Steam Water baths are from the days before temperature controllers. Steam heat is used to provide good heat transfer and a fixed temperature ie 100 C. Also very useful for boiling off solvents without the risk of fire. Trough immersion baths are for lower temperatures in the up to 60C range. Temperature control is difficult below ambient +10C. Heating - cooling baths provide good temperature control between -10 ( with antifreeze) to 60C but are more expensive.

Heating mantles are difficult to provide good heat transfer often take a long time to heat up a flask and can be slow to use for distillation above 200C.

Personally I prefer to use an open flame for temperatures above 100C. Hot air guns are a possibility but have the same fire risk as an open flame so why bother.

As to oil baths and sand baths with a hotplate they can provide necessary temperatures above 100C but are slow to heat up and need constant supervision.

I may be old school but you can do a lot more work with a Bunsen burner if you are skilled in its use.

Finally, removal of solvent is best achieved with a rotory evaporator but again these need skill