2xMagic from what I've heard. Though it might be someone getting 4e and 5e mixed up. But that is also the same for complex forms too.
Alchemy is.. well.. It sucks honestly. About the only saving grace is rule of Cool using enchanted arrows. Some people however will say "Nope wont work" at all on that though.
A couple of the hyperbole arguments against it is people loading up 10 arrows with an AoE, being able to get them at full potency, not having to deal with any drain or the drain goes away in an hour, being able to use invisibility, and filling a troll full of bolts with their team of four others doing the same thing.
In actuality.. My GM at the time ended up having to house rule that the resistance roll can only get up to 1/2 the dice the thing is rolling. Cause many times, I'd get no net hits. I wouldn't fail exactly fail I just wouldn't get net hits. So I wasn't getting potency. Even then, I was only getting 8 or 9 dice for the spells attack roll.
I dunno about any of you guys, but If I'm playing a caster, do you really want your 'main thing' to be 8-9 dice only with certain spells? Anything that wasn't a direct touch spell, I'd probably do a lower force, causing me to have even less dice.