[johnarryn]

A good bless for Ulm is neither particularly feasible nor a particularly good idea. Your sacreds are cap only and not that great - the maidens are better melee units and archers. So don't even worry about a bless.

Your initial instinct about wanting some astral is a good idea... if you don't take any one the pretender chassis, you'll need to hope for a lucky indy find. On the other hand, you have sufficient access to earth, nature, air, water and even fire. Death is also covered by some lucky randoms, and lets you forge skulls of fire.

One game I played as EA Ulm, that I ended up winning, involved an awake cyclops with earth of at least 4, as i recall. The reinvigoration is helpful with the mages and the Cyclops kickstarts your expansion. Along with your fairly good nationals, you should look to expand quickly while building forts to churn out all the mages you'll need to get good randoms. Then site search like crazy and hope for some good indie mages.