Raising magic is *really* expensive!, How can phys-ads keep up? Options

[OSUMacbeth]

So, a short bit of background: I've always been a sammy character in the great sammy vs. phsy-adept battle, but recently I've started an elf physical adept because I wanted to see just how bad 12 agility was at character creation. We use SECKSy, by the way, so skip any posts about my character is illegal. I have to admit, I was wrong about how badly adepts suck. I'm finding that while they don't have the sheer volume of options a samurai does in some areas, they balance it out in other ways. I am now cautiously optimistic that the two may be pretty well balanced (if you use Serbitar's .5 power point cost for attribute increases), though they can excel in different ways. But all that aside.

Sweet Lord God, what has happened with the costs to increase magic in 4th ed!? I can only assume that it was to tone down mages a bit, and it was probably even needed (my mage in 3rd initiated to 7 magic for a measly 9 karma, I think) but it seems to me that this change unintentionally hurts the adept. I mean, mages have about a bajillion powerful and flexible things they can do, and when their magic raises they get loads more powerful. But Adepts? We have 6 tiny power points at character creation, and they really don't go all that far. I find myself thinking "When I initiate and raise my magic to seven for *THIRTY-FOUR KARMA* which single ability or two will I get? The ability to ignore two whole boxes of damage mods? TWO whole more dice to dodge bullets with?" Don't get me wrong, I'm not arguing that adepts are necessarily underpowered, but I'm not sure I buy the argument anymore that our "unlimited" potential is so unbalancing since...well...who can afford to reach it. Long story short, does anyone else feel that this *MASSIVE* increase to raising magic is hurting adepts un-necessarily in order to reign in mages?

OSUMacbeth