I am thinking of replaying an earlier Wizardry game, and am wondering what you think of this starting party:

2 Lizardman Valkyries (should I make one of them a Dracon instead?)
1 Dracon Thief
1 Faerie Mage
1 Priest (race undecided)
1 Faerie Alchemist, maybe change to Bard later

Does this sound like a decent party?

Note: I don't feel like saying which Wizardry title I might replay, but I will say that this party is possible in that Wizardry game.

Races and classes mentiond suggest 6, 7, or 8, but "earlier" means that is not 8.
So it's either 6 or 7 and 6 is more earlier than 7.

Since you're trying to guess the game, I will explain some of my reasoning behind my party selection. Maybe this will help?

Valkyries are really good in this game: They level up faster than Priests, and not that much more slowly than Fighters. Furthermore, they can use the strongest ranged weapon in the game (there's no range difference between bows and polearms). Lizardman is chosen because they can reach the highest Strength and Vitality of all races, and are tied for being the second fastest.

The Thief is pretty much required; Bards and Rangers are bad at unlocking doors, and creating a Ninja would require over 40 bonus points, which is not gonna happen. Unfortunately, there are times when you *have* to pick a locked door in order to progress. (I consider this to be bad game design.)

The reasoning behind the back row is obvious; it allows me to cover all three types of magic. Even though I have 2 Valkyries, having a Priest is helpful in the early levels because Priests are the only class that gets a healing spell at level 1.

I am thinking of changing the Alchemist to a Bard either at level 9 (to get the spell that identifies items) or 11 (to get the alchemist's full heal spell; not as good as MADI because it doesn't cure status ailments, but still useful).

Can you not use Knock-Knock?

Unfortunately, that spell does not exist in this game.

They really should have included that spell, especially since that spell did exist in Wizardry 5 (as a second level Mage spell named DESTO). Why they omitted that spell and made lockpicking mandatory, I have no idea.

By the way, I am thinking of making my Priest a Dracon so she can use a breath attack to speed up battles, and am thinking of making one of my Valkyries a Dracon just to avoid duplicating a setup. (Note that the breath weapon, while pretty strong in this game, hits only one enemy, not an entire group.)

I am now thinking of making my Priest a Lizardman, so that she can eventually become a Samurai who knows all the spells, and Lizardmen are probably the best race in this Wizardry game. (Highest STR and VIT, tied for second highest AGI, and the other three stats aren't important in the long run.) This might make the most sense since my plan currently has 2 other Dracons in the party (one of the Valkyries and my Thief).

Random fact about this Wizardry game:

In Wizardry 6 and 7, one reasonable strategy is to start a character as a Priest and change her into a Valkyrie at level 2. In this game, however, it is actually impossible to do this; Priests can't be neutral, and Valkyries can only be neutral.

(I have been playing this game for a while, and made some changes (changing my Alchemist into a Bard after she learned level 6 spells; I don't need the spell that opens chests without (usually) triggering the trap).)

For Ascii's Wizardry Gaiden games, I think, it is advisable to stick to one class.

The best party is to have those hybrids.

my suggestion would be

Samurai
Samurai
Lord
monk
Ninja
Samurai

3 Samurai? Yes, you need more people to be able to cast Mahaman just in case.

The avaliability of weapons and armours is something to be taken into serious consideration. It would be a waste if you got a Muramasa Blade!, yet do not have Samurai.
Starting from Wizardry Gaiden 3, Ascii introduced a kind of game design which profoundly influence some of the other games in the industry.
It is called "the inflated dungeon" in Japanese. In WG3,4 and Dimguil, after beating the game, a hidden dungeon might be open to you which is called the "Dragon Cave". And in these dungeons, every pawn is far more powerful than the last Boss. And the Bosses in these dungeons will be far beyond the imagination of the most gamers.
So what you need to consider most is how your characters will fare when they are in extrmely high levels. For you will need high level characters if you want to complete the dragon cave.
To simply beat the game is not hard at all. You don't need to worry too much about this.
These games are easy when you focus on the main quest alone, but are very hard when you want to complete the hidden dungeon.

Talking about the "infla-dungeon", WG5 (Dimguil)'s dragon cave was considered to be the most notorious infla-dungeon of all time by many Japanese gamers.
It scared so many people away, that most Japanese Wzardry game designer decided to find other approches to design post-game dungeon.
I think, one of the successful approaches is the one adopted by the designer of Wizardry Gaiden: Prisoners of the Battles (PS2)
Rather than letting you retain your level and items after beating the game and letting you face extramely powerful monsters, the game would strip away most of your powers when you enter into the post game dungeon.
It is a bit like Wiz4.

The thing is, in Wizardry Gaiden 3, I have found that the best strategy for the endgame and post-game is to spam TILTOWAIT until the enemies die, and in the post-game dungeon, you pretty much need most of your characters to cast the spell.

Once getting to level 13 is relatively easy, you can start as a spellcasting class, and then class change to a fighting class. I note that reaching level 13 doesn't take much more experience than gaining one level when you're already past 13.

(Also, your party includes a ninja, which I don't consider a feasible starting class, and doesn't have any other thief character.) Have you played the infla-dungeon in Elminage Gothic? That particular game takes the approach of giving your characters extra abilities that slowly scale as you level up into higher and higher levels, but the game still does get ridiculous (Archer Polete comes to mind, and apparently there's an even more powerful recolor present later on). I believe the game expects you to be around level 400 by the end of it.

Incidentally, that post-game dungeon from Prisoners of the Battles reminds me of the Ancient Cave from Lufia 2 and Lufia: The Legend Returns; it does not remind me of Wizardry 4 at all. (Incidentally, there's a hack of Final Fantasy 5 (my favorite FF game) called "Final Fantasy 5 Ancient Cave" which turns the game into this sort of dungeon.)

Once getting to level 13 is relatively easy, you can start as a spellcasting class, and then class change to a fighting class. I note that reaching level 13 doesn't take much more experience than gaining one level when you're already past 13.
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One drawback of doing this is that you will have less HP than sticking to one class. Because after changing class, unless you character reaches the level at which he changed class in his previous class, you will very likely get 1 HP increase per level-up. even if you surpass that level, you may not get any large HP increase before having your vitality reach 18.

Also, your party includes a ninja, which I don't consider a feasible starting class, and doesn't have any other thief character.
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Start with a thief. You will very likely get a thief's dagger (とうぞくのたんとう) after grinding a lot. invoke its SP to let your thief become a ninja. In this way, your ninja's level will not be set to level one. You will imediately get a high-level ninja.

Have you played the infla-dungeon in Elminage Gothic? That particular game takes the approach of giving your characters extra abilities that slowly scale as you level up into higher and higher levels, but the game still does get ridiculous (Archer Polete comes to mind, and apparently there's an even more powerful recolor present later on). I believe the game expects you to be around level 400 by the end of it.
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I bought the Steam Version of this game, but I haven't played it very much. Starfish's Wizardry Empire and Elminage series are not in my list of must-haves, because they do not feature artworks of Jun Suemi, and their artistic style does not appeal me. I think, they may be one of those titles influenced by the Ascii's Gaiden series. In the future, I may try one or two titles in this series.

Incidentally, that post-game dungeon from Prisoners of the Battles reminds me of the Ancient Cave from Lufia 2 and Lufia: The Legend Returns; it does not remind me of Wizardry 4 at all. (Incidentally, there's a hack of Final Fantasy 5 (my favorite FF game) called "Final Fantasy 5 Ancient Cave" which turns the game into this sort of dungeon.)
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I agree.
Besides, I think PoB also tries to reproduce some of the feels of Wizardry 6. I have heard that the Japanese gamers call this feel "Aranami Kan（荒波感）" (The feel of cold and surging seawave； the helpless feeling of being thrown into a strange world with no reconnection to the outer world until beating the game).
In wizardry 6, we control a bunch of adventurers to explore a ghost castle. At the beginning, the game says, the advanturers thought that they could withdraw from the castle any time when they percived danger. Yet shortly after, they found that the castle gate shut up tightly behind them. They were cut off from the safety outside. They had no where to return. The only thing they could do was to survive in this strange and unfriendly world.
And, I think, PoB tries to reproduce this by forbidden your character to exit the dungeon before finishing it.

This won't actually be a problem in the long run. You will only be maybe one level behind, and vitality will fix itself as you level up. Due to the way HP gains work, once you are of a level/vitality that will give you more HP than you currently have, you will get all the missed HP. In Wizardry 5, WG4 and Dimguil (as well as Elminage Gothic, which has a similar spell), you can use the IHALON spell to force Vitality increases until you max the stat.

If HP is what you are concerned about, race makes a bigger difference; choose a race with high Vitality (like Lizardman), and you will end up with far more HP. (Incidentally, the effect of Vitality is so huge that it it overwhelmes class differences; I would expect a Thief to have more HP than a Fighter at 22 Vitality, once you reach high levels).

By the way, the races are not exactly like what I call balanced. In particular, in WG3 Lizardman is the best race in the long run, with Fairies being an option (though lacking in HP). Lizardmen just have such high amounts of Vitality and Agility that no other race (except a Fairy's Agility) can match. WG4 has different races level up at different speeds in different classes, and Felpurr can get 20 AGI (as opposed to 19 for Lizardmen), which is enough to always go before the enemies. Initiative is very important; in WG3 it's important to get off your TILTOWAITS early, and in WG4 and DIMGUIL, you *really* want to get that CORTU spell off before the enemies breathe on you. (CORTU is badly bugged in WG3, as it makes your spells less effective instead of making the enemy's spells less effective; did anyone ever make a ROM hack that fixes this?)

Three things here:

1. Thief's Daggers are really rare in most Wizardry games, in my experience. (DIMGUIL is the one exception I've encountered.) As a result, there's no guarantee that one will show up in a reasonable amount of time.

2. The Thief's Dagger does not correct the character's experience, so we have a high level Ninja who doesn't have the XP necessary, and will therefore not level up for a long time. The easiest way to fix this is to cast MAHAMAN (or HAMAN in Wizardry 1/2/3), which will force a level drain and an XP adjustment; if the character doesn't know that spell, you will have to find an enemy that will level drain you, and that can be tricky.

3. Ninjas are not as good at inspecting traps as thieves. To inspect a chest with 95% reliability, a thief needs only 16 agility, whereas a ninja (or bard or ranger) needs 24 (only possible for a fairy)

By the way, Wizardry 2 and Wizardry Gaiden 3 have class change item loops that allow you to increase a high level character's level exponentially, making it possible to reach 4 digit levels in a reasonable amount of time. (Although, if playing a computer version of Wizardry 2 on a period computer (like the Apple 2), actually gaining those levels might take quite a while, because the game has to roll a number of dice equal to the character's new level to calculate HP gains, and computers of that era aren't exactly what I'd call fast by modern standards.)

On further thought, I think you are quite right about a lot of things.

Talking about the Ninja, some of the things may be personal preferences. I like to have ninja around for more fighting power. As for inspecting a chest, my habit is to always cross-examine with a spell.

I am curious about the loop you mentioned. I never heard such kind of a loop. Please tell me some detailed information if you wish.

Here's the Wizardry 2 version of the loop:

For the start of the loop, your character should be one of the basic classes (fighter, priest, thief, mage) and at a decently high level already (I would recommend 20+; the higher your level, the more levels you gain per iteration). This character will need to know either HAMAN or MAHAMAN. You will also need an unused Coin of Power. The procedure is as follows:
1. Invoke the Coin of Power. This will change the character's class to one of the slow leveling classes (Samurai, Lord, or Ninja). Level and experience will remain the same. (For example, you might have a level 20 Lord with the XP of a level 20 Mage).
2. Have the character cast HAMAN or MAHAMAN (alternatively, get an enemy to level drain the character, but that isn't as consistent), then either win the fight or run away (losing or teleporting away prevents XP from being adjusted here). This will cause the character's level to decrease, and the character's XP to be adjusted to the minimum required for the character's new level (so the example character's level is now down to 19, but the character now has the XP of a level 19 Lord, which I believe is higher than that of a level 20 Mage).
3. Invoke the same Coin of Power again. This will change the character's class to one of the other 5 classes, but will also change the character's condition to Dead. Again, level and XP won't change, so we might, say, have a level 19 Thief with the XP of a level 19 Lord. (If the character becomes a Bishop, and you have the means to reload from before you used the coin the second time, I would do so, as Bishops take more XP than the base classes to level up, so your gain will be much smaller.)
4. Revive the character. Casting MAHAMAN (not HAMAN), choosing the revive option, and then teleporting away with MALOR or LOKTOFEIT will allow for risk-free resurrection that does not even cast the caster's XP (make sure to rest to get the level back). Alternatively, you can revive the character by other means. Perhaps trying DI or KADORTO, then using MAHAMAN if the character turns to ashes might be a good strategy here. (MAHAMAN can cure Ashes but not Lost).
5. Have the character rest. In this example, since our fast-leveling Thief has the XP that a slow-leveling Lord would need to reach level 19, your Thief will have plenty of levels to gain, and the amount of levels you can gain will increase the higher your level before starting. For more fun, if you are playing the Apple 2 version, try doing this to a character who has benefited from the Identify Glitch; reaching 4 digit levels is quite feasible this way (if you have the patience for the long rests required and/or are playing on an emulator that you can speed up).

In Wizardry Gaiden 3, it is possible, with certain rare items, to change between Bishop and Ninja. Bishops level slightly faster than Ninjas, so while you don't have to worry about death, the XP gain here is slower, and you need to be a higher level for this to be worth doing in the first place, but you can still eventually reach 4 and 5 digit levels this way.

The other problems with Ninjas are that:
* They level up very slowly.
* For them to be truly effective, they need to be a high level.

In games where Monks are an option, they level a lot faster. You can either make the Monk a Dwarf (IIRC) for faster leveling, or go with Lizardman for better stats.

Thank you for telling me all these! They are very useful informations.

According to what I know, the Coin of Power [Before] has an 100% chance to be broken when invoked. After that, it will become Coin of Power [After], which is also definately broken when invoke. After being invoked for the second time, the item will disappear.

So I can only do this trick once per Coin of Power, am I right?

And in Wizardry Gaiden 3, I think the items you mentioned can be vaguely translated as butterfly knife and Pope's Robe. I think, both of them are to be broken when invoked.

So my guess is that this trick can be done once per item?