Level-Gaining Guide (Various systems)

Version 1.3

Written by / Copyright 1998, 2001  Kenneth "SlimX" Miller

slimx@austin.rr.com


I. Intro
     A. Purpose of this guide
     B. Extremely cheesy story I made up about the history of Level-Gaining

II. Explanation of Level-Gaining
     A. Definition
     B. Purpose

III. General Level-Gaining
     A. Conditions
     B. General Tips
          1. Setting goals

IV. Money-Gaining
     A. How it coincides with Level-Gaining
     B. Battles that give lots of EXP or GP respectively

V. Special Points
     A. Explanation
     B. Examples
          1. FF5 - ABP
          2. FF6 - Espers
          3. Chrono Trigger - Tech Points
     C. Ways to get the most out of Level-Gaining for SP

VI. Certain Kinds of Battles
     A. Lossless
     B. Gaining
     C. All or almost all one kind of points / Sacrifice

VII. Tricks and Cheats
     A. Explanation
     B. Examples
          1. Zelda 2 - Swamp
          2. FF6 - Raft
          3. FF2 - Various (explained)

VIII. Some Specific Examples

IX. Version History


(BTW, this entire guide is intended to be somewhat tongue-in-cheek. Don't take
it too seriously. =) )


I. Intro

A. Purpose of this guide

I have written this guide to try and help any of the thousands of RPG and
Action-RPG players in the world. Level-Gaining is a big part of RPGs for me, and
I figured it was time I passed on some of what I have learned. This guide does
not contain any extensive strategy on how to beat any particular RPG, but it
does contain what I feel is useful information.

B. Extremely cheesy story I made up about the history of Level-Gaining

Late one night, a gamer by the name of Kosuge Sugimoto had just begun playing
the first console RPG, Dragon Quest, on his Famicom. He had left the castle, and
ventured forth to a distant town. He fought several battles on his way there,
and was nearly defeated when he reached the town. When he arrived, he found that
he did not have enough money to purchase the items he wanted. Thus, he set out
to return to the castle. On his way, he fought more battles. He simply did not
have the strength to survive, so he was defeated in battle. Kosuge thought to
himself: (Translated from the original Japanese, of course) "What am I to do? If
only there was some way for me to increase my level before setting out. I have
an idea! What if I was to intentionally fight battles near the castle and the
first town? I could earn experience and heal myself when I became hurt. Repeat
this process and I would gain levels without the risk of going out while still
weak." So, Kosuge Sugimoto stayed within a few squares of the castle and town.
He walked about to bring on battles, fought them, earned experience, and healed
himself when low on life. In this manner, Level-Gaining was born . . .

II. Explanation of Level-Gaining

A. Definition

Well, in case it is not obvious from the story above, Level-Gaining is a
process where, in an RPG or any other game where EXP and levels are earned, one
purposely fights repeated battles (usually within a particular area) in order to
gain levels. In an RPG, this would usually mean walking about in a small area to
attract monster battles. In an Action-RPG or other adventure game, it could be
several things, but it usually means defeating all enemies in an area, leaving,
and returning so that the enemies have also returned. Of course, some games
do not allow this, as there are a certain number of enemies who never return.

B. Purpose

There are many reasons for Level-Gaining, but two primary reasons stand out.

The first is to gain power to clear a tough area of a game or beat a tough
boss. This is used any time the player's characters are too weak to handle the
situation in their present condition.

The second purpose is to gain extra power to make the characters over-powered.
Some players will not want to perform this particular form of Level-Gaining, but
it often makes a tedious part of an RPG more enjoyable or allows the player to
experience parts of the game that might not be possible otherwise.

III. General Level-Gaining

A. Conditions

O.K. There are several conditions to be met when beginning a session of
Level-Gaining. Not all of these conditions must always be met to succeed, but
decisions regarding this must be made by the player.

As far as RPGs go, the main conditions to meet are having an area with enemies
that the characters can defeat at their present level, a place to restore HP
and/or MP (depending on the situation), and, usually, a place to save the game.
All of these conditions may need to be slightly bent or changed depending on the
specific game.

To address the different conditions:

-Enemies that the characters can defeat at present level

Ideally, this is a small area of the overworld map where the enemies encountered
are consistently defeatable by your characters without losing so much HP or MP
in the process that it becomes inefficient to fight them.

-Place to restore HP and/or MP

This may change depending on the game, but in general, the area chosen should
have a way to restore the resources lost through battle. This is usually a town,
but could also be a HP/MP restoring area in a dungeon (as in the Lufia games) or
some other sort of system of restoring that is game-specific.

-Place to save the game

This is technically the least important of the conditions as it is not really
a necessary part of the process. However, many a level has been lost due to an
unforeseen character defeat at the hands of the enemy. This condition is also
usually met in a town, or sometimes even without any special area, as in FF4 on
the overworld map.

B. General Tips

This is probably the most important section of the guide, as it addresses all
the general techniques I use to make Level-Gaining easy and effective.

-The proper mindset

This sounds rather simple, but let me explain. Spending a few minutes to gain
one level is not really included in the purpose of this guide. This is intended
for large-scale, multi-level-gaining. Thus, one must be prepared to take on the
challenge. Be aware that this task may take a long time without much immediate
reward, depending on the game. Fortunately, many games have periodic rewards for
gaining levels in the form of spells or techniques learned, or special items
received. This makes the overall goal easier to reach.

1. Setting Goals

This is perhaps the most important technique to use when taking on a
Level-Gaining session. Depending on the situation, the goal may be large or
small, but it is important to set one. If you simply gain experience randomly,
it is easy to get discouraged or lose sight of your objective. When setting a
goal, it is best to be unrealistic about it; to set a goal that appears
to be out of reach. After gaining a few levels, the goal then appears to be
easier to achieve. Using this little "mind trick" can make large goals seem
smaller. Also, while even a few experience points may seem to be far out of
reach early on, after gradual increases in the amount of EXP needed for the
next level, larger amounts seem to be more realistic to gain.

IV. Money-Gaining

Money-gaining is rather simply the same as level-gaining, just that the goal is
to acquire money (for weapons, armor, equipment, so on) rather than EXP (for
levels). In some games, this is rarely necessary; in others, it's essentially
a requirement.

A. How it coincides with level-gaining

In almost all battles in the average RPG, one acquires EXP and money for a
victory. Thus, if you're already fighting for EXP, you will consequently acquire
money as well. However, the enemy that's good to fight for EXP might not always
be the same as one for money, and the reverse is also true. So, you have to
figure out what areas and battles best fit the goals you are trying to meet.

B. Battles that give lots of EXP or GP respectively

As was stated above, some battles are not good for both money and EXP. It is
often necessary to look for an enemy that gives a lot of money and not
necessarily a large amount of EXP so that it may be faster and/or easier to
acquire the money you need. Keep a close look at the points of each you get from
various enemies or groups so that you know the best areas on which to
concentrate.

V. Special Points

A. Explanation
I use the term "special points" in this case to cover any sort of points other
than EXP or money gained in all or most battles.

B. Examples

1. FF5 - ABP
In Final Fantasy 5, you gain ABP (ability points) in every battle. These are
used to increase your job levels and learn new abilities.

2. FF6 - Espers
In Final Fantasy 6, when you have an Esper equipped, you gain magic points
toward new spells with each battle. The espers have different percentages to
which the points go, thus making some spells learned faster than others for the
same amount of points.

3. Chrono Trigger - Tech Points
In Chrono Trigger, you gain Tech Points in every battle. These give your
characters new techniques that act as spells and can often be combined with
other characters' techniques to form powerful combinations.

C. Ways to get the most out of Level-Gaining for SP
Similar to the point on money gaining, some enemies give more SP than others.
However, usually it is even more specific. Rather than having slightly less or
more money or EXP, SP are usually each more important, so an enemy giving 2 SP
instead of 1 could be very significant. As an example, in FF5, most battles will
give you 1 ABP, but some give more. On one island, there is a small area where
you will always fight a group of enemies that give 3 ABP instead of 1. It is in
that area that I raised most of my Job Levels to Master while playing FF5. If I
had fought other enemies, while only giving 2 points less, it would have taken
at least 3 times as long. (The enemies were also easy to defeat quickly through
a specific method I developed for the situation. I'll address it later.)

VI. Certain Kinds of Battles

This is probably my favorite section to write because it addresses some of the
more specific methods that I use when level-gaining. I will describe two
significant types of battles that I have titled Lossless and Gaining, for
soon-to-be obvious reasons.

A. Lossless
A "Lossless" battle is one in which, after the battle is over, you are
victorious, rewarded with EXP, money, SP, or whatever is applicable, and, in the
process, you lost no HP, MP, status, items, or any other expendable resource to
finish it. Obviously, if one is able to fight many of this type of battle,
level-gaining becomes easier since you are not required to use your time or
money to replenish any of such resources. A battle of this type is a relief if
you are already dangerously low on any of these resources, especially HP.

B. Gaining
While I probably could have come up with a less confusing title, "Gaining"
battles are those in which not only do you lose no resources (as in a
"Lossless" battle), but you gain some amount in at least one of those resources.
An example would be going into a battle with 50 out of 100 MP on one character,
casting an MP draining spell on an enemy to go up to 100/100 MP, and then losing
no resources from that or any other character during the remainder of the
battle. I would consider a battle in which I cast a spell to heal someone and
then gained back the same amount of MP I used for the spell to be a "Gaining"
battle, since the character's HP was increased with no ultimate loss in
resources. A battle in which one resource is gained while one or more other
resources is lost would not be a "Gaining" battle, since over some period of
time, such battles would still require the replenishment of those resources.
Gaining battles are those that can be used as small or sometimes even large
replenishments in themselves, rather than a sudden or gradual loss in resources,
as most battles are.

C. All or Almost All One Kind of Points / Sacrifice
Sometimes, there are enemies you can fight that give (usually) large amounts
of one type of points, but very little or none of another. The Red Core in the
Estpolis/Lufia games is such an example. They give very little gold but a very
large amount of EXP. In FF5, the final dungeon contains many enemies that give
20, 30, or even 198 ABP, while giving no EXP at all. These types of battles are
very good if you need one specific kind of points, but if not, you have to
sacrifice those points for the large gain in another. If gaining these extras
makes it easier to gain what is not rewarded in the battle, then they may be
worth it. For instance, gaining large amounts of ABP will reward you with many
new abilities that may make the gaining of EXP or money easier.

VII. Tricks and Cheats

A. Explanation
A few games have tricks or cheats that can be used to increase your EXP. I
very rarely condone the use of such tricks unless it is at least the second full
time though a game. Pure cheats, such as the use of a Game Genie or Pro Action
Replay/GameShark aren't even interesting, and I have found them to make the game
very dull very fast.

B. Examples
1. Zelda 2 - Swamp
In The Legend of Zelda: The Adventure of Link, there is an area of swamp in
which, by using a turbo controller, you can arrange for Link to constantly swing
his sword and hit birds for 2 EXP. It's very little, but over long periods of
time, you gain a lot of EXP. The one drawback is that you must check the game
occasionally, as your levels only go up by confirming it with the start button.

2. FF6 - Raft
One of my favorites and probably one of the best EXP tricks that I know of is
one involving the raft in Final Fantasy 6. In the early part of the game, when
you are instructed to split up into 3 groups, one of the groups is on a raft on
the river. There is a choice of direction and if, at the proper turn, you choose
right (which is the default choice), you will circle around to the same spot,
meeting enemies along the way. If you set up your battles such that Bannon uses
his "Health" special ability on the party, and the others attack, you can win
the battles without losing very much HP, and before long, gaining so much that
there is no danger of losing at all. With a turbo pad, the same choice of
direction will continually be chosen, enemies met, EXP gained, forever. The
amount of EXP stays the same, while your characters require more for levels, so
before long, the levels gained slow down considerably. Eventually, it
takes several hours for one level. Basically, the technique is to leave the game
on in this state for several DAYS. One week should bring your characters to
close to 99th level. There is no way to check the level of your characters
without ending the loop, so if you want them to be 99th level, wait a LONG time
before stopping. Once the characters reach very high levels, they learn
techniques normally only learned from other sources - special spells, Bum Rush,
so on. All your future characters will start at a level within a few of those
characters on the raft and will have the abilities to match. There are two
drawbacks to using this, besides the obvious cheating nature of it. One is that
special abilities are gained through the use of Espers on level up. Since you
have no Espers on the raft, every level gained is one less that can be bonused
by the Esper. However, if you reach high enough level, these bonuses really do
not matter too much. The other and more annoying drawback is that Locke is
already a usable character but not on the raft, so he does not get in on the
levels gained. It's quite annoying to have everyone at 88th level or so, and
Locke still at 11th, since you are required to use him several times early on.

3. FF2 - Various (explained)
In Final Fantasy 2, (and I mean REAL FF2, on the Famicom, which was not
released in the US, not FF4 for the Super Famicom) there are no regular levels
gained. Instead, every type of weapon and every spell and every other attribute
is raised independently of the others based on your action in battle. For
instance, if you attack with a sword, your sword points go up by 1, and your
sword gains a level when it reaches 100 points. However, there are some bugs in
the way this system works. If you attack YOURSELF with a weapon, you'll gain
defense points, shield points (if you have a shield on) as well as points for
the weapon you used ON YOURSELF. You can then heal yourself with a spell, which
raises the spell level. Thus, you can spend a great deal of time attacking your
own party to gain points. The main problem becomes finding an enemy that will
not damage you too much or run away from the battle (since you have to be in
battle to do this).
Also, if you select attack for all 4 characters in your party
and they are all using a weapon, and the first character to attack kills the
only enemy or last enemy, EVERYONE still gains points as if they attacked, even
though their turn never came up! However, this can be taken even one step
further. Most of the game, your first 3 characters are significant and the 4th
is a sub-character that changes. If you have 4 characters so that the last
character's levels can be ignored, you can select an action, such as attack, for
the first 3 characters, then press the B button to cancel the commands and
return to the first character, and you have ALREADY GAINED THE POINTS FOR
ATTACKING!!! All before the turn even starts. The last person can not benefit
from this, as if you selected a command for them, you could not go back and
cancel the others. You can only gain one level on any one attribute per battle,
but it means you can quickly and easily gain weapon levels.

VIII. Some Specific Examples

Basically, a section just for some examples of ways I gained levels in certain
games, such as Final Fantasy 5, since the ABP system is significant.

-As for FF5, I mentioned a method I developed for gaining ABP quickly. On an
island in the south part of the map on the 1st world, there is a group of 5
identical enemies that will be easily defeated with Ifrit summon. Learn this
for your characters, then set the summoning ability on whichever jobs you want
to raise. Then, walk back and forth until you meet this group (there is a spot
where you will meet only this type.) and cast Ifrit until they are dead. Before
long, it will only take one casting. Thus, upon entering battle, you can simply
hold the A button and the fastest character will cast Ifrit, defeat the
enemies, gain 3 ABP, and be done. Just use tents when your MP is low. By using
this, I could gain levels without even watching the screen. By listening
to the music, I knew when I was on the overworld (to walk until meeting enemies)
or in battle (to hold the button down). As a result, I could do simple things
(like talk on IRC) while also gaining ABP. =)

-In Lufia 1, there are several dungeons that contain a magic-restoring circle
and HP-restoring circle right next to each other. By using Foul Water, I could
meet an enemy every step, and thus, with healing so close, fight many battles
without the usual time consuming element of walking to meet enemies.

I hope these examples are helpful in developing your own techniques for
level-gaining.

IX. Version History

Version 1.3 - 12.22.01
Minor edits
Added IX. Version History
Updated person information

Version 1.2 - ??.??.98
Various edits to several sections

Version 1.1 - ??.??.98
Various edits to several sections

Version 1.0 - ??.??.98
First version

