[Quitti]

Well, CBM is enabled in around half or more of llamaserver MP's, which seem to be the majority of multiplayer games organized here. I can't say for other forums though.

But getting back to the topic - astral seeming too good. It is good. Very good. You can't go wrong with recruiting astral mages really, it offers very good spells, but mostly in the form of MR negating effects - there are a few exceptions like stellar cascades and Astral geyser which don't seem to see the use they should (well, perhaps astral geyser isn't that good afterall, it's a good opener if you call a few horrors though). SCs can easily have around 25-30 MR, I've seen 40 MR without artifact MR gear (mainly mage bane) used on a pretender. Death has it's own version of soul slay and has very good summons in conjuration (tartarians, different types of mages) and in echantment (liches, behemoths) and even their own remote raiding spell which beats pretty much any reasonable PD in the game, and one should never forget soul vortex which is one of the best tools an SC can have vs. armies.

The elemental paths have useful spells, but are a bit easy to counter or easily reduce the effectiveness of them in the form of resistance spells and thug/sc immunity gear, with maybe the exception of combination of water and fire in the form of acid spells. Still, they have their uses like it has been said in this thread.