Might and Magic VI Hints

Combat Tips

• 1 of 9: The first thing that you should learn is how to run away or avoid a fight. Unless you need to kill a monster as part of a quest, or unless it's between you and an essential part of a dungeon, you can probably avoid fighting it. You can always come back later when you're at a higher level or have better weapons and armor.
• 2 of 9: Also, know when to change between real-time and phased (paused) combat. Real-time combat is the only way you're allowed to move.  If you're facing monsters without ranged or spell attacks, the safest way to attack these is by retreating and either shooting arrows or casting quick spells.  And, of course, real-time combat is good for easy battles that you just want to get out of the way.
  
  Phased combat is best if you need to be casting more than one simple spell all the time (for example, to heal your party at the right time), or if you need to repair broken items.  You can also pause and unpause the combat as necessary.
• 3 of 9: Certain monsters will have resistances to certain types of spells.  They may have partial resistances, which just reduce the odds of causing damage and the amount of that damage.  Or they may be completely immune to spells.
  
  I haven't included a complete list of these resistances, however.  My own personal experience was that trial and error was sufficient to determine these resistances and immunities.  That is, if you cast a spell and it fails several times to do the damage you expect, or fails to hit at all, it's time to move to a different spell.  You can also use common sense to figure out some resistances.  Fire spells probably won't work on a fire elemental, and poison spells probably won't work on a poisonous creature, for example.
• 4 of 9: Similarly, a very limited number of monsters are immune to physical damage. These include the Diamond Gargoyle around Silver Cove and the various types of Ooze.  Weapons won't do any damage, unless they're enchanted to do magical damage, and then, only the magical damage applies.  Neither will spells like Implosion and Shrapmetal.  Blasters will, however, work on these monsters.
• 5 of 9: Regardless of the kind of attacks you use, you should try to kill specific targets as quickly as possible.  When you use the quick-attack or quick-spell keys, the game will select the closest monster to you.  This may not always be the one that you attacked in the previous round, though.  That's why I prefer to click (or control-click) on the view window when I'm facing tough enemies in phased combat.  (It's generally not worth the trouble to try to pick out targets if you're in real-time.)
• 6 of 9: In a similar light, when you are using spells, you will want to cast spells that will help you quickly kill a few monsters.  Casting a spell like Inferno -- which does a little damage to a lot of monsters -- will not do you much good if you're using it on monsters with large numbers of hit points. Instead, try a stronger single-target spell, like Incinerate.  But if the targets are fairly weak, a broader spell may do the trick.
• 7 of 9: If you're having a hard time with combat, you might want to try defensive spells as well.  The proper type of protective spells are essential.  Day of the Gods (Light Magic) and Day of Protection (Dark Magic) give you most of these protective and defensive spells in one easy-to-cast package, which provides greater protection at the same level.  With these spells, you don't have to be proficient in multiple types of magic.  But the individual spells -- scattered throughout the types of magic -- are also sufficient if you haven't yet learned these spell packages.
• 8 of 9: Stat-enhancing spells may also be worth your while.  Heroism is a good spell, since it makes all weapon attacks do more damage.  Others are probably of more questionable value.  I personally prefer saving my spell points to cast offensive and healing spells.  But they still may be worth experimenting with if you're having particular trouble.
• 9 of 9: If all else fails, it may be time to retreat or teleport and try again. Note, however, that all monsters will heal back to full hit points if you leave a battle.  So if you only have a little bit of damage left to finish off a monster, try to kill it first.  (This is also another reason why you should focus on single targets, rather than spreading your attacks around.)

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