[curtadams]

For SP I have to agree with the OP. With practically any nation I can grab enough territory using a pretty much national army approach that by the time magic becomes relevent I've effectively won or at least played to the point of boredom, barring LA Ermor opposition or such. At least against the mostly normal troop armies the AI fields, 10+ archers or heavy infantry is far more useful than any mage who can't do a battlefield enchanment or large AOE spell, and cost about the same. To that you have to add lab and research costs. Likewise for the effort of making a strong SC I can just take scales to get bigger armies - even the best early SC is about as useful as one decent army, and often less. Against humans I can see how it's different, since humans have a better grasp of making units quasi-invulnerable to normal units and mages can be handy then.