Five levels of magic including a random would seem a bit high for an ostensbily low-magic empire. Good thing it was a typo.
If more games were on maps with few magical sites, slow research and high resources... might be regular Ulm's niche. For something more magical, well, there's Iron Faith or Black Forest, although IF research is a serious problem, and BF requires some ugly scales, IIRC.
Having Black Steel and strength does seem quite thematic, however. If that's not enough, one might wonder whether the focus on the mundane should offer, say, an Administration bonus or Supply, as nerds that might otherwise study magic get channeled into other vocations such as being efficient civil servants or logistics gurus.
