Going back to the past and playing one of the first RPGs ever to come out in the US where you spend at least 80% of the game pure grinding because you HAVE TO in order to have a snowball's chance in Hell against big bad. I'm talking about Dragon Warrior on the NES. Not the watered down joke Gameboy remake, the original one. Leveling up at the "Scorpion's Nest" to the south of the start. It's like Dragon Warrior's answer to the infamous "Power Peninsula / Peninsula Northeast of Provoka" from Final Fantasy 1.
So instead of me at level 4 rocking the Club against Slimes, Red Slimes and Drakees, I take a risk and against the mountains I get to fight Magicians, Magidrakees and Scoprions. Basically, the first set of enemies only give 1-2 EXP and 1-2 Gold per kill. The second set I have to rely on Hurt, since my Club only does like 1 damage to them. The problem is I only have 14 MP at level 4, so I can only go 2-3 battles before I'm out of Hurt spells and need to run back to Tantegel Castle to refill. Pretty much, I do this and get 4-6 EXP a kill and 9-15 Gold per kill. At level 5, I can push it to 3-4 fights since my Copper Sword can be used to save MP (although I use more from healing myself if I get blasted by a 10 HP damage Hurt).
Anyway, my plan is to buy a Large Shield, rack up 1500 Gold, make it to Rimuldar, buy a Broad Sword and fight around there until I have 3000 Gold for Full Plate. I should be level 10 when all of this is done, provided I don't die.