Best way to grind XP

[Moon Man]

What's the best way to grind XP for perks/cards. Want to level up my legendary perks but missing cards to scrap.

[Sirius]

Way too many options to not overwhelm a new player.

A certain someone will list them all I'm sure (they usually do), but be aware that many are difficult or need grind to get in good amounts, so I'll just list a few "low tech" ones and give general tips

1. Cranberry Cobbler
A veggie recipe (you don't need to learn), you only need a cooking station, cranberries and wood. 5% XP bonus, counts a food (see below under general tips)

2. Resting in a bed for a while until the "Well Rested" bonus appears.
Another 5% (I think, also see below)

3. Brian Fungus Soup
Like the Cobbler, no recipe needed, just Brain Fungus, Boiled Water and Wood at a cooking station. Increases INT (again, see below), Brain Fungus is super easy to find everywhere, with certain spots having almost too many for you to use before they go bad.

Those are the easiest, almost-no-grind ones, but also low +XP resulting options.

General:
Note that certain things override each other, there's a better cranberry recipe (Cranberry Relish) that's more involved to produce, and when you eat it, then eat a cobbler, you will have the cobbler effect and lose the relish effect.

The Brain Fungus Soup is also a food, but it increases INT and not +XP directly and so stacks.
Every point of INT increases XP gain by 2%.
In that same logic, you can add a chem that raises INT and (again I think, not sure) a alcoholic beverage that does the same.

Also in case you are at a point where you consider mutations, the "Herbivore" one increases effects of such foods - including XP gains and amount of INT in our examples, with the downside that meat based products lose all effect.

Then just go to the high value events when there are enough people present - Eviction Notice, Radiation Rumble come to mind - where you can just tag enemies a bit with your ammo and level up really fast.

Or go solo and farm Westek (look it up, it's a scheme where you can endlessly respawn Super Mutants).

Hope that wasn't too confusing.

[Moon Man]

Originally posted by Sirius:

Way too many options to not overwhelm a new player.

A certain someone will list them all I'm sure (they usually do), but be aware that many are difficult or need grind to get in good amounts, so I'll just list a few "low tech" ones and give general tips

1. Cranberry Cobbler
A veggie recipe (you don't need to learn), you only need a cooking station, cranberries and wood. 5% XP bonus, counts a food (see below under general tips)

2. Resting in a bed for a while until the "Well Rested" bonus appears.
Another 5% (I think, also see below)

3. Brian Fungus Soup
Like the Cobbler, no recipe needed, just Brain Fungus, Boiled Water and Wood at a cooking station. Increases INT (again, see below), Brain Fungus is super easy to find everywhere, with certain spots having almost too many for you to use before they go bad.

Those are the easiest, almost-no-grind ones, but also low +XP resulting options.

General:
Note that certain things override each other, there's a better cranberry recipe (Cranberry Relish) that's more involved to produce, and when you eat it, then eat a cobbler, you will have the cobbler effect and lose the relish effect.

The Brain Fungus Soup is also a food, but it increases INT and not +XP directly and so stacks.
Every point of INT increases XP gain by 2%.
In that same logic, you can add a chem that raises INT and (again I think, not sure) a alcoholic beverage that does the same.

Also in case you are at a point where you consider mutations, the "Herbivore" one increases effects of such foods - including XP gains and amount of INT in our examples, with the downside that meat based products lose all effect.

Then just go to the high value events when there are enough people present - Eviction Notice, Radiation Rumble come to mind - where you can just tag enemies a bit with your ammo and level up really fast.

Or go solo and farm Westek (look it up, it's a scheme where you can endlessly respawn Super Mutants).

Hope that wasn't too confusing.

Thank you for the great answer, I didn't even consider foods to be honest so your explanation will help me a lot.

[Phantom]

Suggested Munchies
Cranberry Relish +Massive exp (=12 points of int worth)
Gourd Soup +Large Perception (+7.5 easy to make, helps vats accuracy)
Brain Bombs +Massive Intelligence (11.25 points)
Company Tea +Massive AP regen (37.5 = 8 pieces of powered armour = instant ap regen after cooldown)
Blight Soup +Massive crit (~187% I'd have to look now that its been buffed)
Tato juice +Large ap (+37.5? also helps ap regen)
Steeped Fern Flower Tea +Large str (+7.5, carry weight buff of 37.5 pounds)
You CAN do luck but it won't be a breakpoint, you CAN do others but they aren't super helpful

Suggested Mutations
Egg Head (bonus intelligence)
Herd Mentality (bonus stats, you are always on a team)
Eagle Eyes (bonus crit)
Bird Bones (helps prevent fall damage)
Marsupial (game changer)
Adrenal Reaction (extra 40-50% damage
Speed Demon (20% movespeed is the cap)
Scaly Skin (you already have tons of ap)
Herbivore (Massive buff to food)
Bonus - Empath = helps allies, IF you and an ally have it its a net positive for everyone, if only an ally has it is a massive net positive for you :P

Suggested Armour
Secret Service chest - Jetpack
Rest is whatever, but the same type of armour is the gold standard

Recommended Guns
Railways (Quad Explosive is king)
Fixers
Plasma Caster
Enclave Plasma
Gauss Shotguns
Teslas (Quad faster fire)
Two-Shot Grenade Launchers (Nuka Launcher is absurd)
Grenades (IIRC nuka quantum has the biggest aoe?)

Recommended Perks
Any weight reduction (-90% weight ones) that you benefit from, I also recommend the backpack with a 3* weight reduction one
Defensive ones - Blocker, Fireproof, Dodgy, Richochet, Serendipity, Nerd Rage
Exp bonus ones - Night person, Inspirational
QoL - 1 in concentrated fire, 1 in gun fu, 3 chem fiend, 1 radicool, 1 escape artist, 1 curator
Necessary - 1 strange in numbers, 2 starched genes
Good idea - 3 class freak (mitigates downsides of mutations, but you can bypass with serums or just not caring)


100% base exp level

15 +15 base intelligence (specIal)
20 +5 legendary perk card
35 +15 unyielding prefix (1st star) + low health
40 +5 major effect on armour (2nd star)
43 +3 Casual shielded underarmour - https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/Shielded_lining
48 +5 berry mentats - you can craft 1000-2500 an hour fairly easily, firecaps and brain fungus are the limiting factor in making them
Add Live and love 3 magazine (increases food effects by 50%) - easiest to buy these in bulk from players willing to obtain them en masse
59.25 +11.25 from brain bombs - irridated sugar bombs are the only hard part to obtain, the Fasnacht collectron gathers them, also whitesprings trainstation often has 2-50
61.25 +2 intelligence bobblehead (alternatively +5% exp leadership bobblehead - tomatoe tomato at this point virtually the same benefit from either)
63.25 +2 from season 9 race machine
66.25 +3 night person perk [at night or indoors like westtek]
70.25 +4 casual team buff
76.25 +6 Egghead mutation
78.25 +2 Herd mentality mutation
80.25 ~+2 Strange in numbers perk
Use Marsupial Serum (negates loss of a point of intelligence)

343% total exp from intelligence (3.03% exp per point of int from data miners... some argue 2.02% per point... neither is exactly correct so whatever)

5% +5% Season 11 Cranberry Ally buff - Leo - nuka collectron will gather cranberry nukacola, otherwise buy it when you see it, don't need much as its a once a day buff
10% +5% Mothman Tome of wisdom (+15% from the limited time wise mothman during event)
15% +5% The Path to Enlightenment (event, not common and IMO not worth doing... also MAY not stack with mothman above ones... haven't had a chance to get it with the new buffs)
20% +5% rested / lovers embrace / kindred spirit - resting bonus
35% +15% inspirational perk
72.5% +37.5% Cranberry Relish - materials to make are easy to obtain
172.5% +100% well rested - 4x lunchboxes

515% total exp from all sources


1030% x2 during double exp weekends - exp caps at 4000 per kill
1545% x3 during triple exp weekends (been a while) - exp caps at 4000 per kill


Overkill on a double exp weekend to reach 4,000 exp per kill vs supermutants (exp cap) helpful regularly to get scoreboard points easy
Does make the gulpers and the rad rumble ghouls just pour out their experience points.

OR

Less exp, bonus explosive range magazine and grenader perk + nuka quantum? + westtek is apperently stupid fast clear times

[Uugly]

You gain a lots more doing Expedition than doing West Tek farming. If that is only goal then go ahead but when you decide to farm stamp you will realize farming at West Tek is wasting.

[Traveler]

Originally posted by Moon Man:

What's the best way to grind XP for perks/cards. Want to level up my legendary perks but missing cards to scrap.

DailyOps! Lots of xp, it's quick and you finish with more ammo then you start with! Plus it's more fun than most of the public events.