Favourite Training Spot

[Quindiana Jones]

Obviously, as your level increases you'll have different spots, but the Bhujerban Mines and the Stilshrine of Miriam will forever hold a special place in my grinding heart. They were excellent places to quickly level up and get some great loot in the process. I also found them to be really cool zones, these old places filled with memories and monsters. Great places to hang out in. :D

Conversely, that passage to the big city, I forget its name, was easily my least favourite training spot. God damn, I hated that place. Ugh.

How about you lot? Any areas of the game that you loved fighting in? Was your training setup (in terms of Gambits, Licenses and Equipment) any different from your boss setup?

[Freya]

I liked ot grind right out the city in that field that changed cause of the seasons. That was easy for me. I need to replay this game!

[Jiro]

The fact that I didn't really grind may have been an issue for me. I tried to kill enough of everything to get my damn book filled though. Although, I remember the Yensa Sandsea or w/e having a lot of my time. I think I got the little figurine for the super chain there.

[Quindiana Jones]

I don't... what on earth did you just say? :tongue:

[ReloadPsi]

Henne Mines, Jellies. That is all.

[Slothy]

Were the Bhujerban mines the ones on that floating island? I honestly can't remember the names of too many places. Must need to replay this. But those are probably where I did the most dedicated grinding early on. They were quite nice since it was stupidly easy to chain skeletons there. Other than that I think I just did Mark hunts for the rest of the game.

[krissy]

definitely mines... dont' remmeber which ones though.
although sometimes i'd let my lil bro get me ap points by walking around deserts attacking helpless wolves for an hour

[Elpizo]

Lushu Mines on that bridge that only spawns Skeletons, great for making money early game. I had chains up to 182 there in order to get 99 Bone fragments for a rough 18000 gil. Ozmone Plains, because of the purple horses that drop Iron Carapaces, 99 of those for a whopping 40.000 gil in no time at all (seriously, they can drop 4 if you start chaining them), and those werewolf-things because of the 2 lp they give. That's kind of the only time I remember grinding... After that, simply taking my route to archades and filling out my maps gave me enough exp and gil.

Been replaying it for a couple of weeks now, have to go to Giruvegan now, my main party is lv 50. Damn I love this game, it's so deliciously fantastic. An utter blast to play through, and everything goes much smoother and easier (even the grinding) now that I have all the knowledge and experience from my first playthrough.

[Slothy]

Lushu Mines on that bridge that only spawns Skeletons, great for making money early game. I had chains up to 182 there in order to get 99 Bone fragments for a rough 18000 gil.

That's the one. Thank you. It's been driving me crazy all afternoon.

[Quindiana Jones]

There we go. Lhusu Mines. Wonerful.

I grinded (ground?) Werewolves for the katana they dropped. I wanted to make Basch a two-handed damage dealer before Raithwall's Tomb, and it helped a load when it came to those bastard demon walls. I was a considerably higher level with some much better weapons; they went down in no time! As such, I got a waaaaay advanced sword for Vaan. I really enjoyed that whole experience.

[Goldenboko]

Bhujerban Mines

I saw this thread and the ONLY thing I thought was Bhujerba. I'm so glad it was the first thing I read. For whatever reason slaying all the Skeletons there over and over seemed like a naturally good idea. Besides it being the first obvious spot of a lot of the same monster type, I remember the dropped pretty good helms and I liked to get one of each for my party. :)

[Jiro]

I don't... what on earth did you just say? :tongue:

Let me try again for you:

I usually just killed enough enemies to get the extra information from the guide booklet. You know the one.

But the sky pirate's den or whatever that gave you little figurines for meeting challenges: I got the one for getting a killing chain of ~100 or whatever it was by farming the little crab people in the Sandsea.

Goddamn man.

[Quindiana Jones]

I was talking to Freya, but you posted while I was replying. xD

[Elpizo]

There we go. Lhusu Mines. Wonerful.

I grinded (ground?) Werewolves for the katana they dropped. I wanted to make Basch a two-handed damage dealer before Raithwall's Tomb, and it helped a load when it came to those bastard demon walls. I was a considerably higher level with some much better weapons; they went down in no time! As such, I got a waaaaay advanced sword for Vaan. I really enjoyed that whole experience.

If you thought that was fun, try having the Zodiac Spear before you go to the Paramina Rift and Stillshrine of Miriam. You one-hit-KO everything up to pretty much the Phon Coast. ;) And even then things only take two hits until the Cerobi Steppe. I did it, made me laugh maniacally every time I saw Ashe hitting +3000 when Vaan and Balthier didn't even get past 1000 damage. :mwahaha: The only difficulty is beating King Bomb at such a low lvl. I was level 32 and my main team only had 1 quickening yet. But it's not that difficult if you summon Belias to tank and absorb the fire damage for you. Espers coming in handy, fancy that! I did use up all my elixers and ethers in the fight, though. But it was worth it just for that lovely, shiny Zodiac Spear. :D Only took me two tries for King Bomb, too. And then I could finally stop freaking out every time I saw a treasure chest. I swear, the Zodiac Spear gave me a phobia of treasure chests.

[Hollycat]

My favorite spot was the desert place with all the blood wolves that was only one screen off from the jungle.

[Madonna]

Ozmone Plain, south of Giza Plain. It is a good place to start prepping team to visit Zertinan Caverns, another, more worthwhile place to visit.

The Lhusu Mines were a great place to farm chains and get loot, but I always hated the whole mine aspect. After getting Basch and visiting a floating continent, the last thing I wanted was to be cooped up underground again.

[Jiro]

I was talking to Freya, but you posted while I was replying. xD

She meant the Giza Plains.

[Raistlin]

The Lhusu Mines are an excellent grinding spot relatively early on in the game for gil. You can spawn an infinite supply of skeletons on the bridge for retardedly high chains. I spent a long time here on my first playthrough, which I heavily advise. I really wouldn't bother grinding much at all until getting to this point.

IIRC, the Henne Mines with the dropping Jelly creatures is probably one of the best later-game grinding spots. I really haven't bothered to do much late-game grinding, though, since I didn't have much trouble by that point. If I bothered to go after some of the higher marks I probably would have gone here.

After I was past the point of it being particularly useful, I was told about Dustia (http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Dustia), which can be easily exploited very early in the game when you have only Vaan. I will probably try this on my next playthrough.

[Elpizo]

The Skeletons in Lushu are also interesting early game because they drop Iron Helmets, which at that point are great heavy armour headgear. I got enough to outfit my entire party with them simply by chaining the Skeletons on my way to 99 Bonefragments. And still had some left to spare to sell for some extra gil.

[Quindiana Jones]

I chained someplace in the dungeon where you meet Basch. That was good fun early on, and gave me a great start.

[Mercen-X]

I don't... what on earth did you just say? :tongue:the sky pirate's den or whatever that gave you little figurines I have to admit, I was briefly confused by your earlier statement as well. I didn't have the Den in mind when you mentioned acquiring a figurine, while I've chained 999 of those stupid little desert tribals. :|

Bhujerba, Lhusu, Urutan-Yensa... yeah, that's about it. Once I got some better skills/equipment, I spent a lot of time in Feywood (if I named that correctly)... but I still had to flee a lot... :mad:

[ReloadPsi]

Henne Mines, Jellies. That is all.

I should elaborate on this, shouldn't I :P

No, not the strategy involved. That's old news. What it means is that early game grinding/training in almost any RPG doesn't do anything for me, especially in FF12 as it kills all the challenge from what I already don't think is a particularly difficult game. However, much later on when I've decided I now want a full license board and all my characters at LV99, that is what I then do.