Where to grind for the optional content?

[Fennel]

I'm at the section after returning from Giruvegan to get Reddas into the party, I think this is the best point to do optional stuff since later on you'll lose access to a 4th party member permanently.

However, this is my first time attempting to do the optional content, since I've skipped it in my two previous playthroughs, so I'm not too familiar with it.

What's a good spot to grind, possibly up to lv99 to tackle all these optional hunts and bosses?

[FafnirChaos]

Lhusu mines past site 11, Nabreus Deadlands, and you can still do grinding at the tower as there is a teleport crystal there.

[Fennel]

Originally posted by FafnirChaos:

you can still do grinding at the tower as there is a teleport crystal there.

Thanks! This definitely sounds like the best spot, I didn't remember whether it was possible to leave Pharos. I'll check out the Deadlands too since I've never explored them either.

[FafnirChaos]

Originally posted by Fennel:

Originally posted by FafnirChaos:

you can still do grinding at the tower as there is a teleport crystal there.

Thanks! This definitely sounds like the best spot, I didn't remember whether it was possible to leave Pharos. I'll check out the Deadlands too since I've never explored them either.

Yeah just watch out for some of the traps in deadlands, if you don't have something to cure disease, then you'll be healing 1 hp revives until you find a crystal.

[Hinnyuu]

First off, you don't really need to grind levels. While levels do increase your power, you're usually better off spending time getting gear instead - that tends to give you much more power per time invested than leveling does.

In fact, with the right gear you won't need to grind levels at all, even for superbosses. They're comfortably doable even in the low 60s, which most people will naturally be after finishing the story and the gear grind. I've done it in the high 40s/low 50s many times after rushing through the story. And I in fact have never, not once in my life, grinded to 99 in FFXII, because I just personally consider it such a waste of time.

That being said, if you DO want to grind to 99, there's a couple possible spots. One popular one is the Abysteel junction in deep Henne Mines, as that spawns a large number of high-level enemies and can easily be reset. But it's a bit of a special situation since they all spawn at once, which may not be what people want and/or may be boring.

The other premier spot is in the Great Crystal, on the way to Omega Mark XII. It features a linear series of platforms with lots of high-level enemies that spawn for a long time, but it can also be reset very easily.

As other people have already pointed out, Pharos is NOT in fact the end of the game - you can complete it and still play; in fact there's an optional section of Pharos (the Subterra) that only unlocks after you finish it. That is the third popular grinding spot, featuring lots of high-level enemies of various flavors and being located close to a save/teleport crystal (unlike the other two spots I mentioned). That convenience has a price, though, as the enemies tend to be lower XP than the above two areas.

Lhusu Mines (Site 5 and 6) is also okay, though the enemies tend to be lower level there. Abysteels in Lhusu are lvl 57-59, for example, whereas the Abysteels in deep Henne Mines are lvl 64-65. It's not a huge difference, but it does mean the EXP value is much lower (2.6k-3k in Lhusu vs. 9.1k-9.3k in Henne). It's usually advisable to get the highest-level enemies you can, though of course YMMV depending on what you can kill the fastest/most efficiently.

Either way, though - if you want to tackle the superbosses, you'll probably have to grind at least SOME of the high-end gear. The way that XII's damage calculations work for weapons, gear is of supreme importance - you can't outlevel gross differences in weapon power and enemy defense like you can in other games. You could be lvl 9,000 with 5 million Strength and you'd still do literally 0 damage with a crappy weapon because of how the weapon damage formula works: (power - defense) * (stats&levels), so if the first part is 0 it'll always be 0 no matter your level.

I usually suggest to people to grind for the gear first, and then see where you're at with levels. You'll get EXP anyway just from going and getting the gear, so do that first and then see how much EXP you want to get on top of that.

[Fennel]

Originally posted by Hinnyuu:

I usually suggest to people to grind for the gear first, and then see where you're at with levels. You'll get EXP anyway just from going and getting the gear, so do that first and then see how much EXP you want to get on top of that.

That seems pretty reasonable, do you happen to know if the bazaar system for the end-game gear works like in the PS2 version where you would want to bulk sell items that are shared between different recipes to avoid having the sell counter be reset? Or can you just sell everything in this version?

[Hinnyuu]

Originally posted by Fennel:

That seems pretty reasonable, do you happen to know if the bazaar system for the end-game gear works like in the PS2 version where you would want to bulk sell items that are shared between different recipes to avoid having the sell counter be reset? Or can you just sell everything in this version?

Yep, still works the same way. Counter resets on purchasing bazaar goods, so if you want to do the old Tournesol+Masamune materials double-dipping trick it still works exactly like it did before.