YearZeroNIN: When starting new characters, you have to pick your battles, running from ones that take too many HP. But I found once you get to, say, level 12, go to Atlantium. Outside of that town, there is a fountain (or whatever it's called) that increases your party's attributes to 100. It's located a few squares west of the town. This only lasts for one encounter, but you can go back and re-boost and then go back to killing Water or Air Elementals. When your speed is 100, you can kill them before they get a chance to kill you. 45,000 exp. per encounter. That's a lot for low-level chars.
Now for more advanced characters, area E2 offers some encounters that give millions of exp. points. Similar, also, in levels below Castle Pinehurst and Castle Hillstone. If I recall correctly, the other two main castles, Woodhaven and Luxus Palace Royale, didn't offer same amount of exp. points underneath. Also, the ancient Dragon's Dominion also offers good exp. (for example, you can kill a couple ancient dragons resulting in 2.5 million each encounter). What I found was you can hang in some of these massive encounters that involve 200+ monsters with the MaxHP potions and then Divine Intervention. Hit Points are vital to last in these encounters and to last a long time so you don't have to go to town frequently (except to collect what to do with items). I found the maximum HP is a little over 65,000. The thing, though, is you go back to base levels, if you rest, so I just don't rest (unless have to) and then not use spell points much. CTRL-A does the trick in most huge encounters.
It's also quite possible to win that one Cuisinart encounter with a party of level 1 characters and some easily recruitable characters, provided you know the game well enough and use some of the tricks the game offers, including the use of fountains and hireling spells. This gives you enough experience to level up into the 20s.
Then again, under these situations it's not that hard to recruit Mr. Wizard, especially since there is a rather convenient fountain (or something that acts like a fountain) right next to where the fight takes place.
Note that Max HP potions can be enchanted to significantly increase the amount of HP they give; a Max HP Potion +5 gives the character 1792 extra Max HP with each usage. Recharge Item can be cast to get more uses out of the same potion. (Note that I've never had an item break from those spells; just be careful not to go past +62, and not to go past 255 charges.)
By the way, if you're going to Ctrl-A huge encounters, make sure that you turn off the sound before hand. The game's sound effects slow things down, as the game has to wait for every one to play, and IIRC you can't change the setting during combat.
