Assassin’s Creed Shadows is still an open-world RPG at heart. It has some new features like Scouts and two protagonists, but you will still be leveling up, investing points into skill trees, and getting better gear over the course of this adventure. There are a few wrinkles here, such as Naoe and Yasuke each having their own unique skill trees and Knowledge Points acting as a progression gate, but your main concern will still be gettin XP as fast as possible to boost your stats. There are a ton of things to do in Assassin’s Creed Shadows, but not all give XP equally. If you want to power level your characters fast, here are the best ways to earn XP.
Best ways to earn XP
Assassin’s Creed Shadows makes it somewhat easy to know what is in it for you to do each specific task. When you highlight any objective on the map, you will see the XP rewarded alongside any other items or gear. That’s a good place to start, but it doesn’t tell the entire story since some tasks can be done very quickly and others might take the better part of an hour.
The best way to earn XP is to target the high-value castles. These can have 3,000XP or more up for grabs, alongside some top-tier loot. You want to find the bigger ones, which do take longer but are still worth the effort. For one, that huge XP gain at the end is hard to beat for the amount of time, but you will also typically be taking out several high-level enemies as part of the objective. Each of these can be worth 250 XP on their own, not to mention the trickle of XP you get taking out the normal grunts. Plus, these castles are packed with treasures for extra gear, Mon, and supplies. One good castle can take 30 minutes to an hour depending on if you’re going for stealth or not, but you can easily walk away with 5,000 XP or more.
Main missions are not the best source of raw XP compared to some other games, but they tend to be worth at least 1,000 to 2,000 XP and can be quite brief. We don’t suggest skipping the cutscenes, but if you don’t count them, then the time investment is pretty good for the value. You will have to do them regardless, so don’t avoid them unless you find yourself underleveled for the next one.
Shrines don’t seem like a great XP source, but because you can knock them out in 5 minutes or so, making them a great value for your time. Besides also being the way to get Knowledge Points, they all have non-combat objectives like collecting scrolls or praying at shrines. Once you spot the places you need to go, you can complete them in no time for some easy XP.
The more characters you meet along the journey, the more side objectives will open up related to them. These are the main side quests of the game and range in XP and length, so you may want to be a bit selective in which you take. Without spoiling much, there is one related to taking out a group of ronin that is essentially a list of targets to assassinate for easy XP that is worth completing.
Finally, there are always contracts. Once you unlock and set up some Kakurega, you can find a box with optional contracts to take. There’s no reason not to accept them all just to have, but they tend to stick to the low 1,000s in terms of XP and mainly are a way to get a ton of resources. Still, they’re usually quick and far more XP than you can get just mindlessly exploring and fighting.
