So this time around I'm playing on the xbox with my perfected character - but I need to be prepared to keep my allies alive in later parts of the main quest. Putting the difficulty down to the minimum still isn't enough to keep people from dying - I lost almost every ally that followed me in Kvatch despite unleashing holy hell upon the enemies which all fell to my attacks almost instantly. Having played the game before, I know how it goes later on - annoying having to keep Martin alive as daedra swarm you during quests like 'Bruma Gate' and 'Light the Dragonfires'. I managed to beat this at level 25-30 something a year ago with my last character, constantly throwing target effect healing spells with a large radius and strength at my allies, but even then I have to reload several times before my luck finally held out for me.

Specifically, I'm not at that point yet, but by the time I hit those quests, my character is going to be level 49. And at that point, even on easy, I know that those daedra are going to be deadly against my un-leveled allies.

So please, post any strategies you can think of. Are there any spells I can exploit? I've thought of making a massive area paralysis on target spell with a long duration to try to freeze everyone in an entire battle at once (and then go around killing all enemies) - though I don't know if I'll be able to have enough magicka for something like that. At level 49, I don't think healing spells will be enough to keep Martin alive.

It's not Mehrunes Dagon I'm worried about - I always hit him with wabbajack and then promptly kill him temporarily - it's all those swarms of daedra and my allies that have no knowledge of military tactics or even the basic skill needed to stand a chance.

The only DLC I have is Shivering Isles and Knights of the Nine - so I won't be able to use Mehrunes Razor. If there are any crazy exploits left on the xbox that haven't been patched, I'd like to know what they are.

Heh, good luck indeed! On XBox. You already have the difficulty slider working for you. The only other thing you haven't mentioned is casting heavy chameleon on your allies. That would take a boatload of mojo to maintain though. . . .

Truck loads of Shield Spells is one idea that comes to mind for me. I recently beat the main quest with a level 36 Battlemage using truck loads of shield and healing spells. That was on the PC though not the xbox. I'm not to sure as to what else you could do. Prehaps look at a large amount of Charm/Calm spells inline with Command spells? Don't forget the trusty summon either. Something big would do it I think?

You could reverse pickpocket a bunch of zero weight heavily enchanted gear to everyone you are trying to keep alive. Otherwise I would say, if your playing with the slider down and you wont be taking a lot of damage, go into battles in clothing instead of armor. Get some of the super good rings and amulets, like the sorcerer's ring, mundane ring, ring of the iron fist, necklace of swords, and amulet of axes, wear whichever seems best and dedicate the rest of your equipment to fortifying magicka. Since you will be at 100% spell effectiveness, you can use the high level command spells (the ones that are up to level 25) to affect any level enemy. If you do that in a large area and affect a bunch of daedra then they should turn around and fight the unaffected ones, making your army bigger, and, more importantly, putting a shield of expendable temporarily friendly monsters in front of your important allies.

I once did the final Bruma battle at level 48.
I reverse pick-pocketed weightless daedric armor on my buddies, meaning everyone I could pickpocket. I enchanted it. In the end, I lost Jauffre, but not Baurus. I like Baurus.
I used AOE and targeted custom spells that I created that did shield, rally, healing. I also used custom touch spell with a little paralyze in it, to buy everyone a little time. I did use the command spell a lot too. I brought along custom restore magicka and health potions, so my magicka was constantly topped off before I actually entered the gate. I did this at the 75% difficulty slider.
In the end, during the battle my tactics amounted to this:
Take down one enemy.
Check on Martin.
Check on others.
Dance from one skirmish to the next, dealing power blows and spells, not necessarily killing the enemy, but weakening them enough that the others could take it down. Dance to the next. Deal. Then dance. Over and over. All the while I'm running back to check on Martin. Pretty much a whirlwind. Right before I went into the gate, I looked around and saw a lot of people standing there, so I knew I did ok. Just didn't know about Jauffre until later.

The Battle for Bruma mostly (for me) consists of using Azura's Star and a melee weapon enchanted with soul trap, shock damage, and weakness to magicka. Then between waves of enemies, I'd heal the main characters as best I could until the big gate shows up. The first time I did the big gate, it took me a while to find the best path, but once I found it, I've stuck to it since and I can get that gate closed in a matter of 2 minutes (if not quicker). Once in the big gate, I fortify my character with acrobatics and speed to rush through the gate like Flash Gordon or Duke Nukem on roids, ignoring all fights I don't have to do to get further. I find the quicker you get the big gate shut, the better chance you have of saving the main characters.

Once you reach the IC with Martin, it's the same basic strategy. Heal the essential characters between waves of daedra. Once in the temple district, find Martin and get him to stick with you while you run around the temple to discover Mehrunes Dagon. Once you get the quest update mentioning that Dagon is in the IC, run into the temple. Once again, ignoring any non mandatory fights I don't have to do to get further. From there, enjoy the cinematics. When you can ignore fights, speed is key. To my experience anyway.

Speed is seconded.

Really? According to the wiki (which is usually reliable), and by my experience, the battle in Bruma actually pauses once you enter the Great Gate.

just set their health really high in console if all else fails

There are indeed limitless creative ways of doing it on PC, but OP is asking for XBox solutions. :foodndrink: