I love the idea of the Artificer, but find the class to be not good. Very limited spells, which would be okay, but... the infusions seem weak and something that will easily become outstripped by found magic items. I am currently playing a 3rd level Artificer so maybe they get better at 6th level? Would love to hear other perspectives. 

Subclass matters here. General consensus is that Alchemist is on the weak side while the other subclasses are quite strong. There's a level 6 Battle Smith in my current game and she's hitting like a Fighter while also having spells and a companion that's better than a Beastmaster Ranger's. She's also been able to use her Magical Tinkering feature to avoid combats and assist in other ways outside of combat. It basically feels like she's 1.5 characters.

Alchemist seems weak in battle but I still see potential there for a good support. More of a Jack of all trades in that they can do moderate damage, moderate healing, and support. Bump that moderate healing up to good if you play a game with enough downtime for them to actually craft portions, which they get boosted around level 10, so then they can heal without spell slots provided they have the gold. 

Artilliarist and Battle Smith are plenty viable though.