So Etrian Odyssey 4 came out, for everyone who’s into long and complicated Japanese RPGs where you have to draw your own map. Like me!
It has a feature where you can use the 3DS camera to scan promotional QR codes and get free gear and extra sidequests. Naturally, the people who pay attention to Facebook and Twitter are kindly compiling all the codes they find in a forum thread, for people who don’t pay attention to such things. Like me!
Anyway, click the pic to get there. You’ll have to browse the whole thread, as the first post isn’t fully updated. You will also have to bookmark the page, since the quest codes don’t scan until you get to the part of the game where they’re relevant. Or you could just come back here and click the pic again, I guess!
Minimum Safe Distance 
I never got into the first one, the mapping was fine, I just couldn’t stand needing to grind the first level to even scrape by on the second.
The newer ones seem much better in that regard. In III I hardly had to grind at all, so long as I was thorough, and IV has been similar. Mapping everything and doing all the sidequests available has kept me in just enough XP to where it’s challenging, but not punishing.