Starting RE:AOPG can be a little overwhelming. There are fruits, Haki, fighting styles, races, quests, accessories, raids, different seas, stat grinding, and a ridiculous number of NPCs scattered around the map.
If you don’t already know what you’re doing, it’s very easy to spend your early resources on something that barely helps you.
So, rather than throwing a giant list of items at you, let’s go through the progression in the order that actually makes sense. I’ll cover what to do immediately after starting, which upgrades are worth buying, how to get Dark V2, where to farm stats, when to move to the Second Sea, and eventually what kind of weapons, support styles, accessories and races you should be looking toward.
The main idea is simple: get your foundation right first, then worry about the fancy end-game stuff.
RE:AOPG Starter Guide – Best Fruits, Haki, Builds
Before you start grinding anything, redeem all of the currently available codes.
This should always be your first step because the codes can give you a massive amount of resources that would otherwise take a long time to farm.
The rewards mentioned in the guide include things such as:
- Belly
- Gems
- Ponyglyphs
- Extra inventory space
- XP Tickets
- Temporary 2x Luck
- Additional rewards from individual codes
The exact rewards can change as codes are added or removed, so make sure you’re using the currently active codes rather than relying on an old list.
You should also join the game’s group and claim the group reward.
The group reward mentioned in the guide includes:
- 15,000 Gems
- 30 Title Spins
- 500,000 Belly
That’s an enormous boost for a fresh account.
Why Ponyglyphs Are Important
Don’t immediately dismiss Ponyglyphs as another random currency.
They are particularly useful because they can increase your Gem capacity.
This matters because once you’ve used the codes, you’ll have far more Gems than a brand-new account normally has. If your capacity is too low, you won’t be able to comfortably hold all of those Gems.
So, increasing your Gem cap should be one of your early priorities.
Upgrade Your Quest Capacity First
Once you’ve collected your free resources, head over to Starter Island.
One of the first NPCs you should look for is the one responsible for upgrading your quest capacity.
This is one of those upgrades that doesn’t look particularly exciting, but it will save you a ridiculous amount of time later.
Instead of being limited to just one or two quests, you can eventually hold several at once.
The guide mentions getting the capacity up to around five quests.
That’s what you want to work toward.
Buy and Use the Quest Scrolls
Once you’ve unlocked the ability to carry additional quests, you’ll need the appropriate Quest Scrolls.
The important thing to understand is that you don’t simply buy the scrolls and instantly have every quest slot active.
You need to go into your inventory and use the scrolls individually.
Once you’ve used them, you’ll be able to take multiple quests at the same time.
It may feel slightly annoying having to activate them manually, but it’s absolutely worth doing early.
Being able to stack quests means you can travel to an area, accept several objectives and complete them together instead of constantly going back to an NPC.
Get Ignous Helmet and Stone Gauntlets
Your next early purchases should come from the Gem Shop.
The guide specifically recommends:
- Ignous Helmet
- Stone Gauntlets
You don’t need to waste your early Gems buying every item in the shop.
Focus on these useful pieces first.
They’re particularly helpful because you’re going to be spending a lot of time farming, and having better stats early makes everything feel considerably smoother.
Once you’ve got the important gear, you can stop worrying about filling every inventory slot with random accessories.
Get Black Leg / Flame-Style Fighting Upgrade
After sorting out your quests and basic gear, head back to Starter Island and find the NPC who teaches the fighting style referred to in the guide as Black Leg.
The naming can be a little confusing because the transcript refers to the style in a few different ways, but the important part is the progression.
The first version costs around 500,000 Belly.
Buy it, equip it, and then speak to the NPC again.
The upgraded version costs around 20 million Belly and gives you the stronger version using both legs.
That might sound expensive at first, but the earlier code rewards make this much easier to afford.
Why This Fighting Style Is Worth Getting
You might be thinking, “Why should I spend 20 million on a fighting style when I could just use a good fruit?”
Because you might not roll a good fruit.
Having a reliable melee option means you’re not completely dependent on RNG.
The upgraded version also provides useful mobility and, according to the guide, gives a 20% global damage buff.
So even if your long-term plan is to build around a fruit, this is still a worthwhile early investment.
Buy the Island Tracker
The Island Tracker is probably one of the best quality-of-life purchases you can make early on.
You’ll find the relevant NPC around Starter Island, near the area shown in the guide, and the tracker costs roughly 50,000 Belly.
Buy it.
Seriously.
Unless you’ve memorized the entire RE:AOPG map, you’ll save yourself a lot of frustration with this thing.
The tracker points you toward the island you’re trying to reach, so instead of sailing around wondering where Rogue Town, Drum Island or another location is, you can simply follow the marker.
As the game opens up and you’re traveling between different seas, this becomes even more useful.
Roll for Dark and Awaken It
Once you’ve got the basic Starter Island setup sorted out, your next major target should be Dark Fruit.
The guide recommends Dark because it is extremely useful for grinding, particularly once you’ve upgraded it to Dark V2.
The stated awakening cost is around 18,000 Gems, which should be achievable relatively early if you’ve properly redeemed the codes.
Why Dark V2 Is So Good for Grinding
Dark V2 has a very useful F move with a large AoE.
That’s exactly what you want when you’re farming groups of NPCs.
Instead of chasing enemies around individually, you can stand in a good position and repeatedly hit multiple targets.
You don’t necessarily need to fully optimize every part of the fruit immediately, either.
The guide specifically points out that awakening the F move is particularly useful because it provides flight.
So if you’re primarily interested in getting a strong movement option and farming tool, that’s an important early awakening target.
What If You Don’t Get Dark?
If your fruit rolls don’t give you Dark, don’t panic.
You can continue progressing and use another decent fruit in the meantime.
Okuchi is another fruit mentioned as a good option, including for beginners.
The important thing is not to stop your entire progression because you didn’t get one specific fruit.
Use what you have, keep farming, and reroll when you can afford to.
Head to Drum Island for Easy Money
Once you’ve got your basic setup, Drum Island becomes an important farming location.
The guide mentions a temporary 2x Belly event, which makes this area especially valuable when that event is active.
The Snowman NPCs are relatively weak but give a huge amount of money compared with their difficulty.
The stated reward is around:
10 billion Belly per NPC normally
and during the 2x Belly event:
20 billion Belly per NPC.
Obviously, event bonuses can change, so treat the 2x value as event-dependent rather than something permanently guaranteed.
Either way, this is a fantastic place to build up your Belly.
Turn On Autofill Quest Slots
If your current version of RE:AOPG still has the setting, look for Autofill Quest Slots in the settings menu.
This is another small quality-of-life feature that can make grinding much smoother.
Instead of manually filling every quest slot, the game can automatically handle the available quests for you.
When you’re farming for a long period, little conveniences like this make a surprisingly big difference.
Farm Stats at Ice Island
Once you’ve purchased your basic equipment and have a reliable farming fruit, it’s time to start working on your stats.
The guide recommends Ice Island as an early stat-farming location.
The idea is simple:
- Accept the appropriate quest.
- Travel to the NPCs.
- Use Dark V2’s large AoE.
- Clear the enemies repeatedly.
- Keep stacking stats.
The guide recommends focusing on the second quest because those enemies are closer together, making the farming route more convenient.
Dark V2 Makes This Much Easier
This is where Dark V2 really starts showing its value.
Because the F move has a large AoE, you can clear groups of enemies without constantly moving around.
If you’ve got auto-skills available in your settings, you can also use them to make longer grinding sessions less tedious.
The goal at this stage is to build your stats rather than constantly changing your equipment.
According to the progression shown in the guide, you should aim for roughly 1,000 stats in each relevant category before moving on.
Increase Your Gem Cap
After you’ve started accumulating Gems from codes and farming, make sure your Gem Cap isn’t holding you back.
Travel to New Alabasta and find the Poneglyph Merchant.
Use your Ponyglyphs there to increase your Gem capacity.
The guide mentions reaching a cap around 110,000, depending on the upgrades you’ve purchased and the Ponyglyphs you’ve collected.
There’s also an important detail here: you may need to retain at least one Ponyglyph rather than spending every single one.
So don’t automatically dump your entire collection into the merchant without checking what the game currently requires.
Get Haki at New Alabasta
While you’re around New Alabasta, you can also pick up the basic Haki-related progression.
The guide points to an NPC located behind the island, around the tall rocks and tower area.
You need approximately 700,000 Belly for the relevant purchase.
This is another reason why farming Drum Island first is useful.
Once you’ve got your money, travel to the tower area and speak to the NPC.
The reward includes another 20% damage buff, making it a worthwhile upgrade before you start pushing into harder content.
Choose Your Race Carefully
Once you’ve got the important purchases out of the way, you can use your remaining Gems for race rolls.
The guide highlights several strong choices.
Slime
Slime is presented as one of the strongest rollable races, with around a 2.3x global damage buff according to the guide.
That’s a huge increase and makes it one of the races worth aiming for.
Shanden
Shanden is another strong option, providing approximately a 2x global damage buff.
If you don’t hit Slime, this is another race worth considering.
Buccaneer and Heavenly
The guide also lists Buccaneer and Heavenly as strong options, with approximately 1.5x global damage.
They’re not as strong as the top choices mentioned above, but they’re still useful.
What About Hybrid?
The guide specifically warns against choosing Hybrid if your main goal is maximizing global damage because it doesn’t provide the same damage bonus.
So if you’re rolling specifically for damage, keep that in mind.
Other races such as Lunatrix, Santa and Sorcerer can provide useful bonuses as well, but they’re not considered the top damage choices in the guide.
Move to the Second Sea at Around 1,000 Stats
Once you’ve reached roughly 1,000 stats across your relevant categories, you’re ready to start looking toward the Second Sea.
Don’t rush this.
Make sure you actually have a farming setup capable of handling the content first.
The game becomes considerably more manageable when you arrive in the next sea with decent stats, a useful fruit and the basic upgrades already completed.
How to Unlock the Second Sea
The Second Sea progression requires you to complete the relevant requirements, including the Law Raid.
The guide states that you need approximately 5,000 total stats and need to clear the Law Raid.
The raid is located at Teleport Island in the First Sea.
It’s a relatively straightforward raid with around 30 waves, and the guide notes that Dark V2 can handle it solo.
Once you’ve completed the required content, you can speak to the appropriate NPC and travel to the Second Sea.
Second Sea Stat Farming – Sola Prison
Once you arrive in the Second Sea, your main stat-farming destination becomes Sola Prison.
This is where the guide recommends doing your next major grind.
The quest there provides a large amount of XP, and the progression shown suggests you can go from roughly 1,000 stats to around 12,000 stats in about 32 minutes under the demonstrated conditions.
Obviously, your exact time will depend on your build, damage and current game balance.
Having Trouble Surviving?
There’s a simple trick if you’re not strong enough to comfortably tank the NPCs.
Get onto a higher position where the enemies can’t easily reach you.
From there, use your abilities to attack them safely.
With Dark V2, you can take advantage of your large AoE and repeatedly hit groups of enemies without standing directly in the middle of them.
It’s not glamorous, but it works.
What to Do After Reaching Max Stats
Once you’ve reached max stats, the game changes.
You no longer need to spend all your time just trying to increase your basic numbers.
Now you can start collecting the gear that will eventually form your real build.
This is where things like:
- Better fruits
- Fighting styles
- Swords
- Support styles
- Artifacts
- Accessories
- Titles
- Races
- Haki upgrades
start becoming much more important.
Okuchi – A Strong Damage Fruit
If you’re looking for a strong rollable fruit after getting your basic progression sorted out, the guide recommends Okuchi.
It’s particularly good for raw damage.
The main downside is that it doesn’t have the same kind of AoE efficiency that Dark V2 offers.
So there’s an important distinction:
Dark V2 = excellent grinding utility and AoE
Okuchi = stronger raw damage potential
Which one you prefer depends on what you’re doing.
For general farming, keeping Dark V2 can still be incredibly useful even after you have access to stronger damage fruits.
Wukong Fighting Style
Another fighting style worth looking into later is Wukong.
The guide describes Wukong as particularly strong for beginners and mentions using four Wukong Scrolls to maximize its damage.
Its Y move is also highlighted as providing around a 2.63x buff.
This is more of a later progression target than something you need to obsess over when you first start.
Get your basic setup working first.
Then start collecting the materials for Wukong when you’re ready to optimize your damage.
Start Farming Artifacts
Once you’re strong enough to comfortably handle raids, start looking into Artifact Chests.
The guide points toward the Summer Raid as one of the places to farm them.
Run the raid repeatedly and collect the chests.
Artifacts can become an important part of your later build, so don’t ignore them just because your current accessories are already good enough.
Get a Good Support Style
At this stage, you can also start working on support styles.
The guide recommends looking into options such as:
- Goku support style
- Reincarnated Slime
- World Above Heaven
These aren’t necessarily things you need immediately.
They’re part of the transition from “I can farm” to “I’ve actually built a strong end-game character.”
If you’re unsure what to farm next, pick one target at a time.
Trying to collect five different rare items simultaneously is a great way to make the game feel like work.
Best Swords to Work Toward
For sword builds, the guide recommends focusing on Twilight or Zongetsu.
These are more suitable for players who want to specialize in sword damage rather than running a pure fruit setup.
How to Start the Twilight Questline
Go to Rogue Island and speak with Dio.
This starts the Twilight questline.
The requirements mentioned include:
- Around 30,000 Gems
- Strongest Swordsman title
- Clearing the Mihawk-related raid/dungeon multiple times
The guide mentions completing the relevant Mihawk content around six times.
Because requirements can change with updates, check the current quest text in-game before farming for hours based solely on an old requirement.
How to Get Zongetsu
Zongetsu has its own progression.
The guide states that the sword can originally drop from the relevant Zongetsu boss at around a 5% chance.
Once you’ve obtained the sword, you’ll need to continue the questline to unlock its abilities.
Part of that process involves collecting five souls.
The guide gives the soul spawn chance as roughly 50% every five minutes.
There’s also a mask requirement, with the guide estimating around a 30% chance for the relevant drop.
Again, these numbers are worth verifying in-game if you’re following this after an update, but the overall progression remains the same: obtain the sword, find the NPC, gather the required materials and unlock the moves.
Don’t Forget Conqueror Haki
If you’re serious about end-game progression, Conqueror Haki is another major target.
The guide describes it as one of the more difficult Haki upgrades to obtain.
You’ll need to travel to the Arena and repeatedly defeat the relevant NPC.
The location can be found using your Island Tracker.
The frustrating part is the RNG.
Some players may get it quickly, while others can spend hours farming it. The creator mentions leaving the game farming overnight before eventually getting it.
So don’t compare your luck with someone else’s.
If you don’t get it immediately, that doesn’t mean you’re doing something wrong.
Haki V2 and V3 Progression
For the stronger Haki upgrades, you’ll need to complete additional quests across different islands.
The Armament Haki progression includes defeating various pirate NPCs, including:
- Dark Stash
- Experienced Pirates
- Scythe
- Rookie Pirates
One portion requires defeating 100 enemies, which can take a while because some of the NPCs have relatively slow respawn times.
The trick here is to use Dark V2’s AoE.
Find a position where the enemies spawn nearby, activate your strongest AoE abilities, and let the enemies respawn while you continue farming.
Observation Haki V2
Observation Haki V2 has its own questline, including defeating NPCs around Rune Kingdom and later areas.
The guide shows the quest marking enemies with exclamation points, which makes this particular progression easier to follow than some of the older quests.
You may need to defeat specific NPC groups and then return to the trainer.
The exact requirements can vary, so always read the quest instructions carefully.
King’s Haki
Eventually, you’ll want to work toward King’s Haki.
The guide points to Skull Island and an NPC named Andre.
This is not a quick unlock.
You’re required to travel between the First and Second Seas and defeat several major enemies.
The guide lists:
- Big Mom
- Shanks
- Kaido
- Blackbeard
You’ll need to complete the relevant encounters multiple times — specifically around three times each according to the guide.
Once you’ve finished those requirements, return to Andre to complete the progression.
It’s a long quest, so I’d recommend doing it once you’re already strong enough to clear the raids efficiently.
Weapon Progression – Open Weapon Chests
For your gun or ranged weapon, don’t overcomplicate things early.
Start opening Weapon Chests.
They can give you useful weapons and are a good way to gradually improve your ranged setup while you’re working on the rest of your character.
The guide specifically recommends working toward Frost Bazooka, which is considered stronger than Cupid Bow in the progression shown.
Get Pinpoint From Artifact Chests
Pinpoint is another item worth working toward.
The guide places it in Artifact Chests, so once you’ve started farming the Summer Raid and collecting those chests, you have another reason to keep opening them.
This is a good example of why you shouldn’t treat every raid as only being about its main boss.
The chests can contain useful progression items too.
Gold Raid and Heist Gear
The Gold Raid becomes increasingly important as you move into higher-level content.
The guide describes different versions depending on the sea, with stronger versions becoming available as you progress.
The general idea is to farm the Gold Raid for better equipment and eventually work toward the stronger Heist gear.
You won’t be able to access every version immediately, so don’t worry about trying to collect the best possible version from the beginning.
Progress through the seas first.
Best Accessories for Melee Builds
Once you’re approaching an end-game melee setup, the recommended accessories include:
- Awakened Vampire Top
- Awakened Vampire Bottom
- Napoleon Hat
- Golden Rings
- Withered Cape
- Supporter High Suit
The guide places the Awakened Vampire pieces around the purple portal at Dawn Island in the Multiverse Sea.
These are much later goals, so don’t worry if you can’t obtain them early.
Your first priority should always be building a character capable of farming the content that drops them.
Best Accessories for Sword Builds
For sword-focused players, the recommended end-game accessories include:
- Death Top
- Death Bottom
- Death Cape
- Scaled Gauntlet
- Red Hair
- Straw Hat
- Sword and Heist Suit
The Death pieces come from the Death Raid, while the Scaled Gauntlet is associated with the Golden Pirate Gacha or accessory chests.
Again, don’t try to collect everything simultaneously.
Pick the pieces that fit your build and farm them one by one.
Free-to-Play Accessory Options
If you’re trying to build your character without relying on expensive or difficult-to-obtain gear, there are also several free-to-play-friendly options mentioned in the guide.
The standout recommendation is the Midas Suit.
Other useful options include:
- Golden Rings
- Golden Shades
- Toro Top
- Toro Bottom
- LOD Cape
The guide says the LOD Cape can come from Accessory Chests.
If you can’t get the recommended Gillosaur top and bottom pieces, the suggested replacement is Final Magma Top and Bottom.
These alternatives are useful because you don’t need to stop your entire build just because you’re missing one rare accessory.