So, this won't do anyone any good, but I finally put all the pieces of several things which were bothering me togather. Not much going on except the wonderful stuff Astral's been doing so I might as well get it off my mind.
So elves... I've been underplaying them. Back when I was playing, I'm not playing at all lately, but that doesn't really matter. I've been severly underplaying elves, probably moreso than any other race, and I've done almost everything with everything and I still couldn't think of a situation where I'd actually pick them as my race.
On the other hand, I've been singing praises about Sorcerers in general, and goblin sorcerers in particular, and also critisizing the class as being both incredibly storng and sort of reductive since most of it's strenght came from simply having +5 mana and being played as a strightforward prepped up spellcaster.
And then it hit me - the problem is that Sorcerers are not so much a class (the way I play them, and I've been rather sucessful with them) as much as Elves who start with a bunch of CP pops and have another CP benefit on top of their "Elf" one. It's why I go with the goblin so readily - if you took any elf, got a bunch of mana on him, you'd be looking for ways to refresh it.
Sure, you can go much higher on the +mana count with a heavy conversion Elf, but the simple fact is that you don't in fact need to. So whenever something called for a large mana pool spellcaster - I didn't go for an elf, I went for a sorceror. Starting with a large mana pool lets you spam for Mystera piety right away (and she gets you +2 more mana, +1 from subdungeon and you've got 18, find 2 more mana boosters + mystic balance = 4 fireballs), and if you're a gnome you get to refresh it easily, and if you're a goblin you get to refresh both health AND mana (and also up your fireball damage).
Bloodmages are better off as just about anything except elves (they don't really give a damn how large their mana pool is, and if you're just shooting for 12 eventually, Mystera and the 3 boosters or elven boots or 1 booster + mana pendant will get you there. Or to 15 + mystic balance, or you're even ok with 10 + mystic balance). Wizards are arguably fine Elves, but my wizard play is mostly about maximizing your Pissorff usage and that means Orcs over anything else, as well as kinda getting diminishing returns if you prioritize mana pool size over efficcency. Yes, Crystal Ball elf wizards can be ludicrous, but a bit overkill when they work and a bit too fireball focused for a wizard.
Anywho, I whish I came up with this earlier, but there you have it. The problem is that there's a class who's main selling point is that they're in fact elves which you can rivet other races on. This makes actual elves very redundant in my experience, especially since with Sorcerors you start CP'd and CP centric strats love an early advantage AND you don't have to prep for CP action to still get the benefits of it (without exploration due to the start).