Same. I tried out the wolves and jellyfish when I first got them and wasn't impressed. As a result I wound up ignoring spirit ashes entirely. I upgraded some of them to see if that would prompt anything from from Roderika but otherwise never used. I did use NPC summons, though, for what little good that did.
Similarly I was terrible with ashes of war as well. I'd use them for affinities and stat scaling but would always forget to use the actual skills. Never touched magic either after the first few hours I spent on my short lived astrologer that I hated. Turns out I played through the game in one of the most boring ways possible. I just bled everything to death with my dual katanas like a barbaric samurai. Loved it, though.