Final Fantasy XIV offers a multitude of ways to level up your characters, and knowing the most efficient methods can significantly speed up your journey. This guide will outline the best approaches to level up in FFXIV, whether you’re a brand new player or leveling an alternate job.
Maximizing Your Experience Gains
Before diving into leveling methods, it’s crucial to understand how to maximize your experience point (EXP) gains. Several boosts are available to help you level faster:
- Pre-order Bonus: Often, pre-ordering expansions or special editions grants an experience-boosting accessory, like an earring. Keep an eye out for these bonuses when purchasing new content.
- Free Company Bonus: Joining a Free Company (FFXIV’s version of guilds) provides a permanent 10% EXP boost. This is a significant and effortless way to increase your leveling speed.
- Rested Experience: Logging out in a sanctuary city or town (indicated by a moon icon near your EXP bar) grants “rested” experience. This bonus accumulates over time and provides a 50% EXP boost to combat. Make sure to log out in a city to take advantage of this passive boost.
- Food Buffs: Consuming any food item grants a 3% EXP boost for 30 minutes. Food is inexpensive and easily obtainable, making this a readily accessible boost for any leveling session.
- Armoury Bonus: If you are leveling a job that is at a lower level than your highest level job, you receive a substantial EXP boost called the Armoury Bonus. This bonus encourages players to level multiple jobs and makes leveling subsequent jobs much faster. Focus on leveling one job to a high level first to benefit from this bonus when leveling others.
Leveling Your First Job: The Main Story Quest (MSQ) Path
For new players, often referred to as “sprouts,” the Main Story Quest (MSQ) is unequivocally the best path from level 1 to 80. The MSQ is the backbone of FFXIV, guiding you through the game’s narrative, introducing essential game systems, and unlocking a vast amount of content.
Following the MSQ, displayed on the top left of your screen, offers numerous benefits:
- Comprehensive Tutorial: The MSQ gradually introduces you to all aspects of the game, from combat and crafting to dungeons and trials. It serves as an extended tutorial, ensuring you understand the fundamental mechanics of FFXIV.
- Content Unlocks: Progressing through the MSQ unlocks essential features such as dungeons, trials, raids, new zones, and even new playable jobs. It’s the key to accessing the majority of FFXIV’s content.
- Engaging Story: FFXIV is renowned for its compelling and immersive storyline. The MSQ is a critically acclaimed narrative experience that is well worth experiencing firsthand. Taking your time to enjoy the story and cutscenes is highly recommended.
- Community Engagement: The MSQ often involves interacting with other players, whether in dungeons, trials, or simply questing in populated areas. It’s a great way to meet people and become part of the FFXIV community.
While completing the MSQ to level 80 can take approximately 200 hours if you watch cutscenes, it is an incredibly rewarding experience and the most recommended way for new players to level their first job.
Alternatively, for players who are less interested in the story or want to catch up with friends quickly, purchasing a level boost and story skip is an option. Furthermore, New Game+ allows you to replay the MSQ at your own pace while still being at a high level and accessing all game systems. This can be a viable option if you want to experience the story later without the leveling grind.
Leveling Subsequent Jobs: Efficient Methods for Alt Jobs
Once you have leveled your first job and unlocked flight in various zones, leveling subsequent jobs becomes significantly faster and more flexible. Before embarking on leveling an alt job, it is highly recommended to unlock all Aetheryte flight points in all accessible zones. This will drastically reduce travel time and make leveling much more efficient. Utilizing an aetherial compass can aid in locating any missing Aetheryte nodes.
After unlocking flight points, several efficient leveling methods become available, depending on your level range and preferences:
- Roulettes: Daily roulettes offer a substantial EXP bonus once per day for completing a randomized duty. Prioritize the Leveling Roulette, Alliance Roulette, Trial Roulette, Main Scenario Roulette, and Guildhest Roulette for significant EXP gains.
- Dungeons: Running dungeons that are appropriate for your current level is a consistent and effective way to level. Dungeon runs are relatively quick and offer a good balance of EXP and rewards.
- Trials and Raids: While less EXP efficient than dungeons or roulettes, running level-appropriate trials and raids can be a good way to break up the monotony and still gain decent EXP.
- Deep Dungeon (Palace of the Dead & Heaven-on-High): Palace of the Dead (PotD) is an excellent method for leveling jobs from level 1 to 60. It offers consistent EXP, regardless of your outside level, and is particularly effective at lower levels. Heaven-on-High (HoH) is the follow-up Deep Dungeon, ideal for leveling from 61 to 70 with similar mechanics and efficient EXP gains.
- Bozjan Southern Front & Zadnor: For levels 71 to 80, engaging with the Bozjan Southern Front and its follow-up zone, Zadnor, provides a fast and engaging leveling experience. These zones offer unique content, skirmishes, and critical engagements that reward substantial EXP.
These methods, while potentially repetitive, are often social and relatively quick, especially dungeons and roulettes. Content like Palace of the Dead and Heaven-on-High level-sync you and provide skills relevant to those levels, allowing you to learn job fundamentals quickly. Furthermore, these methods delay the need to purchase new gear frequently. Poetics gear, purchased with Poetics tomestones, becomes highly relevant at level milestones (50, 60, 70, 80, 90), allowing you to gear up efficiently at the end of your leveling journey for each role (Tank, Healer, Melee DPS, Physical Ranged DPS, Magical Ranged DPS). If you plan to purchase gear while leveling, consider doing so at levels ending in 1 (e.g., 51, 61, 71) as gear at levels ending in 0 is significantly more expensive and less stat-efficient.
Leveling from 1-60: Palace of the Dead
Palace of the Dead (PotD) is a deep dungeon located in South Shroud, accessible after completing the level 17 MSQ “Into a Copperhell.” It’s a 10-floor dungeon (with further floors available) where your level and gear are reset to 1 and you progress through floors gaining levels within the dungeon. PotD provides consistent and fast EXP, especially for lower levels, and is a popular choice for quickly leveling jobs up to level 60.
Leveling from 61-70: Heaven-on-High
Heaven-on-High (HoH) is the follow-up to Palace of the Dead, located in Ruby Sea, accessible after completing the level 60 MSQ “Litany of Peace” and having cleared floor 50 of PotD. Similar to PotD, HoH is a deep dungeon with level and gear reset, providing efficient leveling from level 61 to 70.
Leveling from 71-80: Bozjan Southern Front & Zadnor
The Bozjan Southern Front and Zadnor are instanced zones unlocked through the Shadowbringers expansion’s Save the Queen questline. These zones offer unique gameplay focused on large-scale battles, skirmishes, and critical engagements. They are a highly effective and engaging way to level jobs from 71 to 80, providing substantial EXP and unique rewards.
Conclusion
Leveling in FFXIV offers various paths to suit different playstyles. For new players, the Main Story Quest is the most enriching and recommended route. For subsequent jobs, roulettes, dungeons, deep dungeons like Palace of the Dead and Heaven-on-High, and Bozjan content provide fast and efficient leveling options. Remember to maximize your experience gains with food buffs, Free Company bonuses, rested EXP, and the Armoury Bonus. Ultimately, the best leveling method is the one you find most enjoyable.
Have fun leveling!
