I used the GOG version which does not allow to fully play the first MM4 and then MM5 as both are already installed. To simulate I decided to not use any of the ways to enter the Dark side but focused on finishing the game MM4 game. As mentioned in other comments it has been one of the easier games and it was a bit strange as there has been a pretty low maximum level limit. Different than the first three I never played MM4 or MM5 before it kind of slipped through...So MM4 till now is probably the easiest of the first 4. MM5 is a bit different and allows you to go up to level 200. At Level 100 the cost for a level increase is 100.000 and this gives you an indication of the main challenge in this game. It is money. During the game but especially in the last 30% of the game you are getting huge amount of Experience Bonuses which at the end you really cannot convert into Levels as you just are running out of money. Now there is a cumbersome way to overcome this. You can in a special location get all your gems back for paying around 300K. This can start a cycle where you can buy with these Gems items, which you can sell and at the end you can generate more money than what you invest. But it takes time and is really boring...So I rather gave up on the goal to have all my characters at max level

One of the presumably challenging highlights is the fight against the Mega Dragon. But different to the prior Versions of this Enemy it is this time quite beatable. All it takes is
1) A high level party.... surprise surprise I have attached mine.
2) Then you need to make sure each of your Party members has an Obsidian Weapon.
3) Having two Characters that can cast Mass Distortion (I had Paladin and Cleric)
4) Make sure that each character has about 100 Energy Protection - this is fairly easy as you can buy at the Sky Road late in the game Energy Protection Scarabs. And you can wear two scarabs at once... This covers already 60. Then all you need to do is to keep the of Armor with Energy Protection even it if inferior to Obsidian Armor in any other fight. But just in this fight it really helps.
5) Then you teleport right to the slot where he is and the fight is starting

Due to very high level I had only one Character been "Eradicated" And the role split is clear Paladin and Cleric are casting all the time the Mass Distortion spell while the rest of my Party, the Ninja, Fighter, Sorcerer and Ranger keep hacking with their Obsidian Weapons.

What has been a bit confusion is the third part...which is following once you won MM5. Then you can continue and do a a couple of missions across both worlds in order to bring Xeen and the dark side back again. This requires you to travel across and I have to admit it took me a while to find the places on Xeen as I played it almost 4 month ago.
Yet it is nice and if you finish it will get your second little Movie

1: You don't actually need that high of a level, I've heard of the dragon being beaten at a base level of 1, albeit this was with the +50 level fountain, raising level temporarily to 51.
2: Or, you could just transfer one obsidian weapon between characters, which works fine as long as the character holding it doesn't get eradicated. There's also the option of using the Xeen Slayer Sword; if your level is high enough (don't know how high), the lack of a to hit bonus won't be an issue, and the ability to ignore resistance (Mega Dragon has 90% physical resistance) will outweigh the +50 damage (before resistance) that Obsidian gives you. Plus, that Xeen Slayer Sword never breaks, even if its wielder gets eradicated. (Note, however, that you can only get this nice weapon in MM4.)
3: This does help, though keep in mind that the spell doesn't always do meaningful damage; (It either does 5 or half the enemy's HP, depending on whether the enemy saves.)
4: That's what fountains are for. Also, Obsidian Armor isn't useful as often as you think, since there are entire areas where party AC is irrelevant. In fact, once you get past the dungeon with all the minotaurs in it, you won't be needing AC again until the Southern Sphinx.
5: This is, of course, true. With that said, I believe it's possible to get past the Mega Dragon without killing it if you're careful. This gives you two targeted +5 level bossts, though you don't get the 100M XP (divided between your party members) you'd get for killing it.

Also, don't forget to have someone, preferably your highest level character, cast Day of Protection and Day of Sorcery before the battle starts. (Items with these spells are useful late in the game because of this, though you can replace Day of Sorcery with Power Shield, provided somebody casts Levitate.) There's also the Dungeon of Death, which I recommend exploring after completing all three endings. No significant treasure (aside from more obsidian), but there's a a surprise on the last floor. (And solving the crossword on the first floor gives everyone +5 permanent levels; as usual, wait until you're done training before you do this to save money.)

^ Huh?? "not allow to fully play" ????

You can fully play it. The catch is that you can't install MM4 alone, and I hear there are some things that change when installing both games, (I heard that characters with a base level (ignoring temporary boosts) of 14 or less get double XP from killing enemies in WoX, but not MM4 alone.)

MM5 alone can actually be played; you just need to rename a certain file so that the game doesn't see it. (I think the file has "World" in its name.) If you do this correctly, you'll get a different title screen, and if you start a new game, you'll start in Castleview with a level 5 party. You can then play through MM5, though you'll find that the one pyramid that word in WoX doesn't here, with some explanation about celestial alignment. Loading an MM4 save will put you in the MM5 map with the same ID, and at the same coordinates; this can be used to reach the final town early, but it can also result in you being stuck.

By the way, if playing MM4 or WoX, there's one way to get stuck that you might want to be avoided. There's a certain hidden town that's underground, at the end of a dungeon. There's all sorts of wondrous things here, including answers to the game's riddles, and other stuff. However, if you go to the pub and check in, you'll end up in a corner of the map that you can't get out of without Lloyd's Beacon, Town Portal, or Mr. Wizard (but note that Mr. Wizard takes all gems you're carrying), and the game saves when you leave the inn. (Also, be aware that, if you reach the city, that the well has a permanent level boost that you might want to save, and that the town's other exit takes you to the Darkside, and therefore should be avoided until you're well into MM5.)

I happen to have the original floppy standalone versions of MM4 and MM5 so I tested what you just said
with two new games with starting party and went to kill the Orc outside Vertigo.
MM4 standalone: 33 Exp each char,
WoX: 66 Exp each char

I also noticed another change; the blacksmith makes (midi) noise with his hammer in the standalone version,
Not in WoX

(edit)Discussion around the double XP thing: https://www.gog.com/forum/might_and_magic_series/littleknown_bug_of_world_of_xeen

Somebody with too much time on their hands made a utility to cut XP in half to compensate for this. The utility changes the monster definition tables to either normal XP or half XP. Patch to half XP until your party hits lvl15, then patch back to normal XP.

http://games.playazlounge.net/#UserUtilities

RE: The hammer hit --
With Sound Blaster Pro I get a dull thud.
With Roland LAPC/MT-32 I get a piano key (lol).
With Roland Canvas the game doesn't load (lol x2)!

I thought I remember it being sharper or more high pitched...

Hello,

I have made some more much needed testing of the double XP "bug" with MM4 standalone, MM5 standalone, and WoX standalone, toying with my experience level using my own UGE modules (save editor)

MM4 never doubles monter experience, as reported.
WoX doubles monster experience until you reach 15, as reported. Cloudside and Darkside.

BUT

MM5 standalone also doubles monster experience it until you reach 15, exactly as WoX.
Tested thoroughly with goblins(2000xp -> 1000xp) and gremlins(4000xp -> 2000xp)


This means it was intended, at least for the Darkside.
I am trying to put myself in the shoes of the developers at the time.
They most likely implemented this 2x experience feature to make the beginning of the game easier for player starring a brand new Level5 party on the Darkside.

But, clearly, for WoX, the (programming) code that is primarly used is for Darkside of Xeen (MM5), over the (programming) code of MM4.
So, Cloudside of WoX is using a "feature" that was meant for starting a MM5 standalone game.
So the "bug" if you call it that, is the unintended side effect of that 2x exp feature in the WoX game code.


Does my hypothesis make sense, in light of my discovery that this 2x feature existed in MM5 standalone?

Clouds was meant to be played with a starting party. Clouds uses a Clouds-only executable.

Darkside could be installed standalone (lvl5 starting party), or combined with an existing Clouds installation to make World ("starting" party with whatever you had in Clouds... up to lvl20/22). Both Darkside and World use the same executable. The installer overwrites the Clouds executable if you are installing over Clouds.

Doubling XP up to level 15 seems like a decision to try to balance the Darkside/WoX experience for both new (lvl 5) and Clouds (lvl 20/22) parties. Why didn't the developers add a "side" check (i.e. "under 15 and on Darkside: 2xEXP", "under 15 and on Clouds: No XP bonus") -- who knows?

If memory serves, there is a monster definition table for each side, so I guess one could half the XP for Darkside only. Still need to change it back once your party hits 15, though.

I completely agree.
Thanks for your patch, by the way. In light of this, I intend to use it, until I reach lv15, which is when I will put back the original Dark.cc file.

I think it's OK to halve the xp for both sides in your patch.
If I feel like I want to try to punch above my weight and go to darkside early, I don't want double XP there either.

I prefer to try to exploit the double XP as much as possible. The way this can be done is as follows:
* Level up no higher than level 14. (But definitely use level fountains; temporary levels aren't counted against you for this mechanic.)
* Clear the Dragon Tower, except for the dragons in the clouds. (Just teleport to the fountain, then set a Lloyd's Beacon there for those nice +50 temporary levels.)
* At this point, you may very well have enough XP to reach level 50 or at least close.

One other strategy that I may pair with this is to train to level 50 in Sandcaster, and then never train again. Permanent party-wide level boosts get everyone up to level 71, then I can use targeted level boosts to get through the high-level areas. I note that stopping at level 50 means you don't run into late-game money issues, which arise in part due to the quadratic scaling of the cost needed to gain 1 level, meaning the cost to go from 1 to X scales cubicly.

Thanks a lot for the great advice - and I fully agree that using fountains will allow you to do beat the Mega Dragon with a far less advanced Party. Fountains are a key element in the Might and Magic Series. However for whatever reason I found the location of the more useful Fountains cumbersome despite having two Characters with the Lloyd's beacon spell. The Day of Protection is a great Spell indeed - I would just recommend to cast the Protection from Elements Spell as well as it does create higher protection. Thanks for pointing out that there is also the Dungeon of Death as additional Challenge. I skipped this initially as I struggled with the questions till I realized there is a bit of help provided right at the beginning of the Dungeon. But this I realized only when I tried it again after your recommendation.

I like to get an item that casts Lloyd's Beacon, which will allow everyone to have their own beacon.

Saving on Tensday, then checking a shop twice (to reroll its contents) tends to be the best way to get an item with that spell, or with Power Cure (another good spell to have on an item), and it happens that these spells are only available in what it probably the least common rank to find in treasure.

By the way, if you decide to play Swords of Xeen, here are some tips:
* The game is not well balanced. Hence, I strongly recommend playing on Adventurer mode. to hopefully take some of the edge off some of the more unreasonable encounters.
* Robbers and Ninjas are useless, as Thievery isn't that useful in SoX, and there's a way to teach anyone that particular skill. The default party has both a Robber and a Ninja; I recommend replacing both of them.
* Unlike the rest of the series, SoX is quite linear, particularly early on. A few sequence breaks exist, however.
* You will lose access to the starting area early. Well. you *can* go back, but only via Mr. Wizard, though (IIRC) it needs to be used outside of battle; using it in battle is a sequence break.
* Do not trust the game. This is the big one. SoX is buggy. The core mechanics of the game work fine, as the game just uses the WoX engine, but the scripting isn't so nice. This does, for example, mean that you should save often and in multiple slots.
* Speaking of not trusting the game, the Clairvoyance spell can't be trusted. Don't cast it, and if you cast Day of Sorcery, ignore the hints the spell gives you.
* There are a few exploitable events. There's also one that can cause integer overflow if exploited too much, as well as one well that can trigger integer underflow.

Is Swords of Xeen better or worse than MM9?

I haven't played MM9, but I can say that, in Swords of Xeen, at least the basic combat and spell mechanics work properly.

I'd need someone who's actually played MM9 to really answer that question.