Secrets of Grindea: A Completely Viable Arcade Mode Build

This build is the one I, and my friends, use for most of our arcade mode runs. It’s the culmination of a lot of trial and error and playing around with different potions, perks, perk orders, curses, blessings, items & play-styles with all of us contributing different ideas & Strategies. It is, by far, the most consistently good build we’ve come across in our arcade mode playing.

It’s fully capable of beating the true ending and getting an S-Rank on every floor up to, and including, Mt. Bloom (I haven’t bothered getting floor S-Ranks beyond that yet) and is theoretically viable for every floor if you have enough patience or skill.

It works for achievement hunting, no-hit runs, quests, challenges and everything else I can think of on both normal-mode and hard-mode.

Before getting into the actual run, there are a few things you can do to set yourself up for success. These are the ones that I’ve found to work best, feel free to develop your own setup.

The perks I would recommend are:

Challenge Pins

Guarantees a pin will drop after a challenge room!

This one is good for a consistent flow of pins due to getting one guaranteed challenge room per floor.

Pins alone can absolutely make or break a run. The more you get, the more chances you have for something good so, the more, the merrier.

Lucky Pins

After every battle room, there’s a 5% chance of a pin spawning!

Same story as Challenge Pins, pins are good, get more.

Smart Start or Max HP % Boost

Max HP % Boost

A long term investment which will boost your MaxHP With 5%

Better than the regular MaxHP Boost Perk, this one is better for hard-mode when you want all the health you can get, and avoiding damage is much harder.

Smart Start

Start with an apprentice staff instead of just your good looks. Abra Cadabra!

This one is especially good for getting S-Ranks on the early floors before you get something better. The Two-Handed Wand does more knock back than the One-Handed wand you start with and does more damage allowing you to clear the early floors faster and more safely.
It’s not as good in the long run but it is nice to have early on if you’re trying to go hit-less, in which case Max HP % Boost would be useless anyways.
Use this one when you’re really trying not to get hit (Tip: you should be doing anyways) or are playing normal mode, where health doesn’t matter quite as much.

The potions I recommend are:

Lightning Potion

Spawns 4 thunder orbs! While recharging, using another pot adds 2 more. Refills moderately fast

Absolutely broken, best potion for arcade mode hands down.
The Issue is, it costs Golden Essence (Either 10 or 15 I don’t remember)
Golden Essence is the reward you get for reaching the end of the game for the second time onward. You get 1 on normal & 4 on hard. You can trade them after unlocking the priest in the bank, 1 golden essence for 40 regular essence (30,000 gold each if you buy the essence) which is a lot easier but still takes a while and you might as well do full runs because you get more from the reward at the end of one hard-mode run than you do trading for them with all the money you get from said hard-mode run

Power Potion

Increases ATK and MATK by 15% for 12 seconds. Refills quickly.

This is your next best option, and the one I recommend in your second potion slot. It works well with the Lightning Potion & is just good on its own.

Gale Potion

Increases your ASPD and CSPD by 15 for 18 seconds. Refills quickly

Good for if you want to play on the front lines and aid your minions from right beside them.

Wealth Potion

Increases gold dropped by enemies you defeat by 60% for 20 seconds. Refills moderately fast.
If you’re not using one of the other potions or want to play more passive, this one is good for letting your minions get you rich so you can buy even more drip from the merchants (Or just gamble more).

Curses & Blessings are pretty subjective depending on what you’re trying to do, these are my personal recommendations.

The minimum score percentage required to get achievements is 70%

The minimum score percentage required to get the true ending is 100%

Time Crystal (-15% Score)
Start with a time crystal, which lets you retry a floor once.

(In my experience) This extremely helpful for hard-mode because you not only get another try, but you approach your second run already knowing whats in all of the rooms and the layout of the floor. (Chests & things like that are still randomized)

Better healing (-20% Score)
Health orbs heal for twice as much.

This skill works really well with Max HP % Boost and is best used on hard-mode runs when avoiding damage is not something you can do consistently, unless you’re insane at this game, which I am not.

More Loods! (-10% Score)
Increases the spawn chance of loods by 30%.

Loods Can provide some extremely nice bonuses like extra pins, health potions, talent orbs and straight up CASH. Having more of them is nice.

These are some nice bonuses but what if you want score? Well I have the answer for you! Curses!!!

More Elites (+25% Score)
Every room will have a guaranteed elite enemy.

This one isn’t too bad because it only guarantees one enemy to be elite, so if a room already has an elite spawn, it may not add any additional ones, plus it doesn’t effect special rooms or boss rooms (To the best of my memory at least).

Big Brothers (+20% Score)
In most regular rooms there will be an enemy from a higher floor

On top of not even being guaranteed to spawn a higher tier enemy, it’s just a regular enemy most of the time. Monsters don’t get too much stronger from floor-to-floor so fighting them one floor lower isn’t much trouble.

My preferred Curses/Blssings are:

• Time Crystal
• More Loods!
• More Elites

This fills up your 3 curse/blessing slots but maintains a 100% Score Multiplier. It gives you extra loods and an extra try in case you die. In exchange, there’s at least 1 elite enemy per room and slightly more on average.

There are only a few skills worth using with this build, the rest are used to buff Elemental Specialist, which grants a moderate damage boost when you put enough points in same-type skills

Frosty Friend

Summon a snow creature to help you fight against your enemies!

This is your main skill and the crux of this build. As one of two summons, and the only one with active abilities, it should be your main skill focus. Don’t forget to use its abilities, they do provide a huge boost to your overall damage output, especially the smash ability it unlocks at max charge.

Cloud Strike

Summon a lightning cloud companion to assist you in battle!

This is the other main skill of this build. It lacks the active abilities of the Frosty Friend but provides damage and can kill bees while they’re flying. The damage is good and having more passive damage while being able to shield is very useful.

Barrier

Create a barrier that protects you or a friend against enemy attacks.

Barrier is always great to have. If you feel the need for some damage reduction, put Silver Points into this after getting Frosty Friend up to level 5, otherwise get it after both main skills are at level 5. If playing alone, taking this is super useful but not necessary, if playing with friends, at least one person should absolutely have this.

Reaper’s Blade

Creates a blade above the target. It gains power from damage dealt, and strikes down after a few seconds.

Reaper’s Blade is another very good support skill, although not to the same degree as Barrier. A very solid option for supporting other players or playing more passively and letting your minions do all of the work.

The rest of the skills are mostly just here to buff Elemental Specialist

Ice Spikes

Unleash rows of ice spikes, piercing enemies in its path, slowing them with a chance to freeze.

This is one of the better skills in this category and probably the main one worth using besides Ice Nova because they both have knock-back and some damage.

Ice Nova

Utility spell that damages and slows enemies around you, with a chance of freezing them.

The other skill in the Ice Element category. Somewhat worth using for protecting yourself with knock-back because it hits all around you.

Chain Lightning

Create a surge of lightning which will bounce between enemies, dealing damage to each one.

This Skill provides some damage and auto-targets enemies. This is probably the only other skill, besides Ice Spikes, that is actually worth using if you want to play more of a spell-caster.

Static Touch

Charge yourself up with electricity, making you deal additional damage with your physical attacks!

This skill is completely useless, only there to buff Elemental Specialist. It’s likely you won’t even have enough points to get it unless you get an extra level from a gambling room or something like that.

This is the order I recommend for standard play, pick up Barrier or Reaper’s Blade if and/or when you feel works best for you or your party.

• Frosty Friend To Level 1
• Cloud Strike To Level 1 (Just to have both by level 2)
• Max Frosty Friend
• Max Cloud Strike (Likely won’t reach max level in regular run)
• Ice Spikes
• Ice Nova
• Chain Lightning
• Static Touch (Likely Won’t Have Enough Points)

There are a few ways to build talents, either prioritizing damage or suitability. Like Skills, I will list notable talents, then the order I recommend to build them

Wand Master

Increases the damage dealt by your wand projectiles by 15% per Talent Level.

Since this is a magic build, you’ll always be using a wand, so boosting the damage of this one thing will make you do considerably more damage overall.

Arcane Collar

Decreases the EP cost of summons by 4% per Talent Level.

This skill is a given, with this build being summon focused. It’s pretty much necessary if you want to cast any spells besides your minions.

Intelligence

Increases MATK by 2% per Talent Level.

Self explainitory, having more magic attack means having more damage. Buffing magic attack will make this build perform much better, especially since it’s a percent increase, it will scale well too.

Elemental Specialist

Increases spell damage by 0.15% (per Talent Level) for every skill point spent on the same element.

This perk is one of the most important for this build, and the reason you build so many extra skills. The damage boost is significant, we take it later than Intelligence because it scales better but starts off worse. (Assuming max level, 0.75% damage per point, max level Frosty Friend W/ Ice Spikes & Ice Nova at level 5, that is a 15% damage increase for ice element spells)

Adaptable

Increases ATK and MATK by 1% per Talent Level

More damage is always good, even in what small amounts we can get it.

Endurance

Increases MaxEP by 3 per Talent Level.

This one is pretty important for casting spells while having summons active.

Tenacious

Increases MaxHP by 2% per Talent Level.

This one is good for hard-mode or if you find taking too much damage to be a problem.

Health Insurance

The HP gain from picking up Health Orbs is increased by 10% per Talent Level.

This skill is also good for hard-mode and works well with Tenacious. It’s also extremely effective in conjunction with the Better Healing blessing, the two combined almost guarantee a full heal with every orb.

Lady Luck

Gain a 2% chance per Talent Level to dodge an attack that would otherwise hit.

This one is a bit of a gamble but it can and will save you from the occasional attack. It’s especially useful if you get hit often or need just a bit more resilience to survive some encounters.

Alchemist

Increases the rate at which your potions refil by 5% per Talent Level.

This talent is great if you have the Lightning Potion and even more so if you also have the Golden Potion Flasks.

Knowledge Is Power

Increases your ATK by 5% (per Talent Level) of your MATK.

This skill is good for a more balanced build. Sometimes you get a pin or item that buffs ATK build options while preserving MATK, this is good for those situations.

Surgeon

Increases Crit Chance by 3% per Talent Level.

This is a good choice overall because summons can crit, but it’s especially good if you find the basic-attack pin that makes your wand projectiles count as melee attacks.

Some other viable options

• Shield Bearer (Move Faster While Shielded)
• Brutality (More Crit Damage)
• Metabolism (Faster EP Regen For More Sell Casting)
• Arcane Charge (More Basic-Attack Damage After Spells, For Melee Builds & The Like)
• Soul Eater (Wand Projectile Hits Recover EP, More Rapid Spellcasting)

This is the order I recommend for certain things but finding the order that works best for you, the proper balance between damage and survivability/sustainability, is the ultimate goal. Everyone plays differently.

• Wand Master
• Arcane Collar
• Intelligence
• Elemental Specialist
• Adaptable
• Lady Luck
• Alchemist
• Endurance
• Surgeon
• Soul Eater

• Wand Master
• Arcane Collar
• Intelligence
• Tenacious
• Health Insurance
• Elemental Specialist
• Lady Luck
• Endurance
• Alchemist
• Adaptable

I hope this build works well for you. I’ve found builds to be surprisingly sparse, and in some cases, outdated. With the release of 1.0, I wanted to share the build that made arcade mode tolerable for myself and my friends. It can feel mind numbing or tedious, running up the same mountain over and over, but it can also be really fun and give a great sense of accomplishment. Hopefully this build will give you a route to explore the more fun elements of arcade mode. Remember not to take any of this too seriously, games are meant to be fun.