Yeah... the extra races give your town some visual diversity, their houses are one-0by-one so they fit in some small places you may have left over, and since you can't change their classes, if you leave enough room in your adventuring party (remember, maximum for the entire game: 16) you can hire plenty of the other races to ENSURE a stable stock of black mages or white mages or thieves or whatnot. I personally really dig the Yukes... especially since they pull double duty since they're either randomly black or white mages.
They do give you SOME added options... but not enough to discount the fact that their main contribution is visual diversity.
Also, they say they get "wiped out." They don't "die", they limp back home and sulk in bed. If you visit them, they sulk for only one day.
And yeah, you usually skip over battle reports, but they're useful in seeing just how your adventurers are getting wiped out so that you can better construct parties or get a good idea of what you're up against.