A lot has passed since I started my game and kept losing because my clubs were not equipped. Since a single cleric was a formidable opponent. Since I got overconfident and was hammered by ogres. Since I got my first OMG 500+ XP from a single fight. Since I wondered how could someone ever ever defeat a diamond golem.

After becoming level 20+ it became too easy. Even Monster breeding grounds in Doom were easily passable with only few rests in between (exceptions: demon lords who are fast enough to cast Eradicate before dying and Invisible things stealing important stuff from backpack)....

Although I did my own mapping, I used some of the maps in cluebook. Mainly in outside areas full of trees where you had to go against each wall separately to see which was fake (example: outside Raven's ruins). It just became too annoying, especially if you're not sure if you pressed the arrow key, which direction you\re facing now, whether you moved forward or not. Location spell helps, but if you've run out of spell points after fight and it was too dangerous to rest, it wasn't all that useful. Almost gives you motion sickness. Another place where I used maps was areas with lots of invisible barriers, where location spell wasn't even available. I also used the cluebook for checking which item does what, especially since there was no way to find it in-game (no identify spell), and using the item only gave you the message *Done*.

Big thanks to everyone who helped me in these 2 threads
http://www.gog.com/en/forum/might_and_magic_series/might_and_magic_1_questions
http://www.gog.com/en/forum/might_and_magic_series/mm1_alignement_shift

And finally 2 questions:
In the intro, there is an amazon lady sprite. Does it appear anywhere in the game? hers is the only one that I didn't come across.

When you reach gates to another world, you get a message that you can pass through if you got MM2 installed. Was it actually possible in the original Apple/NES game to move characters to MM2 this way?

As a bonus: how do you know you've played to much MM1? That's when you quit and restart a game everytime you want to load. I caught myself doing it several times in NWN after finishing MM.

Are you talking about the lady on a throne next to the sprite used for the castle lords?

If you solved one of the lord's quests where he asks you to "Discover the secret of Portsmith" then you should have seen that sprite in the game.

Yes. Where does she appear. As you attack the succubus queen?

EDIT: just checked, and yes, she's there. Must have missed it when I played it..

She is the Succubus Queen. That's the sprite that shows when you land on that square.

Congratulations for finding the secret of the inner sanctum ! No, in the apple version it's just like in the PC Version. You import your characters into MM2 (consider this as passing through the gates) and their levels and stats are reduced since level 20 is too easy to start the game (although you'll have to reach far higher levels and stats to finish MM2).
MM2 isn't available for the NES.

Great. I'm still in Sorpigal (leveling up to at least 3 so I'd survive outside).

Make sure that you save your game AFTER visiting the gates to another world. When you import your characters into MM2, it takes into account whether or not those characters have finished the first game. If you have finished MM1, then you don't get your level reduced as far as you would if you haven't finished the game. I'm not sure exactly what counts as finishing the first game so to be safe, make sure you sign back into an inn after visiting the gates to another world... that way you'll be sure.

Congratulations!
No, seriously. Finishing a game of this calibre is a feat of some note, especially without use of a walkthrough. Well done.

I envy you i dont know if i will ever finish it i suck at map drawing lol

Have your thief type character wander out onto the internet and find some [url=http://home.online.no/~rolfsr/mm/mm1/maps.htm]maps[/url] He can then come back and guide you through to the end of the game.

Thanks m8 it makes me feel continue to play now i know where im going :)

The GOG version also has a cluebook which contains many of the maps (although they are not fully annotated). Check your GOG account page, click on the MIght and Magic pack, and then look under "additional content". The cluebooks are also nice because they have all the item stats so you don't have to guess at them.

true abd most of the +1 requires you to be evil.

Well, I read some pre-character creation guides from gamefaqs, used maps from cluebook for weird mazey areas + all the help I got here, so not exactly without a walkthrough...

The good thing about this game is you can carry it around on a usb stick and play anytime anywhere (playing without sound on a tiny laptop screen doesn't make it less enjoyable).. and lots of areas where you can play around even if you know you have to stop playing after 10 mins.
It just requires a small change in mentality if you're used to new games. You're not guaranteed that the next fight won't erradicate your party, losing the uber sword you just got. Be prepared to die a lot...

Precisely. Those are the maps I used. The lack of annotation was actually a good thing for me because it meant no spoilers/direct answers.

but they also hard to read