Black Desert Online Where To Grind In BDO

If you have played Black Desert Online, you’re probably aware of what AP or attack points are. It can be a pain to know where to grind with your specific AP, especially if you don’t know where to grind for the best results or find yourself competing with other players far too often than you would like. 

This guide will tell you all about where the best places to grind are, and where to head with the amount of AP you have, some of the items that drop off of the monsters in the area, and will hopefully help any new players who enter the game to get you started.

Below 100 AP – Black Spirit Questline

To start, if you’re set upon grinding, and you’re below 100 AP, your best bet will be to progress through the story quests, which will give you free items including gear for your character as well as weapons as you progress. You can also unlock inventory slots as well, and will continue to do so until you get to an area called the Hex Chapel. Hence, it’s best to start with the story.

It is heavily recommended to progress the story as much as you can as all the monsters you kill will drop items, and you will want to carry as much as you can to make the optimal amount of money. 

If you are under level 56 be sure to check out our leveling guide

100 AP – Hexe Sanctuary

Once you obtain 100 AP and have those inventory slots unlocked, you may have an idea of where you can go to grind because you’ve explored the world, but Hex Sanctuary is a good enough spot to begin. It is good to kill monsters in the area because they die quickly, typically in one shot, the only downside to the area is that they are spread out, so AoE damage won’t be as effective. 

Some of the other areas, even though the enemies being spread out may work to your advantage, however, you can close the distance by dashing and you will typically kill the monsters in the area in one hit. This area offers witch’s earings from enemies which are worth a decent profit depending on the worlds market as well as ancient relic shards for memory fragment scrolls which are also worth at least one million on the market most times. This is generally a good place to build up money and skill point experience. 

100 AP – Mediah: Abadoned Iron Mines, Helms Post, Sausans

Alternatively, you could go to Mediah and grind in that zone from 100-150 AP, you can grind at the abandoned iron mines, or fight the elites in the area which are harder to kill than the average enemies but drop forbidden books, these books also drop from the Wandering Rouge Den nearby. 

If you head to the North where Sausan Garrison is, it isn’t as popular as it used to be, however that means there are more enemies to kill in the area which works to your advantage. 

You can also head to Helm’s Post, which is another decent area to grind at, but recently has been updated to drop fewer items. And also the monsters to take longer to reappear after you kill and loot them, thus making this place inferior to some of the other areas listed.

150 AP – Polly Forest or Fogans

Polly Forest in Kamasylvia(west of Grana) has more recently has become one of my favorite spots for grinding for EXP, it gives alot of exp and pretty good money/hour. If you are just looking for mainly EXP, this is the spot I would recommend to farm to 61. The only negative is that Wacki Toshi(where you buy marni stones) NPC is a little bit far away so stockpile on Polly Forest Marni Stones before heading out to Polly Forest. You can even do Polly Forest before 150 AP if you wish.

Once you surpass 150 AP, or even a little bit beforehand if you are feeling confident, you can then head over to Fogan’s. Typically, you can stay around the area until you reach the 170’s for AP before moving on over to Gahaz Bandit Lair, where you can stay until you hit soft-cap.

170 AP – Gahaz Bandit Lair or Desert Naga Temple

These two areas are best for grinding because they are near cover, or near the water, in the game meaning, you don’t have to use items to survive in the desert. You can get good scroll drops from these two areas, and the typical monsters near the bandit lair drop excellent loot, and both areas have a good density of monsters to kill with area of effect. 

If you’re lucky, a serap necklace can drop at Fogan’s, while the item only drops at the bandit lair off of the elite enemies in the area, however, Rosar weapons drop in the area which can already be enhanced, and meaning you can extract the materials from the weapon which gives you a bunch of black stones, which is a good item to sell on the market. 

If you get tired of these two areas, you can head elsewhere to grind, The Desert Naga Temple is one of the alternatives to Fogan’s or Gahaz Bandit Lair. But you will need gear to survive in the harsh desert conditions so be prepared to bring water, deal with Desert sickness, and Sute tea. 

200 AP – Cadry Ruins

Another area called Cadry Ruins is an area where most people do not like to grind because it used to be terrible but has since been updated to be arguably better than Gahaz Bandit Lair, although that is up for debate. Cadry offers you a Cadry ring, which can be melted to Yona Fragments, which you can make crescent rings with as well as Basilisk belts. 

The scroll rate here has been buffed up when Gahaz got nerfed, which brings the drop rate to be about the same compared to each other. The only downsides to this area are that they are harder to kill, and the enemies who carry around shields have a frontal guard in the area, which can be a waste of time to kill. Another option to grind at is Centaurs Herd, however, the area’s items are going for less on the market and the monsters aren’t worth killing there. 

The basilisk Den was updated with a faster respawn rate for the monsters, however, it still isn’t as good as the other areas. A lower AP area called Tshira Ruins runs off of a RNG, not as good as the next area, but the monster density is incredible, it just isn’t nearly as good compared to other areas. 

220 AP – Blood Wolf Settlement

When you get up to around 220 AP, you can head on over to the Blood Wolf Settlement(east of Dreighan) to grind that area, and while the monsters do not drop scrolls nearly as fast, it is a good place to make money all the same by dropping ruins rings or Humes, both worth a considerable amount of money. 

The problem with the area as compared to the other is that the monsters you kill aren’t worth as much, and rely more on RNG as compared to the other areas. 

Overall, Gahaz Bandit Lair and Fogan’s are the areas best areas to grind until you can enter into manshuams. It is always worth remembering, however, that you can choose the best place that works for you, the places listed above are just some of the best areas found in the game that many experienced players use to get by in the game.

245 AP – Manshuams

Once you’ve gotten pretty close to the soft cap for AP, or you’ve reached around the 245 range, you can head on into Manshuams, which is where you will be staying until you work to higher areas to progress. You can party up with other players to kill world bosses and other hard to kill monsters which give you experience and simple monsters to loot, and since it’s lower-tier loot, you won’t have to fight anyone or pay anything extra to obtain it. 

Some of the areas like Fadus are getting updated to yield better results when grinding, but the areas aren’t nearly as good as the previously mentioned areas. 

255 AP Or Higher – Hystria or Aakman

It is worth noting that before you work your way into Hystria and Aakman, you’ll more than likely be staying inside the Manshuams. Otherwise, the most effective spots to grind remain to be Fogan’s and Gahaz Bandit Lair simply because of the lack of relying on a RNG for your loot. As well as how fast you can kill the monsters and how spaced out or grouped up they are in the areas. The last thing to note is that the efficiency of how you farm in certain places may depend on the class you play due to the abilities that make up each specific class.

Conclusion

Finding a good spot to grind at can be hard for newer players, especially when seeing how vast the world of Black Desert Online can be. Hopefully, this guide has helped you decide where the best places to grind are and have given you the knowledge of what you should farm to make the most money and get the most experience possible. Remember that results may vary depending on your class and how well you do when dealing with the RNG as well as how many people you have to compete with. Good luck on your adventures and happy grinding out in the world!