In most JRPG games, grinding can be a huge aspect to breezing through the game. Grinding and gathering experience and items can turn a challenging boss fight into child’s play completely and thus is typically seen as a good idea, but how much is too much?
One thing I have learned when going through the games is that not all grinding moments are created equal! Some worlds are better than others to grind on and some have better advantages to do so then others. Here are the worlds I’ve found are great to sharpen your preverbal teeth on!
One thing to add! In all of these grinding tips, it’s important to know what will count for respawns in the beginning of the game. To get respawns, you have to move two areas away in order to get respawns to appear. For example, in Traverse Town, if you are in Second District, in order to get spawns to appear again, you would either need to go through the Hotel and then into another room or to the First District and then into a shop. There are multiple other paths you can take, but once you fully load into the second area and give it a second, then you can go back to respawns.
There is an ability you can get from the Moogles called Encounter Plus. This will make it so every time you go into a new area it will spawn as if you had been two away.
Traverse Town – After you meet Leon
Destiny Island may seem like a great place to spar with friends, beat Riku, and get experience from every Shadow that appears, however it’s fairly unpractical on any difficulty.
Sparring with Tidas, Selphie, and Wakka do not award you very high experience for beating them. While they are simple fights and you can manipulate hitting Wakka’s ball back at him to get more experience through the use of Tech Points, it’s still very minimal. I’ve done runs where I got to level 10 before I left day 1 of Destiny Islands and it took me far longer than I’d like to admit. Riku isn’t too much better experience wise and while he is significantly tougher than the others, the experience gain difference isn’t going to be worth the grind. Keep in mind, you lose, you get no experience at all!
Shadows are the first heartless you’re really introduced to in the game. They’re cute little dark creatures with blobby yellow eyes that protrude from it’s head. No matter how adorable the lil guy is, it doesn’t count for the fact that it’s experience gain is also just as abysmal as the island. Every Shadow defeated in the beginning only gives 1 experience point, which is pretty low. After the first couple of levels, the amount of experience needed shoots up pretty high for one per heartless.
Once you meet Leon, a new heartless that we had seen in a cutscene before appears: the Soldier. This heartless is a little more hearty and can dish out out hits that can definitely hurt in the beginning of the game give triple the experience of 3 per kill. While this may seen small, in the beginning of the game you’re only getting at absolute max 5 spawns per fight, most likely 1-3. Even if only one of those spawns is replaced with a Soldier the extra experience adds up fast!
Deep Jungle – before Sabor, after Clayton.
Deep Jungle starts out as a very peaceful world with no Heartless spawns, but only a solitary wild cat trying to get a nom. Once you take down Sabor in the Bamboo Thicket, you no longer need to worry about it spawning again.
Is Sabor a bad source of experience before it’s defeat? No, not necessarily. The fight is simple enough, you get a small pile, and then it runs away. However, whenever Sabor spawns, it will not spawn anything else and there are periods where Sabor and Heartless spawns overlap. If Sabor does spawn, you’re losing out on Powerwilds, Bouncywilds, and a handful of Shadows and Nocturnes that adds up well past the amount of defeating Sabor once.
My grinding tactics here is start at the tent after the Sabor fight, clear out anything there, then go to the Hippo’s Lagoon and climb up the first vine. Once you get up to that area, immediately jump down. Then you can return to the Camp area and the Bamboo Thicket to clear out all the Heartless once more. Going back and forth on this path is efficient to get a bunch of experience to help going forward!
Another great spot to grind is around the Tree House when the Pink Agaricus does not spawn. From the Tree House, once you’ve defeated everything, jump down so you enter the area with the save. Instead of jumping down the tree trunk, jump up to the platform and to the Treetops. From there, you can go back to the area you fought the endless swarm of Powerwilds and it is possible the endless swarm will come back! As long as you do not cast magic on the flowers, heartless will continue to spawn.
Agrabah – After the Pot Centipede
Agrabah has so many spawns and so many loops you can go in to make experience farming a breeze. The only draw back is the Fat Bandits. Not only do they lock onto Sora almost consistently, that makes it that the barrier they have in front of them is in constant need of magic.
If you’re starting from Aladdin’s home, you can make multiple different types of loops going through the city itself, encountering numerous Heartless on the way. You can also find the Pot Scorpion, which with some timing with Guard, you can get a very decent amount of Munny and experience from too.
Going into the Desert you’re greeted with what can feel like endless waves of Bandits before entering the Cave of Wonders. Once you do enter, it’s easy again to get into a loop of fighting due to the passages below counting for an area but not having Heartless so it’s fast to pass through.
Halloween Town – Before Oogie Boogie
I have a love hate relationship with Halloween Town in the first time. The love is all in the story and the design of the world, it’s gorgeous and the fact of how well it all fits with the ambiance of both universes colliding is a chefs kiss. What I do not love about it is the grinding aspect is really kind of difficult. In order to make the most out of the grinds with this game, you have to wait to defeat Oogie until you’re done because there are FAR more spawns before than after.
The best path to go down is go to Oogie’s mansion, clear out the entire area, from there go back with the green slime path and go back to the Curvy Hill. You can go back and forth between those two areas getting all sorts of good experience between runs. The only caveat? You do technically lose one area of grinding this way as the area with the bridge will not get respawns traditionally.
Once you beat Oogie, you can still take this path, but the amount of Heartless you will find is significantly limited due to the fact that the mansion will no longer be there. A positive to this is the Chimera can spawn and very often does.
Hollow Bastion – After getting your team back
Hollow Bastion is a great area for leveling up, whether it’s by choice or not! It’s a lot tougher in the beginning though when it’s just you and Beast. Luckily that part doesn’t last too long. Spawns are prevalent throughout the world and it’s easy to find a loop to get more experience.
One of my grinding paths, mostly by accident when I forget my footing, is right by the Castle Gates. This path is only done after the library puzzle. From the Castle Gates, I’ll clear everything and then go to the Entrance Hall, where you fought Riku. From there, go through the Emblem Door, and you’re back at the Castle Gates, but on the other side. This is where I typically lose my footing because of all of the flying creatures that want to fly away mid combo. If you call here, you’ll go to the Base Level, which is a nice spot for some Darkball fighting! Take the lift back up and you can loop this around if needed!
Another path that I love to take, especially after you return the second time, is a little passed this. That path is from the Great Crest, looping back through the Lift Stop and you just run in circles! This path is only really viable if you have Encounter Plus because without that the spawns will not be as prevalent.
End of the World – World Terminus and Linked Worlds
This world is a grinders paradise! This entire world it’s crucial you have Encounter Plus equipped in order to have the spawns noted below, otherwise you may have more moving / backtracking to do and it can take much longer.
If you’re looking for specific Heartless, you can head to the World Terminus and almost every type is found in one of the worlds. That’s because this whole section is full of warp points that connect to the heart of the world and will spawn the “traditional” heartless of that world. I say traditional because after you’re kicked out of Hallow Bastion the first time everything changes and it’s harder to find specific Heartless.
In Linked Worlds, the first time you go through this room it is an absolute gauntlet. There is heartless after heartless and some of them have the ability to respawn their dead. The times you return to this room it is never quite so bad, but it is still a decent amount of high level heartless you’re against. Both Invisible and Angel Stars spawn here and both can be a whole trial to get through.
Olympus Coliseum – Hades Cup
You may be thinking – Ry, why did you keep this one for last? Well, that’s because the Olympus Coliseum up until this massively long tournament doesn’t necessarily provide an amazing grinding spot. Yeah, it’s consistent and there’s Heartless kind of everywhere. However, you don’t get any Munny or items, which puts it on the bottom of my list due to the fact that we’re trying to grind smarter not harder!
When it comes to this cup, not every chunk is created equal. It’s designed to give you more of a challenge the further you’re in. Due to that, the only parts really worth dedicating time to is seat 1-20, and even then I’m being generous. The top 10 are the hardest and have spawns after spawns after spawns and some of them are quite challenging.
Keep some good items on you when going through the cup, as you won’t get HP orbs. The nicest thing about using this grinding method is if you are beaten, you don’t die. If you’re going through the no continues run, this grind is the safest, but will take much more grinding to reach all the goals.
