Has anyone bought the Strategy Guide? Is it any good?

In general I am very confused with this game and how everything is supposed to work (ie, guilds, quests, traits, skills, etc.) Does the strategy guide explain any of this any better than the manual does? Although I suppose this isn't asking for much since my 1 year old niece could give a better explanation than the manual.

It's a role-playing game. I'd suggest starting with Diablo1/2 and working into Might&Magic6/7/8 ... lastly, come back to Wizards&Warriors and embrace a very lush role-playing game in the first person perspective corrupted with show-stopping bugs and flaws in both logic and design. Diablo1/2 will introduce to you what role-playing is w/o confusing the issue. Might&Magic will place you in control of a party of characters instead of just one, and change the perspective. Equipment, leveling up, and quest resolution will still be resident here. The game will rarely crash on you and will introduce a more sophisticated role-playing environment with candy-apple appearance and kid-friendly dialogue.

Finally, step into Wizards&Warriors and sample what it meant to be a die-hard role-playing gamer about 5-10 years ago. As an added bonus, the game will crash often; the interface will confuse you; it will have unacceptable issues with gameplay and design; and will ultimately disappoint you as you cross the finish line and get a poorly animated movie and The Angel Kerah's sword that we've seen in all the screen shots sent to every magazine house in the nation.

Have fun!

-EH

Diablo is not RPG at all. It is light(castrated) realtime roguelike. Nothing to discuss here.

M&M is profanation of RPG idea with:
- idiotical RPG system borned in the 80-s.
- stupid quests.
- puzzles for 3-years kids.
- simple dungeon.
- simple interface. Use key 'A' as main feature of this interface!
- brain-damaged NPC.

W&W is the classical hardcore CRPG.
- good and very complex RPG system
- interesting(enough) quests
- serious puzzles.
- *real* dungeons.
- easy-to-use but difficult-to-understand interface
- not-so-stupid NPC.

Sergey - couldn't have said it better myself. Dialbo is most certainly not a classical RPG.

If you want to understand how a game like W&W (warts and all) came to be, look at:

Wizardry 1-7 - Specifically 5,6,7 that DWB did himself. But 1-4 are great also.
Bards Tale Series
Any TSR book, or game from that genre.
Eye of the Beholder series.
And others for sure...

It all started from there, you know if you talk to a serious DND person, they will tell even further what RPG is!

I think its most important to have fun, but also remember what the history behind these games is.

Don't get me wrong, I own and like Diablo 1 and 2, think they're fun hack and slash action games with great mulitplayer capability, but not serious RPG.

Might and Magic - Hmm, all I remember is clowns throwing juggle balls at me, and leprecauns vaporizing all my money and gems in an instant. I found it more like an RPG theme that someone who took too many drugs made, but in the process forgot something important that made the others what they were, have been, and always will be.

RPG gaming, tried and true.

Scronan

Hey super puper mighty RPG wizards&warriors!
Just couple of words in defense of M&M serie. It seems that most of world RPG players are 3 years old, like Sergey said. But I saw a lot of web sites about M&M, but very few on W&W. And there are a lot of nice features in it, for example, maps.
Just my opinion. Alex.

Although a massive fan of Bradley and all older Wizardries, I have to agree that there is a lot in WW that really needed more explanation.
There is not enough info in the manual to enable sensible race / class decision eg I only switched my warriors to Barbarians because all advice said so, hopefully I'm going to get better hit points, but the manual doesn't say so.
And with Attributes, Skills and Traits to juggle with it does NOT help that the manual keeps referring to the term ABILITY. Who wouldn't be confused??
When levelling up, there is a flash of text as the cursor hovers over the skills, but it doesn't stay on screen. Shame - more pop-up help (that works!!) needed.

In the days of Bane of the Cosmic Forge, you were supposed to work these things out by re-playing the games 6 times - in those days, there were no handy web sites to go to for guidance - indeed, no forums or internet.
Good sites will undoubtedly develop to give us this info, but I think that is a large assumption to make.

I also really liked the way skills improved just with practice in Wiz 7 - a shame that's gone.
Monster AI in this game is also not a patch on MM6, MM7 or even up to the high (?) standards of Daggerfall - they will walk off a cliff walking trying to come towards you, and if only ranged weapons were more effective much fun could be had this way!
Doesn't model party disposition very well either - at least in the classic Wizardries you knew your first 3 would be attacked most - here, it seems only the leader is bearing the brunt of attacks. There is something altogether odd about a first person view when you're handling a party of 6 - no idea where the others are in relation to the enemy, and this misses out on some of the strategic fun had in, say, Pools of Radiance.
Wonderful game anyway - I just hope Bradley keeps going, listens to comments, and has the opportunity to do something even better yet.

I have been playing M&M series since 1991(MM3). And I will play M&M until M&M will loose turn-based comabt.

IMHO, all M&Ms are *GOOD* games(but M&M-6 was *EXCELLENT* and M&M-8 was just *BAD*), but are very limited as *RPG*. M&M series doesn't have roleplay feel and has serious flaws in design, but has *very-very-very* addictive and easy gameplay. In contrast Wizardry series(let W&W will be the part of the seris) *does* have roleplay feel(partly feel, of course) and minimal flaws in design, has *very* addictive, but *difficult* gameplay(Wizardry-7 is *EXTREMELY DIFFICULT* to play). It's my(my friends too) opinion as M&M and Wizardry series gamers.

DEMISE is the GREATEST rpg. The best game ever. I have played it for a year and i´m still
not finish it. the game has 31 dungeon levels and i´m at 24.

Check i out here:

http://www.artifact-entertainment.com/demise/