Alchemy? Worth it?

[Metathron]

In my last game as mage, I maxed alchemy early on and upgraded a whole lot of spells (but certainly not all) to 3rd level. However, I ended up frequently using only about a dozen: battle cry, bless, resurrection, dragon slayer, demon slayer from Order; slow, precision, geyser, magic shackles from Distortion; fireball and flaming arrow (later made obsolete by fire rain), doom, and poison skull from Chaos.

Of course, that's not to say that the other spells are useless (though some certainly seem so...last hero - what the frell?), just that they require a different tactic.