Loved the HoMM series, thought Id give MM6 a try first. It seems like theres way to many enemies swarmed together at the start. Even if I pull one or two off I can still get surrounded pretty easy. I went into goblin watch because I had a quest for it and after opening one door there were a few goblins, a goblin shaman, and a bat right by the door that KOed 2 of my party and diseased another.

Any tips to get around this stuff?

From what I remember, giving ranged weapons to party members helped me a lot at the start

Get a bow for everyone. Don't fight in melee unless there's no other way. You can run faster then any monster. Enter turn based mode, shoot couple of times, run away, repeat. After you level up some more you can start fighting in close range. Also get some spells for your casters.

You CAN go bow kiting mode, but il tell you this: it will make for the most boring and long-driven combat ever, i've newly completed mm6, mm7 and mm9 without ever skilling up bow, and it makes for faster and more fun games definetly.

And i can promise you the games are completely beatable without bow kiting :)

The best tip to give would be analyze stats when designing charechter, personally i liked to pimp up the knight as much as possible, as he tends to carry your team in the start of the game, maxing might, and putting accuracy quite high is imporant, speed is nice to, but far less of a priority

You should also complete a few quests first and level up. There are several quests you can do without any combat, including the first two quests involving "the letter." To avoid combat after that takes some dodging, and it helps to be familiar with the enemy movement patterns, but those first quests should get you started. You'll have skill points and some money left over from levelling to buy better equipment.

From my experience, I learned how to play and got a few hours in a couple months ago.

- Ranged weapons help, but it actually ruined some of the fun of the game for me. It turned it into a kind of crappy FPS. That being said, I think you kind of have to to some degree. I got as far as the second location and there are so many ranged enemies. It's nearly impossible to get close enough to them to kill them without being shot to pieces. Instead I just ended up taking them out one by one with ranged in a really slow, slow process.

- Early on in the first location, you want to methodically take out the surrounding areas. I did Goblin Watch last. What I would do with ranged enemies is I'd try to draw them out one by one using baiting, or with the case of the mages, I would use the town's walls. The spells wouldn't hit, forcing them closer where I could engage in melee.

- I had a party of a Knight, Rogue, Cleric & Wizard. Lots of healing, and decent spell coverage.

(Im writing rogue to, but what you really mean is archer i suppose :)
Which charechters did u dump stat points into? (cleric for instacne should ONLY get personality in my oppinion, wizzard ONLY int, rogue shouldnt get any, the knight MUST have accuracy+might, knight is definetly the charechter who gets most out of having stats)
PS: remove all might from Sorccerer , it's a waste.
Depending on magic school you choose, you can also remove his accuracy (fire arrow for instance requires accuracy though)


Which spells were you using? in my experience air tends to be the best starting spell school, "sparks" spell is a killing machine, especially in dungeons, on cleric get bless very quikly, and have it on your knight constantly (rogue to, he has decent damage)
(also you want fly as fast as possible, cause your lazy right?

Actually luck is another "insignificant" stat, i tend to remove luck from ALL charechters, except for the cleric maybe if you feel its needed.
Since removing accuracy and might from wizzard will make his melle the sadest thing you ever seen, he will use a lot of spells, and he will go oom long before you find you need to rest (meaning you do not CONSTNATLY cast spells), so why not remove speed from your wizzard? it's not like you'll need it anyway.

By doing this you'll have an easy time maxing your knights might, accuracy, and speed.
Personality of cleric will also be maxed (more sp)
Int of sorcerrer will also be maxed (more sp)
And you'll even have unused skillpoints, these should be used to increase rogues combat skills (might is best, but accuracy is damned nice to, speed should be ignored here in my oppinion)
You might have xtra, use these on endurance for cleric (you might consider trading some knight endurance points for cleric endurance points (that means making knight endurance in the reds)

S=Standard, meaning unchanged, M=maxed, m=minimum
My party when designing is basicly this:
---------------knight ----|---- archer ----|---- cleric ---|--- sorccerer
Might------- 25(M) -----| ------19 -------|----- 7(S)--- |------ 5(m)
Intelect------ 5(m)----- |----- 14(S)---- | -----7(m) --|------ 25(M)
Personality 5(m)------|----- 5(m)----- |---- 25(M)-- |------ 7(m)
Endurance 12---------| -----11(S)----- |---- 13------ | ------11(s)
accuracy--- 25(M)---- |------ 16 -------| ----11(S)---| -------5(m)
Speed -----25(M)----- |------ 11(s)---- |---- 7(S)---- |----- 12(m)
Luck -------7(m)------- |------ 5(m)---- |--- 12(m)--- |------ 9(m)


Archer is a merger between sorccerer and knight, i often dulge these kind of classes into the earth magic school only when the time comes, and then spare my sorccerer from that school, earth magic has some pretty neat buffs, and your archer wont require to much magic to cast these, as for the damage spells, they can be used for "dire" situations later in the game.
As melle classes tend to be the strongest early game, you will want to design any paladin or archer's starting stats to focus on combat rather then spellcasting, these stats will with the levels become insignificant, and when the time comes it wont have mattered that you ignored spellcasting when designing him/her.

You might notice my knight has "Axe" chosen, this is because axe is the best weapons in this game, they have such sick damage, the only bad thing is, you cant duel wield axes, thats why you also have sword, axe in 1 hand, sword in the other :) (but skill up axe first, as its the best to start with, that or spear if you prefere a more defensive knight)

Note: it might be worth considering, trading cleric combat skills for more in the archer/paladins combat skills, but thats a question of preference, mace is a awesome weapon and my clerics tend to do a lot of damage around level 6 when they get expert mace when i play :)

Everyone's advice has been good so far. Make sure to pause the game (enter key, I think?) to use turn-based combat to make sure you're being efficient when fighting. Also, make sure that someone has the disarm trap, identify and repair skills (doesn't have to be the same character). It's probably a good idea to give these to your fighters because your casters will need to focus on magic skills. Also having someone with the Merchant skill who will handle all buying and selling will really help you save money.

I think I did Goblinwatch after the letter quests in the first town. If you occasionally retreat back to town, you shouldn't have too much trouble with Goblinwatch, and once you've gained a few levels you'll be having an easier time.

I'll have 1000+1 advices for combat strategies, party builds. This game has no high-score. You can play for being the best of course, no one forbid, but the key is playing for having fun. Variety help a lot for the fun. Just forget builds or how to make a strong party. Strong party = NO FUN. Try to think your party like a real party of adventurers. They have strong and weak points, making a perfect party is possible, but not funny XD, unless you consider perfect the party you most enjoy, for example actually I have Paladin+Archer+Druid+Sorcer)

this is the only game with a decent alchemy system. There are limited ingredients (yes at the start you'll find some ingredients, but later are much harder to find), so you have to tradeoff potions usage (experiment and find a new formula, or just use known formula when you need it?) .. finding empty potion bottles is even harder.

DON'T LOOK FOR POTION RECIPES OVER THE INTERNET (find recipes yourself.. MUCH MORE FUN XD. When years ago i tried MM6 for the first time I spent 2/3 days in findin potion recipes, and that was real fun. Also submitted the recipe list to a local game magazine xD. )

Your post, DarioGOll, was great to read. I feel the same way often, and am glad I'm not alone. M&M6 is one of my all-time favorite games.

ok, some basic tips

A. go to the bar in NS immediately, then just take the coach to Castle Ironfist and deliver the letter as well, that gives you 6k off the bat to buy most of the skills you need and also enough EXP for about level 3.

B. buy bow skill and bows ASAP (in Castle Ironfist)., its very helpful in the early going.

C.Go back to NS to start exploring, you can finish two significant quest very quickly (the Goblin Watch and Baa quest) they both give good money and exp for the early going

by now you should be at least lvl 5 with all the necceasry skills / spells bought. and should finish the NS region without too much trouble.

Important Skills to buy early on

1. Bow (everyone)
2. Merchant (everyone at least 1 level, but could be just 1 guy at the start)
3. Disarm trap (one guy need to level this, probably ur main might hero)
4. Perception (same as above, though everyone should have 1 level as well later on)

Important spells to get early on

1. Healing spells: you should have two char that can cast healing spell
2. cure poison (save a lot of money.)
3. remove curse (same, but not needed as early)

4. Fire bolt (your mage is pretty useless without this.
5. Fire ball (turn your mage into a very powerful char.)

I would like to add that getting Expert Spirit Magic early on did made a difference for me. Mass Bless was very useful in the beginning battles.

Talking about Spirit Magic: Bless, like iatus said, is fine, because it increases the chance to hit, but it should be combined with Heroism to inflict more damage.

I also try to get Learing to Expert as soon as possible to gain more experiance.

A thing about classes: The only difference between them is what skills they get and how many SP and HP they get per level. Since the knight and the paladin get the exact same combat skills there is no reason to chose a knight over a paladin because more HP don't help much when you cant make the enemies focusing on that character. Another thing is that the difference in AC from the three armor types is neclectable because you can easily make that up with some accessory granting AC bonus.

Good advice everyone so far!

Based off the first post: don't forget to use the enter key and go into turn based mode to pick off nasties at your own time and leisure! Make your cleric use the First Aid spell until your SP drops to 0, get the last kills in and run away when you get too overwhelmed. Then rest and repeat!

Like said before, get all of your characters at least one "profession" ability, it will save you loads of cash you'd otherwise spend on repairs, ID item etc. My party consisted of a Knight, Archer, Sorcerer and Cleric and I taught them Repair Item, Disarm Trap, ID item and Merchant skill respectively right away at level 1. Get these skills up to Expert/Mastery ASAP.

Also, get your sorcerer to Master Water Magic as soon as possible! You'll notice that the Town Portal and Lloyd's Beacon spells are awesome to get around very quickly and efficiently!