion. A good example is the Pegasus Cup, which has [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyVIII Leon]] and [[VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII Yuffie]] as the bosses, and with enough Tech Boosts, one can get tons of experence by reflecting Yuffie's shurikens. |
| 315 | *** The Chimera in [[WesternAnimation/TheNightmareBeforeChristmas Halloween Town]] is a BossInMookClothing, but has two forms, the second of which can provide a lot of tech experience divided by 10 should Sora reflect the heads away from the jar by attacking it. Bonus points that the Chimera is a FlunkyBoss that calls for backup every time it returns to its first form, but these enemies also drop good EXP and tons of MP balls, allowing lots of magic. |
| 316 | *** Late in the game, you can farm 1008 experience every 10 seconds in Traverse Town. Just Equip Encounter Plus on Sora and MP Gift on Goofy, climb to the highest rooftop in the first hostile area, and wipe out all the enemies with Thunder. Then go through the nearby door to a small balcony, kill those enemies with Thunder, come back through and kill the first wave again, and so forth. With a couple hours of work you'll be able to max out your level and defeat all the optional boss fights with relative ease. [[https://m.twitch.tv/videos/280603946?tt_content=text_link&tt_medium=vod_embed&desktop-redirect=true A video of this in action.]] |
| 317 | ** In ''VideoGame/KingdomHeartsII'': |
| 318 | *** There's a specific area of the Pride Lands--Pride Rock, specifically--with an incredibly thick swarm of Heartless in it. By using area-of-effect spells like Magnega, one can gain massive amounts of experience in a short time. You'll also find yourself with more munny than you know what to do with. This was nerfed in the [[UpdatedRerelease Final Mix version]], where the swarm only has a 20% chance of showing up. |
| 319 | *** For even more EXP, you can disable Donald's Cure spell, set your party members to Sora Attack (to ensure that you always get the kill), get your HP down to critical levels by getting hit, then equipping the Experience Boost ability and Gullwing Keyblade (both double EXP when at half health or lower) to get quadruple EXP. At the end of the game [[TakeYourTime right before the final boss]], The World That Never Was becomes particularly ideal for this, as the only enemies that spawn are (late-game high-EXP) Nobodies that only drop MP orbs, ensuring that you won't constantly go over half health due to HP orb drops. |
| 320 | *** Discovering penisulas specifically for leveling the game's [[SuperMode Drive Forms]] has been a large focus of the fandom for a long time, as it is functionally impossible to fully level them organically and experienced players are always on the lookout for faster and less tedious ways to power up. |
| 321 | *** Anywhere that spawns Gambler enemies will be a boon for this, such as [[Franchise/PiratesOfTheCaribbean Port Royal]] and one room in Yen Sid's tower. If you let a Gambler transform you into a die or a card while you are in Drive Form, your HP, MP and Drive gauge will be restored when you turn back. This way you can level each form up nonstop without having to worry about the Drive gauge running out. If you beat their minigames, you can also get a ton of munny from not only the one you beat, but any in the vicinity... and with the Drive Converter ability, you can change that munny into Drive orbs, which lengthens your Drive Forms and are the way to level up Master Form in the first place. Clever abuse can let players get immense amounts of Master Form EXP in seconds. |
| 322 | *** Again, Agrabah has the first room of the Cave of Wonders. Unlike most locations, the Heartless respawn after only going one room away, and the second room has a save point to reset the Drive Gauge (similar to the Gamblers above). With Drive Converter, it is an ideal spot to level up Master Form. There's also Mushroom No. 5 in the innermost chamber, which is great for both Valor and Limit Form to wail on and also has a save point right outside. |
| 323 | *** Sometimes, the player party will wonder around a location as [=NPCs=]. If Sora is in a Drive Form when he enters a room with his allies as [=NPCs=], he will revert and the Drive Bar is reset (again, similar to the Gambler and save point examples above). The Solar Sailor (from the [=I.O.=] Tower) in [[Film/{{Tron}} Space Paranoids]] is a permanent case, allowing Drive Form grinding (and Elixir farming). The room right before The Castle That Never Was is ideal for Wisdom Form thanks to the bountiful weak Heartless nearby, but disappears after entering the castle. The graveyard room further up the castle is a good spot for Final Form after Riku joins the party, but before the first battle with Xemnas. |
| 324 | *** The Battle of the 1000 Heartless has several factors that combine for quick leveling of Limit Form - one of the very few times the game's critical path can be utilized for efficient Drive Form leveling. The Vicinity Break ability, learned right beforehand, has a huge range that will definitely hit multiple enemies in the crowded battle - put Sora into MP Charge to boost Drive Gauge gain, and you can easily go from empty to full Drive in seconds. This allows Sora to repeatedly enter Limit Form, use Limits until his Form expires (allowing himself to get hit between uses to regain MP via MP Rage), quickly build Drive back up again with Vicinity Break while in MP Charge and then go back into Limit Form... which also fully replenishes Sora's MP (and multiple steps have the side effect of healing HP, ensuring that he doesn't get worn down). Not only that, this battle is one of the few times in the game in which it is impossible to accidentally activate Anti-Form, making it even more ideal. One can go from level 1 to almost level 6 (the Drive Form LevelCap at that point) just by leveraging this method in this one segment. |
| 325 | *** As noted above, right before the final boss, The World That Never Was will be populated with nothing but Nobodies, making it perfect for Final Form grinding. |
| 326 | *** Possibly the best place for leveling most Drive Forms and Summons is Hall of the Cornerstone (Disney Castle)/Cornerstone Hill ([[WesternAnimation/SteamboatWillie Timeless River]]). There are 4 rooms that are easily accessible and have a decent amount of enemies. The best part? The door between Cornerstone Hill and Hall of the Cornerstone removes you from a drive form and resets your drive bar. Simply enter, kill enemies until you're almost out of drive, and run out. Rinse and repeat. |
| 327 | * ''VideoGame/KnightBewitched2'': After completing Zamaste, it's possible to sail to a patch of land on the Vulcan continent, where late game enemies spawn. This seems to be intentional game design, since the miniguide specifically lists this spot. |
| 328 | * ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic'' has the Dune Sea, one of the few areas with infinitely re-spawning enemies that both give good experience points, ''and'' are guaranteed to drop ShopFodder that sells for a pretty good amount of Credits on the Yavin Station, in a game where EXP and credits are mostly finite. |
| 329 | * ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic 2'' has a cave on Korriban that can instantly spawn enemies that are easily defeated for pretty good EXP. And in a game with a finite amount of experience points where you're likely to stop 15 levels short of the cap by the endgame (even '''if''' you finish all the side quests), having a source of easy, unlimited XP falls ''hard'' on the Good side of GoodBadBugs. |
| 330 | * In ''Videogame/TheLegendOfDragoon'', there's Nest of Dragon, Snowfield, and Home of Gigantos for grinding Additions as all three have an area to fully heal your party for free. For grinding levels, there's the area between Home of Gigantos area and the Valley of Corrupted Gravity. Home of Gigantos has an enemy that sometimes drops a Satchel which can be used to instantly kill the [[MetalSlime Blue Birds]] nearby for a thousand experience each. |
| 331 | * ''VideoGame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsOfColdSteel IV'' has the Sleipnirs, especially the level 3 variants (although they're only unlocked in the final chapter), found in Act 3 [[spoiler:right when the players get the Courageous II and have explored the Luna Sanctuary.]] Players can just have a character (usually [[TheHero Rean]] as the [[HumongousMecha Divine Knight]] fights are mostly based on his stats) equipped with the "Kaleido" Master Quartz to boost the character's EXP gains and gain lots of sepith to convert into money as their primary MQ, and the "Pandora" MQ to increase art damage for their secondary. Equip said character with as many cast reduction and speed quartz and nuke the field with water arts since the robots are weak to water. As an added bonus, the other characters will also slowly level up as well, even those on reserve, including their link levels. After using up all the EP and BP the players have, players can just use the bathroom just within a few feet of where the training room is to refill their CP, EP, and BP. As an added bonus, players can then use the excess money earned to boost up the stats of whichever character the player wants by exchanging all of the money as tokens to the casino and then buying whatever stat boosts or items the player wants from the casino. |
| 332 | * ''Videogame/TheLegendOfHeroesTrailsIntoReverie'' has the True Reverie Corridor, a procedurally-generated extradimensional dungeon that each of the protagonists gain access to early on at certain points in their story for the explicit purpose of strengthening them. Through it they can not only grind out levels but also gain a surplus of loot in both gear and consumables. The dungeon expands as the characters progress through the story. You can also unlock additional features such as minigames, side-stories and bonus characters usable only in the dungeon. |
| 333 | * ''VideoGame/LostOdyssey'' has Numara Atoll, which will give you one of two random encounters -- Silver Kelolon, or Hell Shaker. The latter gives huge EXP (guaranteed level up upon defeating until around 47 or so), but is nearly impossible to beat when you are first able to reach the island, while the former is a spineless wimp whose first action is almost always to run away. Swat the Silver Kelolon with Gamble and huge EXP and AP gains are yours. Numara Atoll is the grinding spot of choice through nearly three discs' worth of story progression. |
| 334 | ** You defeat the Hell Shakers quite easily at a low level if you use the following technique. Have everyone learn Gamble (Mack knows it naturally after a certain event, Jansen and Cooke can equip Spirit magic items, and the Immortals can learn it from Mack). Enter battle with a Hell Shaker, and have one character physically attack, and the rest use Gamble. For the majority of the time, the Hell Shaker's first move will be to use an All-Water spell, because by physically attacking, the attack will be pushed back one turn. Spam Gamble, and hopefully you'll take it out before the spell can hit. |
| 335 | ** By Disc 4 though, there is the Temple of Enlightenment, [[BonusDungeon which is basically the toughest dungeon in the game.]] Although all of the enemies in there give off loads of experience, Hellish Kelolons will instantly level you up until you hit level 97, [[GameBreaker making pretty much every enemy in the game a breeze.]] |
| 336 | * In ''VideoGame/LufiaAndTheFortressOfDoom'', as soon as you get the ability to control a ship, you can quite easily go out of your way and fight monsters you wouldn't fight for several levels, gaining much more experience than expected. It also helps that you can reach Frederia by ship and obtain much more powerful equipment than you would be expected to have. |
| 337 | ** Arus Cave has [[MetalSlime Mimickers]] as a not-too-uncommon encounter. The kicker is that the plot requires you to travel through the cave several times over (let alone getting all of the treasure), meaning it's likely you'll gain half a dozen levels from Mimickers alone. |
| 338 | ** If you're prudent with levelling, you can access the later floors of the Old Cave long before you encounter the powerful monsters (and equipment) found within during the normal course of the game. The seventh and final floor is especially notable, since it's possible to obtain the InfinityPlusOneSword from the Hydras encountered there. |
| 339 | * Once you get a ship in ''VideoGame/LufiaIIRiseOfTheSinistrals'', you can find a small island that seems to serve no purpose, but has an enemy population solely made up of all four varieties of [[MetalSlime Cubes]]. While you can't reach it until late in the game, it's perfect for buffing your characters for the last dungeons. |
| 340 | * In ''VideoGame/LufiaTheRuinsOfLore'', ''any'' dungeon where Cores can spawn. Cores will always attempt to flee from the party until they hit a wall. Approaching an enemy from behind always earns a preemptive attack. Cores' sky-high Defense does nothing against magic or [[DiscOneNuke Chance Hit]]. Enjoy. |
| 341 | * Xanantos' fortress in ''VideoGame/{{Lunarosse}}'' gives out a surprisingly high amount of cash and EXP with relatively easy foes. Until the final or hidden dungeons open up, it's the best spot to grind. |
| 342 | * In the H-game ''Lust Grimm'', there's an area where [[ChestMonster Mimics]] appear as respawning enemies (Mimics outside this area don't respawn). If you're powerful enough to reliably defeat Mimics, this is a good way to get experience and money. |
| 343 | * In ''Megami Tensei'' for the NES, you can go straight to the final dungeon as soon as you defeat the second boss to fight enemies that are multiple times stronger than you are. |
| 344 | * In ''VideoGame/MightAndMagic'' II, there are Cuisinarts - high-level enemies that grant enormous amounts of experience (far greater than even enemies of similar power). Normally they would be an uncommon sight in high-leveled areas, but there is a spot in the mountains of map sector B2 where three will always spawn. You can use the putrid fountain just outside of Atlantium (and later, the Greatest Fountain in E2) to buff up your party and steamroller them with relative ease, gaining millions of XP, mountains of cash and equipment with high (+25 or better) enchantments. The downside is that encounters in M&M2 scale to your level, so powering up too much will result in powerful monsters accompanied by ''hordes'' of 200-355 mooks hounding you wherever you go. |
| 345 | * In ''Miitopia'', at the same time as you unlock the final boss fight, you unlock a secret side-area that contains an area labeled as "snurp hunt", containing exclusively Snurps (a variety of somewhat common enemy) that can include Rare Snurps and Very Rare Snurps, the game's own MetalSlime. It's one of the best grinding locations in the game, assuming you can power through the snurps' insane defenses before they run away. |
| 346 | * ''VideoGame/NiNoKuni'' has Swan Island, a small island north of the early game continent you can access the moment you GetOnTheBoat. It's kind of a gimmick area, as all the enemies here are of the various species of Familiar you get given automatically at early points in the story. (They can't be found anywhere else) Except one, the [[Anime/MyNeighborTotoro Tokos.]] [[MetalSlime They run from you on the world map, and will run in battle if given the chance, but give 2002 exp when defeated]], when the most exp you're getting from regular battles at this point is around 150. With a bit of luck you can easily turn your party into a DiskOneNuke here. |
| 347 | ** Later on once you get Tengri the dragon as your transportation, you can get to the place north of the Tombstone Trail and go to a place named Perdida. You can go inside the city for bookmarking purposes but the guard won't let you in until a certain point. That's fine because outside Perdida, you get to encounter the slightly more powerful version of the Tokos named Tokotoko. Still has the same gimmicks as the Tokos, but if you're lucky, you could encounter ''two of them in one battle''. One already gives out at least ''8000 EXP''; do the math. |
| 348 | * ''VideoGame/{{Off}}'' has Purified Zones. They are home to only one kind of enemy: the Secretaries (each zone has its own kind, varying in power depending on the zone's level). Secretaries are DemonicSpiders of the worst kind, but give massive amounts of experience and often drop health-restoring and resurrecting items. If your party is strong enough to defeat at least one group of them, it is possible to run in circles around a savespot until you encounter Secretaries, kill them, go to the savespot for health replenishment, rinse and repeat. While ''Off'' combat is not very hard and level grinding is not at all necessary to beat the game, if you want to see the high-level moves (like Ultimate Homerun) in action, you'll have to spend a couple of hours grinding Zone 3 Secretaries. |
| 349 | * ''VideoGame/OracleOfAskigaga'': There's barely any grinding in this game as it's possible to gain 30 levels in 30 minutes from grinding in the final temple. |
| 350 | * ''VideoGame/PanzerDragoonSaga'' has certain rare enemies that often give upwards of 10x the amount of experience points that other enemies at that point in the game give but aren’t really any stronger. However only really applies to rare enemies that the player has to go out of the way to find. Notable examples are Sand Mites which are found in the final section of the Garil Desert after defeating the Gigra, Kolba which are found in the northwest area of the first part of Uru from the start of disc 3 and the 2 Golia variants which are found in the Forest of Zoah after defeating the [[spoiler: Infested Grig Orig.]] |
| 351 | * ''VideoGame/{{Persona 3}}'' has this on its second playthrough, in the Monad Block. This new area of Tartarus is accessible from the lobby, and has super-powerful monsters. Ordinarily this would be a problem, but (if you put enough time into the first playthrough), your NewGamePlus-powered protagonist can probably kill these monsters by himself, adding 10 to 20 levels at a time to your party members - which allows you to rapidly out level even this grindy game, and speed on through to the interesting parts by only fighting bosses (and intimidating everything else to run away from your party). |
| 352 | ** The Monad Block is accessible in the first playthrough as well...but to reach it, you must defeat [[StalkedByTheBell the Reaper]]. It's worth it simply to see how long the final boss lasts with an all-Level 99 party (answer: about 15 minutes, and that's only because he has [[MarathonBoss 14 forms]]). |
| 353 | * ''VideoGame/{{Persona 5}}'' has a few: |
| 354 | ** Flu Season in the original game. There are 4 specific days out of the entire calendar where enemies have the chance to spawn with the Despair status effect, which causes instant death unless cured within three turns - and prevents taking any action during those turns. Bosses and minibosses are meant to be completely immune to status effects because of immensely powerful ones like Despair. However, for some reason, [[OptionalBoss the Reaper]] can spawn with Despair during Flu Season (and it's easy to run away from him until he does). While the 4 Flu Season days are pretty late in the game, the Reaper is still likely beyond most players' capabilities at that point and gives immense experience. The Reaper got his flu shot in ''Royal'' however, so this no longer works. |
| 355 | ** Right before the FinalBoss (or penultimate boss in ''Royal'') is a room containing two shadows which spawn powerful, high-experience enemies like Kali and Abaddon, which is next to an area where you can warp back to the entrance to refresh your party, which also causes them to respawn, allowing you to get some last-minute grinding in and fuse strong Personas before challenging that boss. |
| 356 | ** In ''Royal,'' the entirety of Mementos can become this over the course of the game by giving Jose stamps to increase EXP gain as well as unlocking Ryuji's instakill ability, allowing you to farm experience, cash and items simply by ramming into enemies on the field. In addition, the new Path of Da'at area accessed during the new palace arc has, in its deepest floors, versions of early-game enemies like Jack Frost and Jack-o'-Lantern with levels in the 90s and endgame skills who give out tons of experience upon defeat. While overkill for the TrueFinalBoss who can be beaten at lower levels with strategy, [[spoiler:you'll absolutely need all the levels you can get for [[{{Superboss}} Lavenza]].]] |
| 357 | * In ''VideoGame/PersonaQShadowOfTheLabyrinth'', oddly, you're most likely to get more experience from the final floor of the third labyrinth rather than the death trap in the final floor of the ''fourth'' one. |
| 358 | * In ''VideoGame/PhantasyStarIV'', relatively early on, you have the opportunity to fight monsters called sand worms (there's a SideQuest where you can fight a severely de-powered one, but here we're talking about an infinite number of the real deal). Sand worms have a lot of HP, and their attacks will be lethal to one or all of your party members at low levels. However, ''if'' you can take one down, it gives a fairly massive amount of experience. Once your characters can survive at least one hit, it's one of the best monsters to farm until you can access the VeryDefinitelyFinalDungeon. |
| 359 | ** Also in ''Phantasy Star IV'', after the battle with Zio, two of your party members leave the group. Since EXP rewards are split between characters, it means that any battles fought from the time Gryz and Demi leave to the point where Wren and Raja join are giving each character 33% of the total XP instead of 20%. Going back into Nurvus and hunting the Tarantellas (which Rune can wipe out in a single spell) are a great way to grind, since a full screen is worth well over 1000 EXP. If you're not shy about letting Rika and Chaz bite it, Rune can hoard that EXP for himself, and walk into the second half of the game with most of his Skill list filled out (and thus several of the game's best Combination Attacks). |
| 360 | ** Related to Rune's amazing potential, the first time he's acquired for a short span while leading the party to Tonoe. During this time, if you were to kill off the rest of the party except Chaz, you have a very easy time with Rune's Multi-hit spells to gain Chaz a great deal of levels very quickly. |
| 361 | ** South of Jut on Dezolis is the Weapons Plant, another mechanical-themed dungeon filled entirely with robotic enemies. If you purchase Thunder Claws in Zosa (which cast Tandle when used from the Item menu) and equip Wren with the Pulse Vulcan, you can easily kill off said robots en masse and gain 10 or more levels with only a couple hours of work, which makes completing the Air Castle (and the two or three dungeons following it) much easier. |
| 362 | * ''VideoGame/RadiaSenkiReimeihen'' has Rema Desert, an area meant to be accessed three-quarters through the game that can easily be accessed in the first quarter. The flying enemies encountered right near the entrance not only have the best EXP of any enemy encounter up to that point, but also significantly lower HP compared to other enemies in the area. With enough Techs to do 400 points of damage, you can effortlessly defeat a group of five for 125 EXP, roughly ''ten times'' what you would obtain from enemies in the previous area—and then return to the TraumaInn right near the entrance to the Rema Desert to restore your Techs and repeat as desired. |
| 363 | * ''VideoGame/{{Robopon}}'' has this. In particular, the waves in front of Vanza Village can carry you for at least a dozen levels early on, and the well in Cools Town is also useful. |
| 364 | * ''VideoGame/RuneFactory3'' has two: |
| 365 | ** An island within the Privera Forrest dungeon, accessible once you have the Lily Pad seed or the Water Shoes. It contains a random powerful boss every time you visit (and will respawn a new one if you hang around without destroying the [[MookMaker monster portal]]). Tough, but will give you loads of XP and valuable boss drops. |
| 366 | ** The BonusDungeon in your basement: Accessible once you defeat the first boss. Will be FAR above your level at first (You'll probably be around level 5-7. The first level starts at 30) , but each monster will give that much more XP. Plus each dungeon has at least one room with one or two rare chests[[note]]Or, if you're unlucky, those rare chests will be Mimics who will proceed to eat you[[/note]], containing random weapons, accessories, magic spells, and/or skill seals. If you're lucky, you'll come away with gear you wouldn't be able to nab for months, in-game. Works even better if you're trying to level up a low-level NPC (In a high-enough level dungeon, they'll level up with each defeated enemy). |
| 367 | * ''VideoGame/SagaFrontier'': The Bio Research Lab in Shrike and the Yorkland Swamp will always have the enemy levels surpassing your party's current battle levels. While they can cause easy game overs, they make ideal places to raise your stats or gain new powerful techniques. |
| 368 | * In ''Sands of Salzaar'' by Han Squirrel Studio, the kingdom with the sweetest goodies are the Zagros Mountains. This game bleeds experience so anywhere can max your levels quickly, rather the Zagros Mountains have a lot of places (some of them unique) that can really help your party - keep in mind that locations can only be successfully explored once a week (with some places it's even less frequent). Besides various prisons for recruiting locals there's also a dungeon to recruit monsters from (only 3 out of 6 kingdoms have a dungeon). It's also one of 3 kingdoms to have a Meeting of Wizards which gets you magic items for a cheap price. Unique to Zagros is the Mysterious Door not only does it have high end monsters like dragons and demons that dungeons don't have, the fight here allows you to use your entire party instead of a maximum of 3 other Heroes plus yourself in dungeons and prisons. Another unique place is the Grunt base which after a quest will allow you to recruit strong Grunt units. The Zagros alao has 2 Ancient Libraries and a Dark Altar (one of only 2 places that has one) the former can get you Experience and Wisdom Crystal's as well as a Potion that permanently improves a stat, while the Dark Altar will apply a choice of 3 Legendary enchantments to an item. Finally there's the secret heroes Threnody and Omar live in the Zagros Mountains. |
| 369 | * In ''VideoGame/ShadowHearts'', after [[spoiler:Alice gets captured by Dehuai about halfway through the game]] and you pick the first option in the following cutscene all three times, you can depart Kuihai Tower, return to Shanghai and get on the boat to go to the Kowloon Walled City in Hong Kong. This area is purely optional and the enemies here dish out some hefty damage, but they give 800-1000 experience per battle and a good chunk of cash, and you can buy some quite awesome accessories from the Silent Peddler right outside the front door. The enemies are also relatively easy to kill with a combination of the Flash Badge (+25 Agility at the cost of the Judgment Ring's indicator sweeping twice as fast) and the Mind's Eye (doubles damage and makes the Ring's hit zones invisible). Once you beat the boss and depart this area you can't come back though, so get everything you need before you go! |
| 370 | * In the SNES version ''VideoGame/{{Shadowrun}}'', when you get to the Volcano, you can optionally fight a large Wyrm. While this is necessary to get access to a spell by getting the Wyrm scales, if you ''don't'' pick up the item after the battle, the Wyrm will respawn, letting you kill it again. Although it's not an easy fight, it's not terribly difficult either, and it gives a ''lot'' of Karma for killing it. |
| 371 | ** Similarly, at the beginning of the game, you can do some Ghoul Busting, which involves going to the local graveyard and killing the undead enemies that spawn. Learning their spawn points isn't difficult, and they give a very disproportionate amount of Karma per kill, initially on the order of 1 Karma per kill. The only reason you can't infinitely grind Ghouls is because they get harder to kill the more of them you kill, eventually becoming unreasonably tanky and boring to kill, and their Karma rewards slow down significantly. Still, for the early game, it's an easy way to get 15-20 Karma. |
| 372 | * ''Franchise/ShinMegamiTensei'': |
| 373 | ** In ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiI'', there is a shrine in the [[spoiler:post-nuke world]], where the enemies have levels in the 40s. All of these enemies are vulnerable to StatusEffects, most notably Marin-Karin, which causes them to attack themselves and their allies. As the experience gain for battles increases based on the level difference between your party and the enemy's, and you can first go to the shrine at about level 20, you can easily get multiple levels per battle. |
| 374 | ** ''Videogame/ShinMegamiTenseiIIINocturne'': |
| 375 | *** Following the highway east of Ginza will lead to Shibaura, where enemies there are roughly level 28-33 when normal foes are in the teens. What makes it good for power leveling instead of getting youself killed is that the two enemies of any threat are both weak to StatusEffects that prevent all actions by them. These encounters net over 10 times the experience from a normal fight in the area. |
| 376 | *** The "Mercy and Expectation" DLC adds two extra areas, The Centre of Conception and Where the Demifiend was Born, that serve as this. The former has demons that drop bull statues that can be sold as ShopFodder if you need some extra macca. The latter has demons that drop Grimoires, RareCandy items that can help your party level up very quickly. |
| 377 | ** ''VideoGame/SoulHackers'' has the Primate Intelligence Lab. While the enemies range from mildly tough to incredibly weak with a sky-high encounter rate, it's this very feature that makes Magnetite easy to grind. One common group of enemies has three Pyro Jacks and three Jack Frosts. Killing them all, which should be fairly easy as you're very likely leveled in your mid thirties gives out a whopping 1200 MAG. With an encounter happening every 5 steps maximum, it becomes trivial to grind up tens of thousands of MAG quickly, making compendium Fusion and healing a breeze. |
| 378 | ** In ''VideoGame/SoulHackers2'' it's a fairly easy ordeal to eat a meal that gives an experience boost when defeating higher-level enemies, then venture through dungeons searching for Risky foes (black in color as opposed to normal enemies' red); these enemies are well above your level when you find them and can easily wipe your party if you're not prepared, but if you win a fight you'll gain enough XP to earn at least one level on all your characters just about every time. If they're proving difficult you can also adjust the difficulty to "Easy" and continue as many times as you want without penalty; one only needs to defeat the final boss on the hardest setting to earn that trophy. |
| 379 | * ''VideoGame/SkiesOfArcadia'' has a fairly large overworld area in the far upper-left corner of the map that has no affiliation with any of the other areas. This largely empty area has been dubbed "Looper Sea" by fans, due to the fact that every enemy encounter in this area contains nothing but experience filled Looper enemies and their [[PaletteSwap palette swaps]]. This makes it a prime location for Power Leveling, since Loopers are typically [[MetalSlime rare and have a tendency to run away]] as soon as battles begin. |
| 380 | ** The pacing of ''VideoGame/SkiesOfArcadia'' in general, can cause you to accidentally power level if you take a long time to find the discoveries. Plus, there's an area in the arctic sections while flying on a ship that yield encounters with multiple purple loopers. (The strongest looper, which nets the best exp.) And if you're smart, you'll equip a "Black Map", which makes it impossible (Or at least very hard) to run away while attracting more random battles! |
| 381 | * The Bequerel Mine copper gathering mission in ''[[VideoGame/StarOceanTillTheEndOfTime Star Ocean: Till the End of Time]]'' -- assuming the near-end boss Demetrio has been defeated -- allows a small window of time to explore the dragon-infested Bequerel Mountain, with several save points and a free bed-for-healing, allowing the player to train indefinitely. The player, who is expected to be somewhere near level 19 by this point, can reach levels of 35 and higher with enough grinding. |
| 382 | ** And if the player is crazy enough to try, the Sanmite Republic is open after rescuing Ameena. Just outside is a number of higher-level bird type enemies, and beyond Surferio is a cave leading to the Mosel dunes, an area the party won't be visiting till ''much'' later. With proper management of the bonus gauge, training in these places becomes (mildly) feasible. |
| 383 | * Thanks to a GoodBadBug, the gate between Muse and Matilda in ''VideoGame/SuikodenII'' is pushable: as long as you don't talk to the guards around the normally closed gate, you can just walk straight through it. On the other side is a zone which you aren't supposed to reach until noticeably later in the game, with appropriately leveled monsters and items in the shops. There's also a pair of recruitable party members who join you temporarily to complete a side-quest (and join permanently at the end of the quest). All you have to do is make a mad dash from the gate to the town where these two are, and you can grind all your low-leveled members up in a matter of a few fights and use the money to buy them good armor. |
| 384 | ** This was also possible in ''VideoGame/SuikodenI'' after you pass through the Fortress of Kwaba. Head straight south to the Great Forest, which you normally won't head to for another few hours. It isn't possible yet to go past the first screen, but that screen alone is filled with Kobold enemies that are very easily taken out with area of effect magic like a Fire Rune (such as the one Cleo normally has). You don't even have to grind that long to get your characters a significant EXP boost, which makes the next few dungeons rather easy. Making it even better, there's a town just before the dungeon itself with an inn that you can use to recharge when you run out of fire magic. |
| 385 | * About halfway through ''VideoGame/SuikodenTierkreis'', you can reach the bottom floor of Grayridge Mine. Most of the enemies are the same low-level ones that don't give you much in the way of rewards, but every so often you'll run into the miniboss "Fanged Silkmoth," which is absurdly high level. What makes this good for gaining levels instead of getting killed is that it's vulnerable to the Sleep Freeze line of spells, which you conveniently just got access to when [[TokenMiniMoe Manaril]] joined. Once it's asleep, you can take it out in one shot with Gadburg's Spark command. The same area also connects to a corner of Mt. Svatgol, a late-game area where you can pick up a ton of expensive item drops and recruit a character early. |
| 386 | * ''VideoGame/SummonNight: Swordcraft Story'' has floors 24-28 of the main dungeon. While you can access them on day 7, you aren't required to go till day 10 (7, 8 and 9 take place in separate dungeons), and the enemies, which aren't that much tougher than before, give enough experience to easily gain ~15 levels before you stop gaining the bonus for being lower level than the enemies, the otherwise annoyingly rare but necessary Mystic Ore is relatively common and the boxes there give great materials for crafting. |
| 387 | * ''Franchise/SuperMarioBros'': |
| 388 | ** ''VideoGame/SuperMarioRPG'': |
| 389 | *** Shy Rangers are this game's resident {{Metal Slime}}s. They only appear in the Pipe Vault alongside Piranha Plants and have a high speed stat which they often use to flee as soon as they can, but if you can outspeed them, you can get 20 Exp. for defeating just one Ranger. However, this method tapers off after a while, and greater farming locations become available. |
| 390 | *** There's a room in Booster Tower that features an infinite row of enemies walking down a flight of stairs. By standing in their path, you can get an unlimited number of battles without moving. Once you are strong enough to beat them in one hit, a turbo controller and a rubber band on the A button will get you all the way to the level cap. |
| 391 | *** If you're willing to spam Mallow's Thunderbolt, the Dry Bones between the two sets of clues for the Sunken Ship puzzle offers a good grinding opportunity: Put the Zoom Shoes and Work Pants on, and then every encounter with this respawning enemy will consist of Mallow blowing the enemies away with a Thunderbolt, 27 Exp. (54 Exp. for the character wearing Exp. Booster) for 2 FP; the money you get here will more than allow you to stock up on Maple Syrups at the nearby Shaman store to replenish the FP, and with concerted grinding, you can make it all the way to level 30 in about 300 encounters. Of course, you'll probably do better stopping after a little under 100 encounters, making best use of the Lucky Jewel and Exp. Booster at the Culex fight in Monstro Town (to get 288 Exp. for 4 characters and 576 Exp. for the Boosted one), and finally getting the rest of your experience at the Machine-Made Yaridovich (60 Exp., 120 Exp. Boosted) just before the factory gates. Using a Lucky Hammer and winning the subsequent minigame can further double these gains, and (in the remake) getting a Special fight during the Spearovich Machine Made fight can net you up to a whopping 240 or 480 XP per fight! |
| 392 | *** Some tricks exploit the fact that when you get a Game Over, your money and items are reset back to your last save point, but your experience and levels are not. There's a spot in Land's End where you can buy an invincibility star power-up for a hefty price right before a roomful of enemies, which lets you clear them out in seconds, almost always granting you a level up or two. Proceed a bit further and lose to Belome. Your coins, the star salesman, and the enemies are back, but the extra levels you got from them are retained. Rinse and repeat as needed. |
| 393 | ** ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigi'': |
| 394 | *** In ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiSuperstarSaga'', as soon as you get down from Hoohoo Mountain, you're supposed to go to Beanbean Castle Town and advance the plot from there, but nothing is stopping you from venturing north to fight Tanoombas or far east to fight Bob-ombs. Due to [[ActionCommands the game's mechanics]], a player who knows the attack patterns of these monsters can reap some massive rewards from them without being hit in return. A Tanoomba's attacks are ridiculously easy to dodge/counter, and they yield thirty experience points and the occasional Green Pepper (for comparison, a Dry Bones from Hoohoo Mountain gives six XP); Bob-ombs are tougher to deal with, but they yield almost fifty XP apiece and sometimes drop Nuts. |
| 395 | *** ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiDreamTeam'' has this in the second area of the game. You see, while you're supposed to adventure through Mushrise Park and a couple of other areas before heading to Wakeport, the path to said area isn't actually inaccessible in the meantime (just the door to the actual town). And in this area, you can find plenty of easy-to-defeat Hermite Crab enemies that you're meant to fight in about five hours time at a much higher level. So it's very easy and useful to just head west instead of south when you first reach the park, and fight the crabs instead of the weak mooks you'd encounter in the next area, letting you gain some very fast levels and experience in the process. |
| 396 | *** ''VideoGame/MarioAndLuigiPaperJam'' has Boomerang Bros. and their paper counterparts in [[DiscOneFinalDungeon Bowser's Castle]]. Both of these enemies have a chance of carrying a boomerang that's [[EquippableAlly actually another folded-up Paper Boomerang Bro]], and if you get hit by such a boomerang, the folded Bro will land on the floor, unfold into their normal form, and join the battle. Combining this with experience-boosting Battle Cards can allow for your levels to get a good bit higher than what you're intended to have by that point. |
| 397 | ** ''VideoGame/PaperMario'': |
| 398 | *** In ''VideoGame/PaperMario64'', the Flower Fields contain Amazy Dayzees, the enemy with by far the biggest EXP yield. It's the only enemy that can allow Mario to level up twice in one battle (though with Merluvlee's help). It might not sound like much, but in this game, Mario tops off at Level 27, so it's pretty significant. Amazy Dayzees continue to appear in subsequent ''Paper Mario'' games and continue the tradition of ridiculously high EXP yield, although they are much more difficult to encounter and defeat. One path in Chapter 3's Forever Forest will also take Mario to an area containing a beehive that will release unlimited Bzzap!, a GlassCannon enemy that is not formally introduced until Chapter 6. |
| 399 | *** In ''VideoGame/PaperMarioTheThousandYearDoor'', the Amazy Dayzees provide vast amounts of experience ''no matter what level you are''. While most enemies provide less Star Points as you level up (up to the point where they give none at all), the Amazy Dayzee will ALWAYS give you enough to level up quickly. Unfortunately, they are quite strong and only appear rarely in the Twilight Forest and semi-rarely in the depths of the Pit of 100 Trials...but they are the most economical way to reach incredibly high levels. |
| 400 | * ''VideoGame/TalesOfXillia'' has the Xagut Floodmeadow. It becomes available very early in the game (around 10% of the way through) and features enemies of a level more appropriate to the halfway mark. They'll likely wipe your party without much trouble even on Easy at the time you get there, but by the time you can fight them (albeit with some difficulty) they'll still give around triple the experience and money of level-appropriate encounters, as well as some valuable item drops. What really makes the area great, though, is the loot farming. In addition to a few chests with rare items, there are respawning harvest points that contain loot of a much higher level than anything else nearby, allowing a player skilled at dodging enemy encounters to make an average of 3-4 thousand gald per minute in money and items, at a point in the game where a party with 30-40k is pretty rich. Between the money and the shop upgrades, it's easy to acquire high level gear that makes Hard and Unknown difficulties substantially more manageable. |
| 401 | ** The Old Vicalle Mine has some spindly enemies called Gentlegnomes. Three of them give 1500 experience and have good drops and stealables worth great amounts for shop expansion. Adding some spicy chicken rolls grants that fight 3000 experience, enough to level up your characters in one battle each time till level 40 and still good enough to level up till 50 rather quick. Only possible after Chapter 2 starts and you have a full party, and are at least level 25+ already with decent equipment. |
| 402 | * ''VideoGame/TalesOfTheAbyss'' has a minor example in the icy continent of Sylvana. The party is actually forced to stop there pretty early in the game (stopping there just after the 10% or so mark that is Akzeriuth is passed), but the monsters are levelled for just under the halfway point in the game. Like the similar example in ''Xillia'' above, it'll be a CurbStompBattle unless you're prepared. |
| 403 | * In ''VideoGame/TreasureOfTheRudra'', at the beginning of Surlent's scenario, you have access to Sakkara Desert, which has powerful monsters which give about 50 times as much EXP and money as the surrounding monsters, and also randomly drop a weapon which is much stronger than anything you could get for a while. |
| 404 | * ''VideoGame/UltimaVII'' has the cave south of Empath Abbey with continually respawning giant bees; you come here as part of the story, but there's nothing stopping you going there at any time and killing them repeatedly for easy experience. Just be sure to keep your team in Berserk mode so they don't run away and lose important inventory items (and preferably carrying as little as possible for when you inevitably need to haul them back to Lord British and resurrect them). Marking one of the Virtue Stones so you can quickly Recall back here to retrieve dead allies/resume grinding after dying is a good idea too. |
| 405 | ** In the SNES version of the game your starting health is atrociously low, so you'll naturally want some levels as quickly as possible to offset it. Enter Conner's basement with a weak weapon (like a whip, which you can find in the stables), hit the slime that spawns there once, wait until it multiplies, then hit it again. They're worth over 100 experience apiece, so with only about 10 minutes of farming you can boost yourself up to level 6 (16000 XP) and make things much easier on yourself. |
| 406 | * ''VideoGame/UltimaVIIPartII'' also has continually respawning trolls in an abandoned mansion east of Monitor, which are easy to kill and drop handfuls of gems you can convert to cash at the Sleeping Bull. |
| 407 | ** The Silver Seed addon has a few as well. If you employ a little trickery to take your entire party through the maze (edge up to the entrance, ask them to leave, quickly pause once you see your weapon disappear and talk to them again to bring them back into your party), they'll all gain 1000 experience for completing it instead of just the Avatar. You can also repeatedly solve Stumpy's riddles for free XP, or grind the constantly respawning arachnians in Aram-Dol's lair. |
| 408 | * In ''VideoGame/UltimaVIII'' you can grab any melee weapon, visit Devon just outside of Tenebrae, and whack him repeatedly to quickly raise your Strength and Dexterity stats. He's invincible, doesn't fight back and one of the few [=NPCs=] in the game who won't call Beren to smite you for any perceived slight, so go for it. You can easily have both stats maxed out approximately twenty minutes after starting the game. |
| 409 | * ''VideoGame/ValkyrieProfile'' features the Tower of Lezard Valeth, which opens up in the fourth chapter (of 8). The first time going through, it is more difficult compared to the rest of the chapter, but with proper use of ElementalRockPaperScissors, the enemies are manageable. That said, its experience yield is the greatest up until chapter seven due to [[MarathonLevel the sheer size of the dungeon and the number of monsters therein]], and players who know the ins and outs of ItemCrafting via transmutation in this game can get the materials for multiple [[InfinityMinusOneSword Infinity -1 equipment]] from foes. Subsequent runs typically involve three level 1 characters building up a combo so that [[RequiredPartyMember Lenneth Valkyrie]] can cut loose with a OneHitPolykill [[LimitBreak Purify Weird Soul]]. Particularly on Hard Mode, where [[HardModePerks all recruited characters start at level 1 and can thus benefit more from equipment that gives boosts upon leveling]], it's pretty much ''the'' first stop when training a new character, whether it be to use or just to buff up before sending them to Valhalla for Odin's sake. |
| 410 | * The entire rest of the world can technically become this once you acquire the Bat Transformation spell in ''VideoGame/VampiresDawn''. While the main quest will tell you where to go, nothing is restricting you from accessing any other point in the world. Typically, at least German walkthroughs will even advice training on the starting continent first before heading for the snow-covered island in the north-east to face some slightly-stronger opponents for easy EXP gain. |
| 411 | * In ''[[VideoGame/WildArms1 Wild ARMs: Alter Code F]]'' (the remake of the original), the area around Adelhyde Castle is a goldmine of both money and experience, if you know how to farm the monsters correctly. |
| 412 | * An obscure one in "[[VideoGame/{{Wizardry}} Wizardry VI: Bane of the Cosmic Forge]]", which most game maps don't call attention to and some don't even include: a staircase up in the northwest part of the Castle Basement leads to a one-square corridor that ends in a locked gate on the starting Castle level, beyond which you can see water. That's the Forest, and you can spin in place here for encounters much more difficult than anywhere else in the Castle, for huge experience - if you can survive them. |
| 413 | * ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles1'' gives us Bionis' Leg. Besides the regular {{mook}}s, the game lets EliteMooks over 50 levels higher than the regular ones roam most areas. Generally you're just supposed to avoid them until you're much, MUCH later on the game, but on Bionis' Leg is possible to take down a few of these by having Melia put the EliteMook to sleep with [[StatusEffects Hypnotize]], then [[VideoGameCrueltyPotential pushing it off a cliff]] with [[KnockBack Spear Break]]. The end result: Loads of experience and lategame equipment. |
| 414 | * ''VideoGame/XenobladeChronicles3'' has the Elaice Highway, a large area that takes up almost the entire western side of the Fornis Region. This area is crawling with enemies whose levels are in the range of 42~55 when your party is expected to be around level ''20'' or so when you are first able to access it. It may seem like venturing in is suicide, due to the abundance of extremely powerful enemies who will swarm you given the chance... ''but,'' the Camills and Caterpiles are fairly docile and rarely join in if one of their own is attacked nearby, allowing a halfway decent party to take them down one-by-one. It doesn't take very long at all to reach level 30 just by doing this, at which point you unlock your characters' second accessory slot, and suddenly the entire area becomes much more survivable. At this point, taking down the Aspar enemies becomes more than feasible, and they give more experience than most any other enemy in the area - around 800 points with a level ~30 party. Reach the high level 30s, and most enemies become not just survivable, but consistently beatable. Stay here long enough and you'll easily reach level 45-50, at the point in the story where you've only just recruited [[spoiler: Ethel.]] |
| 415 | * Both of the Underground dungeons in ''VideoGame/YakuzaLikeADragon'' tend to be used for power levelling due to the [[MetalSlime Invested Vagabonds]] that inhabit them. The Yokohama Underground is useful for early-game and/or initial job levelling, while the Kamurocho one is good for late-game leveling. |
| 416 | [[/folder]] |
| 417 | |
| 418 | [[folder:Turn Based Strategy]] |
| 419 | * The obscure Sega CD tactical RPG ''VideoGame/DarkWizard'' has one too. Late in any given battle you can surround your opponent's castle, blocking their summoning hexes with your own units so they can't call in any more backup. Then you can just stay as long as you like, hitting them but not actually killing them, to build up an absurd amount of XP on your units. Each unit, friend and foe alike, can only attack once per turn, so just make sure the first member of your squad to attack is strong enough to survive a hit. Then just use the rest of your units to whittle them down, end turn, wait for them to heal themselves, and repeat. |
| 420 | * Since the ultimate goal of a lot of players in the ''Franchise/{{Disgaea}}'' series is to make characters as ridiculously strong as possible, many try to look for places to very quickly power-level. The go-to place in each game is usually a specific stage of the Cave/Hall/Mount of Ordeals, which has to be unlocked by passing a bill in the Dark Assembly. The stage usually has high level enemies on an EXP (and sometimes Mana) boosting Geo Panel, all placed in a specific pattern (often 3x3) so that one strong [=AoE=] attack (usually magic or the Big Bang fist skill) can take them all out very quickly. Boost the enemy levels in the Dark Assembly and use EXP boosting Innocents, and suddenly, the player's characters are jumping thousands of levels (in some cases, going from lv 1 to lv 9999 in ''two battles''). However, getting that specific stage may require dealing with a couple of annoying stages beforehand. |
| 421 | ** ''VideoGame/{{Disgaea|Hour of Darkness}}'', one level has all GeoEffects that make everyone on the stage but one square invincible. By throwing enemies on top of each other, you can create a level 100 enemy to whittle down for great EXP gain. The same chapter is also good for building weapon levels, as you can freely have your troops attack each other without concern. |
| 422 | ** The PSP and DS releases has an even better place. After clearing the Demonhall Mirror, you get a stage similar to Cave of Ordeals 3. Except the enemies are higher level, higher rank, and the EXP bonus is +100% instead of +50%. You'll spend a bit of time there. |
| 423 | ** In ''VideoGame/Disgaea2CursedMemories,'' one chapter has enemies that level endlessly if left alone (thanks to a Geo Effect), you can then capture them once they are twice the level of your highest leveled character (leave him in your base), then repeat, doubling the level you can capture each go until you have a level 9999 character, then use it in a combo to kill other level 9999 characters, giving massive level gains to the other people in the combo. (Note: This has been patched for rereleases. Now you can't capture monsters with a level above the protagonist's.) |
| 424 | *** More fun LevelGrinding: The Dark World version of a late stage has a bunch of geo effects that buff your party, the most important of which is an ATK+ 1 effect; the Dark Sun also respawns enemies every couple of turns, so as long as you're not bored you can just sit there and kill your enemies ad infinitum. |
| 425 | *** And there are plenty of areas with Exp X 3 effects. |
| 426 | ** ''VideoGame/Disgaea3AbsenceOfJustice'' has a map in Chapter 7 that is just a ordinary battle when played for the first time, but once it's beaten, it changes into a field with 9 mushroom-like enemies sitting in panels that boost their experience and mana given. And by passing four Stronger Enemies bills, they will be at Lv. 99, which makes them award as much experience as a Lv. 320 enemy[[note]]The experience that enemies give is proportional to their "to next level" experience, which is the highest it can be since enemies start at 0% of the way to the next level. The experience formula switches from level 99 to 100, making it take about triple the experience to get from 99 to 100 as 98 to 99, and the jump from 100 to 101 actually take slightly less exp than 98 to 99. Thus enemies at exactly level 99 will award roughly triple the experience of monsters that are around but not exactly level 99.[[/note]]. Roughly a half hour there will net the player millions of HL and boost their levels to 300 range, making the rest of the story a breeze. |
| 427 | ** ''VideoGame/Disgaea4APromiseUnforgotten'' did the exact same thing: one of the Chapter 9 levels feature a normal battle when played once but by playing the map again will have the same mushroom enemies sitting in exp and mana boosting grounds. Passing the Stronger Enemies bill once will have their levels increased to 99, and the same experience loophole can be exploited. |
| 428 | *** As early as Chapter 5 unveils a similar map, with one key difference -- Desco, when turned giant via merging with another monster, is the only one who can hit the entire enemy team at the same time. It's incredibly easy to get Desco to around level 500 without any real work, making the rest of the game trivial. |
| 429 | ** In ''VideoGame/DisgaeaDimension2 A Brighter Darkness'', the cheat shop (which allows you to increase both enemy levels ''and'' EXP growth.) can make many story maps one, but 6-1 most of all. Simply change the enemies' level to 99 and use tower attacks and you'll be at level 400-700 in a few minutes. More than enough to blaze through the rest of the game. |
| 430 | * ''Franchise/FireEmblem'' |
| 431 | ** The Tower of Valni in ''[[VideoGame/FireEmblemTheSacredStones The Sacred Stones]]'' is a good place to train, but the chests and dropped items are also fairly valuable. Furthermore, you can exit and reenter at any time, and the boss Entombed of the first floor doesn't move, has no ranged weapon, and gives out a full 100 experience (one level-up) for landing the killing blow, even to a level 19 promoted unit. Also, there's a chance of extra Entombed spawning, which will give out ''almost'' as much EXP as the boss (and far more than the non-Entombed enemies on the same level). |
| 432 | ** ''VideoGame/FireEmblemShadowDragon'' has the Port Warren Trick: reclass a unit to General in Chapter 8, preferably Wolf or Sedgar [[MagikarpPower due to their incredible growth rates]], and then warp them to the northwestern fort, which is guarded by a bunch of cavaliers and horseman. Even on HarderThanHard difficulty, they're taking very little damage, and though they don't get a lot of XP for countering with a javelin toss, they're being attacked five or six times a turn, which is enough to get them a few levels. And each Defense level causes the enemy to do progressively less damage until they're doing none at all, at which they can slaughter the cavaliers and horsemen with impunity, pumping a phenomenal amount of XP into units that really need it. |
| 433 | ** It seems the dev team realised how popular Entombed were for grinding: ''VideoGame/FireEmblemAwakening'' has a [[DownloadableContent DLC]] chapter consisting of ''nothing but Entombed.'' [[spoiler: However, if you just rush in and start attacking them, you'll be in for a [[CounterAttack nasty surprise]]...]] |
| 434 | ** In just about every game, there's at least one enemy that has this particular setup: A. They are stuck standing in a particular spot such as a castle entrance, throne, etc. B. said spot heals them and C. they lack ranged attacks or said attacks can be disabled. Due to the fact that the games reward experience simply for hitting a enemy or healing an ally this means that it's easy to park a ranged character a couple spaces away, nail the enemy with an attack, wait for it to regenerate its health, then repeat for as long as the character's stock of ranged weapons hold out. If the enemy does have a ranged attack, parking a melee exclusive character with high defense a couple spaces away and having the healers repeatedly heal said character makes it just as easy to level healers -- and then eventually [[BreakableWeapons the enemy's weapon will break]], and you can use the other strategy from then on. |
| 435 | * One early level in ''Videogame/FrontMission1'' provides a unique opportunity for LevelGrinding; Lloyd's ArchEnemy Driscoll is on the map and piloting an extremely powerful HumongousMecha, and the game ''expects'' you to destroy the rest of the enemies while keeping your distance from him. However, Driscoll begins the level on a raised area that he needs to leave before engaging your squad, and his mech is fitted exclusively with short range weapons. By correctly positioning your squad, you can trap him in the raised area in a way that prevents him from attacking you, and any members of your squad equipped with long range bazookas can then chip away at his armor until they max out their long range skills. Also, if you destroy his mech's arms, he loses the ability to attack you and you can safely use him for target practise with your short-range weapons as well. |
| 436 | * In ''VideoGame/PhantomBrave'' similar to the ''Disgaea 2'' example above, there is an early level where one enemy is under the effect of Level+ 1 - but its current Hit Points don't increase. If you are far enough away from it, you can let it level an enormous number of times before letting any character with a decent attack stat and item kill it for huge amounts of EXP. |
| 437 | ** For a more certain level-up, there's an ability that allows a newly confined spirit to damage everything around him immediately (called Big Bang). It's a simple matter to fuse a spirit who has this ability to any spirit you want to power level, give Marona a slowing piece of equipment, wait for the little guy to reach lvl. 9999, throw the equipment next to him, confine the spirit, and BANG! Instant Lvl. 100 (or more, once you increase the {{Cap}}). |
| 438 | ** The "Failure" title. Attach it to a high-leveled Random Dungeon, and then BOOM! All enemies in that dungeon are 80% weaker, yet all items in the dungeon still give out experience according to their level. Yes, destroying items gives you XP. |
| 439 | * ''VideoGame/StellaGlow'' may be the only game to have this trope listed on its ''character'' page. The Earth Witch, Mordimort is battled before she joins your party at the climax of Chapter 5, and she's a MookMaker with no limit to how long she can go. Furthermore, once she joins, her Shadows during Tuning are also {{Mook Maker}}s. In all three of these battles, the mooks' levels scale to the average of your party's level, so you won't even run into issues with AntiGrinding and can easily use these fights to power-level...though by the circumstances, Mordi herself can't benefit from any of these fights. |
| 440 | * In ''VideoGame/VandalHearts'' you can use the healing circles in the Castle Ruins to [[GameBreaker level up faster than the developers had in mind]]. Simply move your bishops in the healing circles and have them cast bless weapon on each other. In about 1 and a half hours they'll be at level 70 (the level cap for the game.) Next have the unit that sustained the highest damage find and use the iron boot on your level 70 bishop. Now watch said unit gains 50+ levels. Now you can let all your other units heal that damaged unit with herbs. Congratulations, most of your units will now be at level 60+. Just be careful. The monsters in the bonus levels will be at the same level as Ashe, so you may not want to level him up like this. |
| 441 | * With a lot of patience, players are capable of leveling both Kouta and to a lesser extent, Raul, Fiona, and Despinis in chapter 37 of ''[[VideoGame/SuperRobotWarsOriginalGeneration 2nd Original Generation]]''. For Kouta, all you just need is to have his Ace Bonus, a Dust-proof device, and pump up his skill and melee stats, give him some ability parts, and some pilot skills to help boost his attacks, and watch as Jin Rai {{Mooks}} go down in one hit with his free cost attack, Spiral Knuckle, after getting his Compatible Kaiser. In a few hours, you get a lot of money, a lot of pilot points, and a lot of levels for Kouta. For the Excellence team's case, you can have Fiona cast Bless on the Excellence Rescue, resupply the Compatible Kaiser (as the machine debuts with a low EN) and watch as you get 800 EXP for that one scenario (as you have only 8 turns to finish that part of the scenario and it's an instant game over if you fail that chapter). The only thing bad about this trick is that if Kouta kills too many enemies, the game will crash. Fortunately, if you do get a game over, you get to keep all the money, pilot point skills, and kills that you accumulated throughout the entire stage and thus lets you redo it all over again at the cost of one Battle Mastery point. |
| 442 | * In ''VideoGame/ValkyriaChronicles4'' Skirmish #8 can easily be finished in under 2 minutes and grants 54,000 XP and just over 100,000 Ducats per run. All you need is a Scout and a Shocktrooper - just put up an All Units Defend order, have the Scout command the Shocktrooper to follow them, and move in as close as you can to the enemy's camp. Then just have the Shocktrooper use their turn to rush the base, take out the lone Scout guarding it, and capture it for the win. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HK7JS_o8zRs A video of this process.]] |
| 443 | * The ''War of the Chosen'' DLC for ''VideoGame/XCOM2'' adds a new enemy type to the game: [[OurZombiesAreDifferent the Lost]], an endlessly respawning horde of walking target dummies that tend to go down in one shot. Now if the RandomNumberGod is merciful and spawns you a mission with the "The Horde" sitrep (which also tend to not have a time limit), you can just ignore your mission objective in favor of digging in and shooting zombies ad infinitum. Every dead Lost counts as a full kill, and even though your soldiers can only be promoted once per mission, you can rack up so many kills this way they'll reach the rank of colonel in no time, especially if you have the "Between the Eyes" faction card active that makes any hit on a Lost an instant kill. |
| 444 | [[/folder]] |
| 445 | |
| 446 | [[folder:Tower Defense]] |
| 447 | * At certain times, there are stages in ''VideoGame/TheBattleCats'' where you can easily get a ton of experience points, and most of them have a guaranteed chance to drop an additional reward consisting of more Exp Points[[note]]There are actually 3 rewards, each of them giving you a small, medium or large pack of Xp (with the amount of bonus Xp becoming larger and larger the harder the stage is) and the game will just randomly pick one of the 3 rewards as your reward for beating the stage[[/note]]. Examples include Sweet Xp, Xp Megablitz, and Xp Colosseum. |
| 448 | [[/folder]] |
| 449 | |
| 450 | [[folder:Wide-Open Sandbox]] |
| 451 | * ''VideoGame/EndlessSky'': Human space, where the player starts out, is subject to random pirate attacks, and the more cargo space you have, the more likely they are, which makes building up a fleet fraught with danger. However, if you know where to go, you can head straight for Hai space, without any special equipment except an optional fuel pod to make the trip faster. With no pirates and plenty of worlds to trade with, you can grow a cargo fleet exponentially. |
| 452 | [[/folder]] |
| 453 | |
| 454 | [[folder:Non-VideoGame Examples]] |
| 455 | * ''Literature/SaintessSummonsSkeletons'': The church provides a setup where new [Saint]s can pull a lever to dispense a [Composter Slime] into a contained area, then stab it to death with a wooden pole, over and over. Sofia reaches level 20 in a single day this way, although since the slimes are all at random low levels, she wouldn't be able to go much further. |
| 456 | --> '''Sofia:''' I understand how all the noble kids are at such a high level now. |
| 457 | * ''Literature/ShangriLaFrontier'': |
| 458 | ** Pencilgon gives Oicazzo and Sunraku the map to a hidden sub-zone where they can rapidly grind their levels by fishing up and defeating lake serpents. While the serpents aren't exactly pushovers, they're the only monster in the sub-zone and each one is worth a lot of XP. |
| 459 | ** Ashura-Kai has been exploiting the mechanic that grants bonus XP for simply [[spoiler:encountering one of the Colossi]] to rapidly gain levels by [[spoiler:spawning but not fighting Wezaemon]] without risk of getting attacked by [=PKKers=]. |
| 460 | * In ''Literature/TheRisingOfTheShieldHero'', every ten years the monsters of Cal Mira Islands being to mature and breed at a massively increased rate, leading to a surge in their population. This coincides with an effect that increases all experience gained from slaying monsters on the Islands. This "activation" is a major opportunity for both the Legendary Heroes and regular adventurers to quickly raise their levels. |
| 461 | [[/folder]] |
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