Hi all
I'm a new user of the fantastic GOG service.
I almost went on a buying frenzy in pure nostalgia when i browsed the games today for the first time, but somehow restricted myself to Baldurs Gate 2 and the Might & Magic 1-6 collection.

I remember fondly playing M&M 4 in the very early nineties with a roommate, and many long hours went into that game. Man, I had a lot more free time to play when I was younger... :-)

Well, I've just started playing the game again today, and it's a lot harder to figure out than I remember... Back then, there wasn't really many game interface conventions like there is today, so I was having trouble figuring out a few things.
There's a lot of stuff I've forgotten about how games used to work, much less handholding than today, which is fine, but it does take some work figuring stuff out...

For instance, is it not possible to see weapon stats and compare weapons in the game?
I found out I can "Identify objects" at a smithy, but I'm sure there must be an easier way to see what's what in my inventory?

Man, it's both great and very hard to go back and play those early games.. :-)
Thankfully, I figured out that DOSBox can change the keymapping so I can have the movement keys set up differently so I don't have to sit so akwardly and play.

Love the GOG service, amazing stuff...

This is, in my opinion, the most annoying thing about the early Might and Magic games. Fortunately, the GOG release includes the cluebook (look for it under "bonus content" for the MM pack on your account page) which will list all the stats for every weapon or piece of armor. Technically this is cheating, but figuring out what equipment is best is really annoying, especially given that all the weapons are made of different materials as well. To avoid spoilers as much as possible, I simply use the search function on the PDF to search for the item in question, so I don't see too many other things.

You do have to be careful with that cluebook because it has all the answers to all the puzzles in the game. Stick to the item charts though and you'll be fine.

Thank you for your answer. :-)
Hadn't seen the cluebook, but found a couple of ressources elsewhere on the web where I could search the equipment from the game.

After the initial confusion and getting used to the retro graphics, this game still rocks.
It's also pretty cool to play a game like this on a modern pc, I don't have to write notes on various pieces of paper, I can just multitask into different .txt files to write important stuff.

It's good that these games can get a revival through GOG like this, they deserve it!

I think the best is using that site:
http://shrines.rpgclassics.com/pc/mm4_5/equip.shtml

The way equipment works:
Look up the base stats for that equipment type and then the modification like obsidian or blazing and look how that changes the stats to get the resulting stats.