Is there an incongruous distribution of magic?

[Micah]

Erm...doing a bit of setup for a BE (especially one that doesn't kill your mages) is pretty bar for the course...

Even without a communion it's pretty easy to drop a single booster onto your caster, cast summon storm power and then burn an extra gem while casting to get mists off.

The one time empowerment cost to get to A4 for the boosters (assuming you can't get there some other way, via trading, etc.) isn't THAT steep. You're also flat-out wrong about the helms being at A5.

Thunderstrike is also an incredible spell. It's lower research level than falling foo and has 50 range. A single caster with each spell might fall in favor of the bigger AE spells, but if you bring along a whole squad of mages the range advantage of thunderstrike will become obvious, since the army getting pounded by it will be well on the way to routing before their mages even get in casting range. If you commit enough mages to a fight you'll find that 3 casts of it per mage is generally enough to do the job. It's also never rendered obsolete against troops. Army of Niefelheim completely shuts down cold damage and army of gold makes fire magic pretty worthless...the best you can do against lightning is a 50% resist from storm warriors.