Might and Magic X

The role-playing games (I-X) that started it all and the various spin-offs (including Dark Messiah).
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Kalah
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Unread postby Kalah » 10 Mar 2014, 11:29

As this is supposed to be a party-based game, wherein you combine the qualities of different party members, I don't think making any effort in making it easy to complete with any party should be a priority. Although I would not set up a main story where you need one specific type of spell to complete the game (thereby making it compulsory to use a specific hero type), the game just isn't supposed to work well with parties consisting of the same hero type.
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Unread postby Tress » 10 Mar 2014, 11:58

What I more meant is that as party game, it is by design supposed to have member to fill various roles. As more visible example are modern MMO's . For example unless you outlevel instance there is no way to play by skipping archetypes of tank and healer. There are always more than one way to tank or heal but it's not like you are supposed to do so(unless difficulty is tuned way too low, or you out gear severely) with any tank or healer at all.(not that I haven't done that in wow in my time :P, but it was much harder than it supposed to be). Modern rpg (mmx) including dont really have compulsory need for some classes like classic RPG's used to have. For example I think mm4-5 is not doable without jump, levitate,teleport spells (well you can always remake party mid game to alleviate that in some way ,also sure there is "where to" mirror but you are not supposed to know those codes, for fair game). Or if we pick some other brands of game I think Eye of beholder series game are not really finish able without priest and mage in party(there are recruit able ones but there are alot of ways to cause game become unwinable (and that will be without you have broken thread of prophecy warning))

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Unread postby tolich » 10 Mar 2014, 19:28

Tress wrote:finishing older MM's (3-5) would hardly be possible with every party due to sheer need for some spells. which would block progress unless you have them.
No duh, I've finished WoX with Robber/Ranger team, and heard of solo Ranger. Coins, scrolls, and other magic items totally help.

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Unread postby phamlongtuan » 12 Mar 2014, 11:56

Tress wrote:
Well, suppose I went with a party like Crusader//Druid/Scout/Barbarian, which superficially looks like it ought to be fairly balanced. Are there any obvious problems? Anything I should be looking to pick up as far as skills/spells as quickly as possible?
Aside of lack of dark magic, which causes some problems(of debatable severity) like lack of whispering shadows and purge, there seems to be lack of heavy magic offense. Team seems to be extremelly meelee heavy and since many mobs are vunerable to two schools at best, going in with single pure caster like druid(who probably will work as healer/ support spell caster ) may cause some problems. I would probably switch scout for feee mage or shaman so there is bigger versatility of spells available. Druid doesn't make very good offensive caster due to lack of deep magic focus, and multitasking scout towards ranged/melee/caster will make him sub par due to lack of stat points.
You are wrong for druid role, i have one druid with nearly 600 mana, i only need to pump him with as many + water magic as possible and in level 50 of water magic. Liquid membrane from him make even deadliest attack like a joke. Tsunami (sometimes deal 1000 damage with critical) from him will keep push enemy away and away thus they deal close to zero damage to my party.

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Tress
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Unread postby Tress » 12 Mar 2014, 12:41

You are wrong for druid role, i have one druid with nearly 600 mana, i only need to pump him with as many + water magic as possible and in level 50 of water magic. Liquid membrane from him make even deadliest attack like a joke. Tsunami (sometimes deal 1000 damage with critical) from him will keep push enemy away and away thus they deal close to zero damage to my party.
Druid can nuke but he is weakest of all magic casters(mage and priest can gm focus, and shaman have innate crit increase, which leaves druid behind in damage numbers) in terms of assault spells. Sure my druid used tsunami at the end and was quite effective but he still have weakest assault capabilities.
First of all, I already mentioned that he will likely be support role(liquid membrane, stone skin, etc) which will consume first few rounds of combat , leaving party fend of with melee attacks without second caster. Also membrane is bugged , it absorbs more than it is supposed to, besides shaman can cast it as well.
Second and main problem with statement that
Tsunami (sometimes deal 1000 damage with critical)
is that it will deal 1300 for other classes with similar caliber spells, under similar builds.

I dont say that druid is bad class but as assault caster it is behind the other 3.

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Unread postby phamlongtuan » 12 Mar 2014, 14:34

Tress wrote:
You are wrong for druid role, i have one druid with nearly 600 mana, i only need to pump him with as many + water magic as possible and in level 50 of water magic. Liquid membrane from him make even deadliest attack like a joke. Tsunami (sometimes deal 1000 damage with critical) from him will keep push enemy away and away thus they deal close to zero damage to my party.
Druid can nuke but he is weakest of all magic casters(mage and priest can gm focus, and shaman have innate crit increase, which leaves druid behind in damage numbers) in terms of assault spells. Sure my druid used tsunami at the end and was quite effective but he still have weakest assault capabilities.
First of all, I already mentioned that he will likely be support role(liquid membrane, stone skin, etc) which will consume first few rounds of combat , leaving party fend of with melee attacks without second caster. Also membrane is bugged , it absorbs more than it is supposed to, besides shaman can cast it as well.
Second and main problem with statement that
Tsunami (sometimes deal 1000 damage with critical)
is that it will deal 1300 for other classes with similar caliber spells, under similar builds.

I dont say that druid is bad class but as assault caster it is behind the other 3.
I'm pretty sure that Druid make more valuable class in late game, of course if we exploit as many buffs as possible it will make this game so easy. My points are:

- Druid has huge mana pool, keep using strongest spell over and over
- My build will make him both damage dealer (pump + water magic) and support caster as well.
- Tsunami is AOE and has push back feature so in practical Druid will combo damage with other character (that is my point)

For example: I create a poison cloud in front of my party, when mob get in, they get poisoned, after that i push them back few grids, they keep coming and their HP keep being drained. When they get close, mellee does damage and they be pushed back again. It very safe tactical even with low HP team.

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Unread postby magritte2 » 14 Mar 2014, 23:20

Does Earth Ward work against poison--not poison spray spells but ordinary poison? If not, what are my options for protection? I'm in the 2nd level of the lost city and in this ambush I'm getting a couple of characters poisoned every round and even running regeneration, it's really difficult to make any headway.

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Unread postby Variol » 19 Mar 2014, 10:11

Kalah wrote:As this is supposed to be a party-based game, wherein you combine the qualities of different party members, I don't think making any effort in making it easy to complete with any party should be a priority. Although I would not set up a main story where you need one specific type of spell to complete the game (thereby making it compulsory to use a specific hero type), the game just isn't supposed to work well with parties consisting of the same hero type.
Well, I don't recall seeing any "warnings" in the character creation screens to say, "hey, you must have XXX class to get through the game". If that was the case, why give us 12 party types? And why both to put scrolls and potions into the game if the party can supply all of those needs????
Completely stupid and not well thought out on their part.

My 4 Warmongers are "the" best party I have had, but I cannot see in some dungeons and scrolls like light are too hard to find. Very frustrating.

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Unread postby Tress » 19 Mar 2014, 10:43

Well, I don't recall seeing any "warnings" in the character creation screens to say, "hey, you must have XXX class to get through the game". If that was the case, why give us 12 party types? And why both to put scrolls and potions into the game if the party can supply all of those needs????
Completely stupid and not well thought out on their part.
And you don't, but deliberately gimping party will make some fights extremely challenging(if possible). Same could be said for nearly any game with party configuration, that has at least some decent difficulty. If that wouldn't be the case, then game difficulty would be completely messed up and with half decent party you would steam roll. As I mentioned previously there are nearly no such hard coded game stopping encounters as classic RPGs used to have (Like EOB where priest and mage was mandatory, and they didn't had any warning either).

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Finished..

Unread postby SubEffect » 22 Mar 2014, 12:43

Well, it took me a while, but I finally finished. Minor spoilers here, just my final thoughts and some spell names..


I went through the game with a 'standard' party of a tank, damage dealer, buffer/healer, and a nuker. That being, specially, a crusader, bladedancer, druid, and freemage. I found this team to be fairly effective overall and I didn't feel like I was really missing anything. The druid was my main healer for most of the game with regeneration and finally nurture for the bigger fights. Later on, the crusader/paladin ended up being fairly helpful with healing as well, so I had two characters, one with resurrect (who was sometimes the last man standing - another good reason to have a paladin). I focused on air and fire magic early on for the freemage, even knowing that she coudn't max out in fire (fire seemed to be the less resisted type early on). Later, air/lightning was invaluable and I didn't really go down the dark magic path too much. I loved playing some of my favorite classes - I always use a druid and some type of holy warrior and a pure mage class. For me, the druid was probably one of my stronger characters. I didn't use him for damage dealing too often (I didn't even have tsunami until post-game).

Anyhow - overall a very fun game. It did make me feel like I was playing some of the older versions. I think I started M&M with III, with my favorites probably being VII and the combined IV/V World of Xeen. So for me, this was a good mix of those games, especially with some of the same sound effects and music. I played on Warrior mode which made it fairly challenging, but i can't say what the difference would have been on Normal mode. I feel things were fairly balanced and there were only a few times where I wanted to throw my mouse out the window - but rightly so as it was end-game (some battles/sequences were really tough to get through at the end).

For those just starting out - my original comments around reliance on potions and money to buy them proved to be less of a big deal later on. My druid was able to keep us healed enough through battles to rest after a while, so really the bulk of money spent was on supplies and sometimes a weapon or two if I wasn't finding upgrades enough. I ended the the game with around 250,000 gold and really didn't have anything to spend it on. I think the reliance on potions went away halfway through Act II. I'd only use them during long battles, but most certainly in Act IV since you end up fighting some very large battles with hordes of mobs.

So, kudos and thanks to Limbic/Ubi for bringing back this series! I think the recent editions of the M&M games have been quite good. I certainly hope there's a chance at an M&M XI. For me, now, it's probably back to Heroes VI and... well.. Dark Souls II :)
Currently playing:
MM Heroes VI
Dark Souls II (PS3)
Lightning Returns: Final Fantasy XIII (PS3)

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Unread postby Variol » 23 Mar 2014, 23:34

I have not completed the game yet. I keep trying different parties. I think my 4 Warmongers will take me to the end though.
I'm pretty close now. I'm on "Battle of Karthal".

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Unread postby Arret » 27 Mar 2014, 08:13

I went through it once with Bladedancer, Shaman, Runemage, and Freemage in Warrior Mode a while back.

It was really nice being able to see the elemental lords once again and the gameplay was solid, if unbalanced at times. The use of tile movement was done very well and there were even very well hidden items such as keys under beds. Combat was basically what I expected, although removing the speed mechanic and letting you choose battle order mid fight took out a lot of the challenge.

My major complaint was the inventory system. You are basically required to have the horse hireling for any decent size dungeon.

I also didn't like the whispering shadows mechanic. If you want to put traps up to test my stats then fine, but making sure a buff is up to even know the traps are there is weak. I actually had to restart the game at one point because I couldn't figure out how to get to an obvious switch behind a wall, even though I knew it was there. Bashing walls or even walking through walls (MM2 and MM5 Castle Kalindra) has always been the way through.

Looks like the game is balanced around 1 earth magic caster (rejuv/stoneskin/poison cloud) and 1 light magic caster(Heal, Celestial Armor, Rez, Heal Party). Everything else seems interchangeable. Light magic for burst healing and damage absorbtion and earth magic for HoT and stone skin.

Shaman promotion is the most OP thing in the entire game. It is just about impossible to run out of mana even casting aoe every turn. Earth magic is already an amazing school, and being able to mash GM level spells every round makes the entire game a joke. If I do the caster party achievement I'm tempted to make 3 shaman.

Freemage is completely useless. Dark is terrible (I think I only ever used whispering shadows from the school until mid act 3) and prime beyond expert is really only useful for implosion spamming (but the class doesn't have enough mana to do that) or hour of power boosting melee damage.

Runemage as a hybrid caster was interesting. I really never used the fire aside from burning determination. Light felt like a waste as I see the paladin already gets GM.

Bladedancer was nice, but really missed a lot of the utility skills that I would have expected. The cost in skill points becomes too much when you have to go for weapon and dual wield from the start.


Currently going through it with the 4 hybrid classes and wow...easymode. About to enter tomb of 1k terrors and haven't even had an annoying fight all game. Giving hybrids GM endurance was a major mistake. Paladin having GM light gives you everything you had with a caster based party only with hundreds more HP and actual melee attacks. The only things that are annoying is the lack of prime magic for dispel/identify/arcane ward/beacon and the lack of expert darkness for darkness ward/whispering shadows. Then again it just means spending a ton of gold on scrolls.

By locking down the promotion quests to only your current party it allows for some playability I wasn't expecting.

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Kalah
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Unread postby Kalah » 05 Apr 2014, 12:01

As we know, the deluxe box was not made available in the US. On Ebay, however, there are several opportunities, one of them being this seller from Canada, offering the deluxe edition for $50.
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Unread postby hellegennes » 05 Apr 2014, 14:50

Finished it today. It was quite fun. It was actually better than I hoped, there were only a few elements that I disliked.

The start of the game is pretty linear. I honestly dislike linearity. Might and Magic VI did it right, you could actually do anything from the very beginning. Legacy is far more linear up until around the middle of the game. It is more challenging to not be able to save during a battle or flee, but it makes the game linear because you cannot apply hit and run strategies or quick in and out, where you'd loot some and then return when you're stronger. You cannot fight enemies that are clearly above your level. It allows for other kind of strategies, though, so it's not a downer. It's just that it artificially increases difficulty and restricts gameplay.

The story was good but it could be better. It wasn't captivating. It felt as if it was a side story to something than a main one. Still, I like the numerous easter eggs and the way it tried to connect the two universes: the old and the new one. I felt that the details were much more enjoyable than the actual story. The side quests were also better than the main ones (in my opinion).

The gameplay, skill system and magic system were quite good. It could benefit from a little rebalancing though, because after the first 1/3 of the game, I found myself only putting points to one attribute for each character. That would be magic for casters and destiny for warriors. Vitality, perception and spirit don't do a lot if you amp mysticism and endurance; and ranged combat is weak. Shield is also redundant because most weapons are either two-handed or you benefit much more from having a dual wield of the same weapon type. Enemies simply don't do that much damage in order for shields to become a necessity; that is if you cast protective spells and have a strong healer.

After three fifths of the game, the rewards you get for killing enemies and finding treasure are not up to par. You also amass a lot of gold which you don't really need, because you don't have to pay for training and you don't need to buy stuff. This was especially evident in the DLC were all items dropped from monsters and treasure were useless.

The graphics are really pretty but the game requires a lot of horsepower to run. I don't know why that is; just pressing the save or load button turns my PC into a coal-burning machine. There is a delay of several seconds in turning the pages of the save-book, in deleting saves and for the confirmation dialog to appear, while the actual saving process is faster.

My overall impression was that it was a somewhat short (though longer than I expected) game, fun, true enough to the Might and Magic series, with interesting side quests and good enough gameplay and mechanics. It had it's share of problems and could fare a bit better regarding pacing, its story and its mechanics, but for a first attempt, especially after the disaster that was MM IX, it was great and sets a very promising precedent. I hope it sells really well so we can see a sequel soon. I also hope it gets more DLCs or an expansion pack.

For me, it's up there with Might and Magic VIII, which was actually lacking in the same areas: story, pacing and mechanics, but it was a quite fun game nevertheless and a true Might and Magic game.

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Unread postby magritte2 » 07 Apr 2014, 15:56

Not finished the game yet (part way through Act 3) but I agree with you on a lot of things. It feels like the game is finally opening up now around level 20 or so. As far as the linearity, I think the problem the game has stems from a couple of things:

1) The power curve is very steep early on
2) The number of lower level dungeons is small
3) The game tends to discourage exploration. In M&M VI, most of the dungeons in each region were approximately similar in difficulty, so you felt relatively safe exploring. And if you did go somewhere you shouldn't (I recall getting a ring of waterwalking at about level 7 and wandering into Garrick's Forge--you could always cut and run.

I found act 2 a bit frustrating because there was a certain point where it seemed like the only major quest that was really feasible was the Lost City but it was hard to find and easy to get hammered by powerful enemies while you were looking. I'm not sure why they tease you with the Paladin promotion quest so early when the dungeon's not only too tough but it can't be completed until after you get into Karthal. Why not have Jon just say flat out when you first meet him that you're not ready yet?

Another issue is that it's very easy to miss stuff in dungeons. I can't recall there being any indication that the Shard of Water would be found in the Lost City, so I thought I had completed that quest and it wasn't until I was blocked at Skull Rock that I ended up looking on line for how to get the Blessing of Shalassa. I'm not asking for them to put quest markers everywhere like in Skyrim, but some sort of clue as to where important items are would be appreciated.

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Unread postby hellegennes » 07 Apr 2014, 20:17

I know what you mean, MM6-8 had Wizard Eye which would show points of interest, like treasure (only applicable in dungeons) if you had it above expert or master (I don't remember which).

I agree on all of your points. I wish they had made the game a little more easy early on and a lot more difficult afterwards.

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Unread postby Tress » 08 Apr 2014, 11:08

1) The power curve is very steep early on
2) The number of lower level dungeons is small
3) The game tends to discourage exploration. In M&M VI, most of the dungeons in each region were approximately similar in difficulty, so you felt relatively safe exploring. And if you did go somewhere you shouldn't (I recall getting a ring of waterwalking at about level 7 and wandering into Garrick's Forge--you could always cut and run.
Agree with most points. Game really tears your behind for first couple acts, and there is no much place to fall back and get more fat to progress. In open world games like TES you could always do almost limitless side quests prior to engaging something more strong.
Regarding 3 however I found it on contrary. Since game do not give much hints (like in crusader quest) you are forced to look around yourself. Sure it can get frustrating, for example I too ditched lost city as soon as I defeated act 2 boss, since it was bit too hard for my team, and walked around wondering when the hell I am supposed to get water shard. I eventually backtracked half game until I got it.

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Unread postby Pitsu » 19 Apr 2014, 19:15

Anyone has any ideas how to deal with Caindale the inquisition boss in the DLC? And to do it with a paladin, hunter, runemage and druid (30+)? This DLC seems to be made for realoading fans and with countless reloadings i have made it thus far, but now all my tactics and tricks are failing.

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Unread postby hellegennes » 19 Apr 2014, 23:05

Pitsu wrote:Anyone has any ideas how to deal with Caindale the inquisition boss in the DLC? And to do it with a paladin, hunter, runemage and druid (30+)? This DLC seems to be made for realoading fans and with countless reloadings i have made it thus far, but now all my tactics and tricks are failing.
Before you open the door, make sure you have cleared everything else. Then, cast all your protective spells; everything you have. Celestial armour is important, so are light ward, stone skin and liquid membrane. If you have scrolls of any of these, use it before opening the door. Don't approach at all. It's better if you cast spells from afar. If you have searing rune (it's a fire spell), use it as much as you can. Fire is pretty effective against him. After that, you just need to pay attention to healing. It's preferable if you use the regen spell than wasting your turns with potions, unless you have no other choice.

The spells that I found to be the most effective were thunderstorm, blizzard, searing rune and fireblast. Searing rune is a must. Don't let light ward lapse. At the very least, you need arcane ward.

If you have enough good spells (fire, air and water) and have given your magic users enough magic points you have to mainly rely on them. If your non magic users are strong enough, you can try engaging him in close combat. I think you cannot use skull crack because it's mind-related and bosses are immune to that.

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Unread postby Pitsu » 20 Apr 2014, 06:20

Thanks, the fire magic finally did it. Paladin and druid healed and buffed, runelord spammed rune and blast and an occasional buff and the poor melee fighter had no use at all.


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