Why would you want to spend all that time mindlessly grinding the same monsters over and over? Increasing your weapon skill, of course, provides bonuses to damage, but also unlocks new combo skills at various levels, with a passive skill unlocking at 1000 that significantly increases your damage output.
There’s not much need to level grind Lost Song during the main story, as you absolutely don’t need to be anywhere near 1000 in either level or weapon proficiency to finish the game. Grinding more comes into play in the post-game if are a completionist or want to remain competitive when battling other players in PvP or taking on those diabolical extra quests with maximum level enemies.
If you’re looking for tips on the best party lineup and what skills to level during the main story, check out our guide here.
Grinding to 1000 makes Kirito a beast with dual wielding
While on a quest to grind your weapon skills to 1000, keep in mind that regular attacks raise your level faster than using combos. Your weapon skills also raise based on the number of attacks landed and not on the amount of damage you do, so don’t unleash those powerful skills that quickly kill enemies! Level grinding is more efficient if you keep hitting something with lots of health that isn’t dying than to 1 shot kill waves of weaker enemies over and over.
Extra Quests
More difficult extra quests with higher level enemies are unlocked after completing the main story, and several of these have excellent opportunities for level grinding. If you have difficulty battling the bosses in these quests you can always set the difficulty to easy, but keep in mind that will mean enemies will go down faster, so sticking with normal mode is usually best as you’ll get to hit each monster more times.
Hitting an enemy repeatedly is the best way to increase your weapon proficiency, and the higher level the monster, the more experience you gain, and that’s where Siegfried comes in. You do have to complete all the lower star quests for this to unlock first, but the 10 star extra quest [Hunting] Demon God’s Advent quest is an amazing place to grind due to Siegfried’s huge health bar. You can really drag this battle out by repeatedly hitting Siegried and then guarding and blocking until his health recovers, repeating the process over and over.
Siegfried is the go-to level grinding enemy
If you haven’t gotten all the way to the 10 star quests yet, the extra quest [Hunting] Sandstorm Wastes is another excellent option, as it stakes you straight to a boss with multiple body parts. The main body has a ton of health and you can repeatedly attack him with whatever weapon you are trying to level for quick gains.
Keep in mind that any enemy that regenerates health can potentially be a source of level grinding your weapon skills. The boss Seven (found in the post-game dungeon on the last island) in particular regenerates health quickly, making this fight a solid way to boost your weapon skills – since you keep your gains even if you die.
Battling In The Sandstorm Wastes Quest
Co-op Farming
After unlocking the multiplayer aspect of the game, you can join in with other players for co-op instead of straight PvP. Popping into the game with a group that’s higher level than you is an easy way to level up faster, following them around and launching your attacks at stronger enemies that net faster experience gain. Finding someone who already has their skills at 1000 and is still playing is the best way to go here.
AFK Grinding
OK, so this is frankly just cheating and defeats the whole purpose of having a huge level cap that takes forever to reach, but for those without a sense of shame who don’t want to put in the work, it is actually possible to grind while walking away from the game entirely.
There are two ways to handle this. The first is to go to an overland map area where there are no aerial monsters. Have your main character hover a bit up in the air where monsters on the ground can’t reach and literally just walk away. That’s it: make a sandwich, watch some Sword Art Online episodes on Hulu, mow the grass, do some Christmas shopping, or whatever.
The other two members of your party will keep fighting and gaining levels while your main character just hovers there looking bored and wondering why nothing is happening. As long as those other two party members have healing skills and you didn’t go somewhere with extremely deadly creatures, your other two party members will level over time while you do something else.
This is going to be slower than actively playing – since one character isn’t leveling at all and you’ll have to pick a lower level area to ensure your AFK slaves aren’t dying – but time isn’t really a factor when you’re reading a book or surfing the web in the other room.
The second way is to pick an extra quest that has respawning enemies like [Search] Deserted Tunnel where you can leave your main character in a room the enemies don’t enter, and then have the rest of the party endlessly battle the respawning high level monsters in the tunnel area.
Crest of Yggdrasil
Eventually during the game you’ll pick up a Crest Of Yggdrasil that not only increases how quickly your characters level, but also boots your weapon proficiency leveling, making it much faster to hit 1000.
Wondering how to get extra Crests of Yggdrasil so each character can have one? Some monsters in the 10 star extra quest [Search] Shrine Of Impurity will randomly drop them as loot! Eventually you can get three and increase your level capacity for everyone in the current party lineup.
Shrine Of Impurity Extra Quest
