Strategy advice wanted

[quantum_mechani]

Loren said:
... way more powerful than anything I can recruit or afford to empower.

First off, I get the feeling you are empowering way too much. Almost the only reason you will want to empower is to get at least one mage capable of doing high level forging/rituals in a given path. For instance, say you have ton of air gems, but only air 3 mages. In this case, spending the gems to empower a level in order to get booster items and air queens might be a viable choice.

Now, as for what your mages should be doing in battle, I advise phoenix power + fireballs, or raise skeletons. For troops, you can usually get by recruiting almost only lizard legionaries, and triari/alae when you need the gold for mages/mercs/buildings.