I see your point. With all those spells available from turn 1, mages can immediately do considerable damage (and of course there's little reason to keep them in the lab anyway).
But I will say, I've really come to dislike your D9 bless. I much prefer Mictlan with an F9 bless. Give your thug/SC some fire resistance and decent protection and they're ready to go to work against Mictlan. With that D9 bless there's so many MR rolls to deal with that some fail - which is real threat to low HP units.
Which leads me to the Eater of the Dead.
I'd never summoned it before and was just looking for something tough to send against your sacreds. I'm happy with it so far, considering it's the only reason I still have that castle, and can report that after its first battle it's considerably stronger. Hopefully I can keep control of it for a while and not have it attack me...