Reread my P.S. I'm not jealous and I don't think others are.
My main issue is that if MI's are so terrible because they duplicate build, the same goes for HM as it does the same thing that MI's do.
This is a logical fallacy, because I could also say that the problem with Weapon Proficiencies is that they duplicate Damage Auras. It is literally a circular argument.
For your 3-4 build (depending on your class) you cast powerful ritual magics.
More like for my 3 - 4 build, I can read scrolls. If I could realistically cast every ritual ever at any difficulty ever for only 3 - 4 build, I'd consider this a better argument. But I can't, really. I currently have 96 build invested in Formals, and I still get ignored as a caster because I can't True Empower the "Good Stuff." But that's a gripe for another day.
Then you can cast some of those rituals for the cost of 1-2 reagents (as if you were a dragon mage minus the comp).
Suuuuuure, but...are you really willing to throw away that many components on it? Because that gets expensive really quick. The only thing I ever spellcraft are Spirit Recalls and Limited Circles, because everything. I mean, if you have a bunch of components just sitting around, and a bunch of scrolls, and you really, really, really want to feel INCREDIBLY POWERFUL for that event...I guess you could blow a bunch of HM on Spellcraft. But man...that's...so many components gone. So many. Also, some rits can't be crafted (the aura rituals come to mind).
Then you get the bonus of being able to wear Arcane Armor past your class limit. Then you get to have all these other nifty tools at your disposal like cloaking any thing you pick at logistics (you can even wait till the 2nd logistics, Saturday to pick depending on how the event is going. Ex. is heavy sleep event.), baneing, casting a Purify or Dispel while Silenced (huh?). Do you realize the power of that? The bane of existence for casters is the dreaded Silence. Not any more because of HM.
The Arcane Armor benefit is pretty sweet. I won't argue that. But I sorta think that as a caster gets higher level, they need a boost in their defenses to deal with the fact they're fighting guys swinging 10s instead of swinging 2s and 3s. This is pretty much the case in every game where stuff "scales upwards," in that even casters get defensive boosts. For Alliance, that translates into Arcane Armor boosts, Cloaks/Banes for casters, more Parries/Dodges for martial classes. And if you happen to know how the event is going to lean, you can focus your picks towards that. However, HM doesn't get you -that many- Cloaks. As a character approaching 28th level with 6 columns, I get 3 Cloaks. If I happen to be fighting undead, do I go necromancy cloaks? But even undead can throw spells. So maybe Binding? Who knows. The point is that there are events where I burn a couple HM Cloaks. There are events I burn none of them. I've had to use my Magic Augment a few times.
So, yeah, these things are useful. Way useful. Way more useful than the actual Ritual Casting portion of Formals. Because if HM didn't exist, then other than as a sweet RP skill, I'd put 15 build into Wear Extra Armor and the remaining 81 build into 3+ columns, and Seattle would be out its biggest active Earth formalist.