Albion or Albi-not?

This friday evening I've fieldtested Albion for the first time in a 500 point battle against a friend.
I won the first battle in round 1 due to sheer bloody luck: David got the kick off and promptly suffered a miscast wich resulted in his necromancer losing a wound, next I pushed with a magical wind ( nasty beans) his unit of skeletons into his necromancer killing him outright.... my troops never even reached the first half of the table.
I won't go into all the details but the second battle was..... different, I got wiped big time.
1-1, seems fair to me.
My list consisted of:
1 magic level 2 Druid
1 30 strong warband with command unit and armed with optional spears
2 5 strong units of clansman cavalery with musician each, armed with optional javelins
1 unit of 3 hunters and 10 huntingdogs, hunters were given throwing axes as an extra
All in all it was a fun little list and I must say them buggers are nasty on the charge due to their Furor Celtica special rule.
BUT......
All their basic troops are... basic and even the special ones are more of the core with a bit of extra flavour and not really special at all apart from their pointscost that is.
Take the druid neophytes for instance: they only boost morale, I'd have made that unit a level 1 wizard.
Hearthguard: a Warband unit with a slightly better save.
Swordmaidens: Woadraiders with boobs and a bit meaner on the charge.
Only the Pixies and the Fir Bolg stand out from the crowd by a margin, thet former are flying garden pests and the latter is an undead unit.
So okay, I've made some tactical errors and I hadn't tried them before but I don't think they really work in small battles, I feel you really need those speacial and rare units if they want to stand a chance against all the other bullies in the playground.
Will I abandon them? Surely not, they are fun and can dish out a lot of hurt
Will I take them to the 500 point tournament? Surely not, it's meant to be a fun affair but only taking miniatures away just aint THAT fun.
I like to give them another go and they really ARE Celts but I think I'll just settle for my trusty deamons for now.
Still, lately I've been thinking on starting a new army but I'm not sure wich one.
Orcs and Goblins: my wife's ex-husband's a dedicated O&G player, I don't want to give her nasty memories.
Dark Elves: been there, no thanks
High Elves: defenetly out.
Lizardmen: never really liked them
Tomb Kings: see Lizardmen
Ogre Kingdoms: see Lizardmen
Skaven: to many models to paint
Brettonia: not really backed up by GW due to lack in popularity
Vampire Counts: those are allready all over the club, I'm not joining in too
Beastmen: I'm allergic to furry animals and owned a few previously, they're not really fun to paint.
Empire: I don't want to paint the same uniform over and over again
Chaos Dwarves: to expencive
Dwarves: I still have an army of them, pygmees actually, but they're not really my style
Wood Elves: my first 'love' and they brought me into the hobby, they may lure me into their clutches again someday.
Warriors of Chaos: I've got some Chaos Knights left and Avatars of War has some more than gorgeous Chaos Warriors and characters.
So wich will it be? Treehuggers? Or Deamonworshippers?