Thanks, that's clear. True on less magic in ASWS, and also good point about MoM getting more into politics and plotting, and of course dragon pet. More magic, intrigue, and dragons are definite pluses.
But I do think there is a bit of running around back and forth in MoM like there is in ASWS, and also I think MoM is full of bugs, more so than ASWS. My first two playthroughs with MoM led me to see some scenes but others to be skipped, with second playthrough showing me scenes I didn't see in first playthrough, but missing scenes I saw in the first playthrough. Very annoying. Now I know to strictly follow whatever the walkthrough says is the next step (except when it has no step to offer...), but that makes the game a lot less fun because part of the joy of RPGM is the ability for player to explore and now I'm afraid to explore because it'll fuck up the events playing when they should. Not good.
So this made me reticent to do anything with Calamity, because I was worried it is supposed to be saved for later or I'd fuck up the events again. Thankfully, mrttao explained how Calamity works without ruining the story, so I feel better about that part. But really, it's not good that the buginess of the events gives me anxiety for anything to do with optional content.