How do I mage?

[marv4791]

I've played Skyrim for hundreds of hours and I've experimented with a number of different builds. But I've never played the magical character.

 

The main reason is that the whole thing overwhelms me. You start with 2 spells, you add more, suddenly you've got dozens and I have no idea what to pick?

 

My primitive brain always goes back to basics: get big axe, swing into enemy head, enjoy blood splatter.

 

But I'd like to become more cerebral and learn how to mage.

 

Can somebody recommend a build or a guide of some sort? 

[Jacob201]

Its not really that complicated, you level magic skills and find better spells from dungeons and merchants. Prepare to run away/hide from enemies alot though Lol.

For me the vanilla spells were a big disappointment, not much variation and no match to an battleaxe.

 

I recommend some magic mods (Apocalypse, midas evolved, grimoire, etc) just to add some spice to the relatively bland vanilla.

[GodSmack]

Honestly i dont think there is a build or guide for this, if there is its not needed, the best way is to pick a type of magic you want to go into and prioritize that class first before anything, and once(if) you think you have a decent understanding of that class try another on a different save maybe and so on until you have a full understanding of if magic is for you. it also kinda depends on if you are using a mod for your perks like perkus for example.

 

ive had fun using magic from time to time on my mage mains, however i have yet to try a healer/alteration since it would require that my followers be competent.

 

i look at the classes of magic like this

 

Destruction - easy way to get the job done, pick a element and send your enemies into a painful grave. get a follower that can tank and peel

 

conjure - a bit complicated as the vanilla version requires you have some skill in weapons for full effect, or you can go for straight necro and create an army of dead people that will probs die in 3-4 hits till you reach higher levels.

 

healing - MAYBE the easiest depending on if you have a good follower that can peel waves off you and crushes your foes with overwhelming force (2 handed)

 

illusion - i haven't gotten much into this one but its pretty much just fooling your enemies into either attacking each other, stopping attacks, or sending enemies running in fear, very situation.

 

alteration- this effects your abilities  and grants sight in dark caves and allows you to breathe underwater, again situation but handy in some cases.

[endgameaddiction]

I actually enjoyed being a mage over melee in Skyrim. Being a mage has always been much more challenging and requires you to have quick fingers and think fast. Which means you use spells depending the weakness of a creature. The downfall of magic is that most mobs are weak to fire and gives a big disadvantage to the other two element spells. I guess I can see why Nords hate magic. It's not the magic itself, it's just pointless in skyrim even though it's much more fun than melee.

 

I never used any mage mods so I dunno. Maybe I will if ever I return to Skyrim.

 

 

[marv4791]

Thanks for some good advice, I will download some of those magic mods even though the idea of even more spells is overwhelming haha

[afa]

Cheese enchanting until you can cast spells with zero cost.

Forget all the perks that cuts spell cost unless they are pre-req for useful perks.

Get Impact and spam dual cast shock spells. Ice when need to run away, fire for trolls.

 

Use Conjuration for tank if you need to. Alteration for extra defense and quality of life stuff. Can occasionally use Illusion for emergency charm, buff allies, and unorthodox tactics.

 

By the numbers magic will never reach the damage potential of any physical build, but there are tactical advantages for range and area of effect attacks.

 

Keep an eye out for enemies level and Illusion level cut off if using mods that increase enemies level.

[Cema]

it's not that much that you've got tons of spell, it's more like you have tons of spell, the damage dont scale with the level, the gameplay is boring and you get oneshot by archers.

[Shivalala]

Its not really that complicated, you level magic skills and find better spells from dungeons and merchants. Prepare to run away/hide from enemies alot though Lol.

For me the vanilla spells were a big disappointment, not much variation and no match to an battleaxe.

 

I recommend some magic mods (Apocalypse, midas evolved, grimoire, etc) just to add some spice to the relatively bland vanilla.

 

This running away thing took me out of the whole Mage roleplay. I can hear that chase music in my head https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnHmskwqCCQ

[SableShrike]

Honestly, if you keep your load order light and don't use conflicting mods, the SPERG overhaul is my personal preference for Maging.

With it your summons, wards, bound weapons, and spell scaling are all fixed.  The perks do INTERESTING things, not just a stupid-ass 50% cost reduction.

Best of all, it opens up totally new pathways for some of the underwhelming schools.

 

Illusion has a lot of perks granting you phantasmal allies, say.

Enchanting, which is boring as shit usually, now lets you do fun stuff with artifact level items.

 

Staves can teach you unique spells, et cetera...

 

Best part is, SPERG introduces these quality of life changes to ALL perk trees.  Everything about Skyrim seems more fun with it, and the boring "level locking" perks are all auto-gain.  Meaning you don't have to waste time earning perk points for Novice, Adept, etc. perks.  You get them automatically as  you level.

Which is, you know, logical.

I've tried all the rest, but I always go back to vanilla spells and SPERG.  Don't need anything else.

[Jacob201]

 

Its not really that complicated, you level magic skills and find better spells from dungeons and merchants. Prepare to run away/hide from enemies alot though Lol.

For me the vanilla spells were a big disappointment, not much variation and no match to an battleaxe.

 

I recommend some magic mods (Apocalypse, midas evolved, grimoire, etc) just to add some spice to the relatively bland vanilla.

 

This running away thing took me out of the whole Mage roleplay. I can hear that chase music in my head https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZnHmskwqCCQ

 

 

Yep.. the music sums it up pretty good.  x)

Enters dungeon. Attacks Bandit thug with firebolt and sparks. Uses all mana and potions. Bandit still has 60% health. Runs around the dungeon jumping and trying to evade the greatsword/battleaxe. This music. Ends up beign beheaded. 

Maybe im just a horrible mage?

[marv4791]

God that music made me laugh. Reminds me of playing Requiem.

[Varithina]

 

 

Its not really that complicated, you level magic skills and find better spells from dungeons and merchants. Prepare to run away/hide from enemies alot though Lol.

For me the vanilla spells were a big disappointment, not much variation and no match to an battleaxe.

 

I recommend some magic mods (Apocalypse, midas evolved, grimoire, etc) just to add some spice to the relatively bland vanilla.

 

This running away thing took me out of the whole Mage roleplay. I can hear that chase music in my head <snip video>

 

 

Yep.. the music sums it up pretty good.  x)

Enters dungeon. Attacks Bandit thug with firebolt and sparks. Uses all mana and potions. Bandit still has 60% health. Runs around the dungeon jumping and trying to evade the greatsword/battleaxe. This music. Ends up beign beheaded. 

Maybe im just a horrible mage?

 

 

Nope, its pretty much standard fare for any low level mage in any game, try summoning things to sorta tank things, they won't do very well, but even the familiar summons will do some damage, and it will stop the bad guy attacking you for at least a bit of time.

 

Don't forget that even as a mage you can still haul around an axe or other weapon for those moments of hell I'm out of poitions and mana, pulls out sword, axe whatever, die scum die, chop, chop, main, main. After all even without perks into 1 or 2-h you can still hit people and things with them, and any intelligent mage will carry a weapon as backup, burn them with magic then when you are out, chop them into kibble with the appropriate weapon, a nice big 2-h sword or are just make enemies go wtf, when the mage pulls them out

[Coopervane]

Maybe im just a horrible mage?

 

Nops, magic is just wholly broken in this game.

 

 

Destruction: All the spells are too weak compared to physical weapons, and you have no means of boosting them. With physical weapons you have so many options to make them more powerful, via perks, alchemy, enchanting and smithing, aswell the game giving you better tiers of weapons even before you could make them yourself, there's a constant progression in your power output. With Destruction magic you can do none of that, spells do the damage they do (which is not enough), there's only 2 perks to boost damage per school (and they don't boost enough), buying better spells is gated off by your level, enchants can only lower spell-cost not damage output, you can't get crit's or stealth bonuses, and really all you can do is dual cast, but at twice the cost. The progression is borked too, start a game and swing a sword around a few times and you'll quickly have gained 3 levels in one-handed, but even with the Mage's stone enabled, leveling up Destruction takes an eternity. Passive race bonuses like 50% frost resist for all Nords also means that frost magic is rarely very usefull, fire spells face the same problem on Solstheim since all the Reavers have 50% fire resistance and so forth, unlike swinging an axe in to someone's bonce, which will always have predictable results, you actually have to think about what you're using on whom with Destruction magic.

 

Illusion: Muffle and Invisibillity are really useful for stealth-based char's, as is the silent-casting perk, but that's the only use i ever had for Illusion, and it's not a use that benifits pure mages. Illusion spells are all about crowd control and combat avoidance, which is fine in theory, but it's not really worth using because of one vital flaw. All the spells only work on enemies up to level X, if the enemy is higher level than the spell can handle, then you just wasted precious time and magica casting it and have nothing to show for it, the enemy won't even stagger from the hit or anything. You can't see what level your enemies have in this game, thus using an illusion spell is a complete gamble. So why do it? There's so many other things you could do instead that is garuenteed to have an effect.

 

Restoration: The healing magics are fine except they take just as long to level up as Destruction does. All the "turn undead" style spells have the exact same problem as the Illusion spells though, they only work up to a certain level, you can't see enemy levels, so it's a gamble every time. Why not just set the charging Drauger on fire instead? That you atleast know will do something..

 

Alteration: The utillity-belt of the magical schools. Most of them are fine and even a bit fun to use, waterbreathing, telekinesis, paralyze and so forth. The mage-armour spells however face a similar problem to the destruction magics, namely that they are enferiour to the physical counterpart. Again, with physical armour you have so many means to improve your protection, many tiers of armour that you can just find anywhere, lots of perks to take, enchantments that boost light/heavy protection, and of course the smithing/alchemy/enchanting loop that will let you turn even a low tier armour into an armour of the gods. You get none of this with mage-armour, a few tiers of spell with increasing cost of use, and gated behind your Alt-level before you can buy them, only 3 perks to take which you get access to way too late and they completely fail if you're wearing just a single piece of physical armour, you've got no protection untill you cast it (curse you, sneaky pouncing Saber cat's!), and the cost comes out of the same pool you need to do damage with. Mage armour does start to be viable in the mid to late game, but it's completely unbalanced in the early game, because the perks you need to make actual use of it as a mage don't become avalible till you're Adept level. Before then, you're going to have a bad time trying to play a pure mage.

 

Conjuration: Bound weapons are very useful in the early game, even to the point of beeing overpowered as it gives you access to a tier of weapon you shoulden't have yet, but without the means to improve them via smithing and enchanting, their usefulness quickly starts to vane as you progress, till finally becoming the worst option you have for a physical weapon. Necromancy and summons are of limited use i find, unlike the enemies who seem capable of permanently enthralling the dead, you only get to rent them for a short period of time, the AI they get is limited (can't figgure out how to sneak for instance), and again you've got the problem with spells only working up to a certain level, but you can't see what level that corpse you want to raise is, so it's a gamble. In the late game when you can summon in some reasonably powerful stuff it becomes viable, but early on it's not that good..

 

 

Looking at it objectively, beeing a mage in Skyrim is crap, you will always be better off focusing on physical armour and weapons, or alternatively stealth. Magic just can't compete, you don't do enough damage, you don't get nearly the same protection, improving takes much longer and comes in big perk-blocked steps instead of there beeing a constant upgrade path, there are fewer ways to game the system and give yourself an advantage, and just on and on. Magic sucks in Skyrim.

 

 

But that said, i always end up playing a Stealth/Magic based char in Skyrim. Why? Well because as broken as it is, it's also a lot more fun.

Skyrim's sword'n'board, 2-handed and archery mechanics are functional, but extremely basic. There's really no skill involved, it's all about passive buffs, perks and weapon/armour tiers, just get on the treadmill and make sure to level up your stuff, the rest is just mindlessly swinging away at the enemies and administering a healing potion or spell as needed. The first char i made for Skyrim was a Nord warrior, and i got my fill of it with that char alone, it just got tedious and dull so very quickly.

 

With Stealth and magic though, yeah it's pretty broken, and fluctuates violently between beeing overpowered when you get it right, and completely useless when you get it wrong, and the progression curve is all over the place, but atleast it requires some modicum of engagement from you, you do have to think and plan a bit, and exicute it with some level of skill and forethought (not a whole lot, it's still quite basic, but certainly more than "mash mouse-1 till victorious").

 

 

But definately shop around for mods, because magic really is quite broken in many ways, and there are means to improve it. 

[BRANDNEWMEMBER777]

[ Coopervane kind of beat me to the punch in some points, vanilla mage is unfairly challenging as opposed to melee/stealth types.  More so If you try cloth mage.  Seriously, you kind of feel like a sidekick mage to Conan. ]

 

I've been trying to figure this it out myself. From a Vanilla (no magic/combat/perk overhaul) standpoint: 

* If you are somehow trying to play an oldskool all cloth wearing (no shields)/ non melee pure caster (daggers ok, maybe swords like Gandalf).

1) Run away, a lot, run away!

2) If it has a Two-Hander, RUN AWAY!

3) If it is an Orc, RUN RUN RUN AWAY!

4) Double this if it is an Orc with a Two Hander.  RUN FASTER!

 

Seriously: Caveats are that Destruction damage does not scale,  you have to hit foes from a distance (or be smothered), It likely will not oneshot anything beyond wolves (unlike stealthy bow strikes), and it makes noise (unless you take that illusion perk).  I'm level 21 and don't have Impact yet (an essential tool if you go this route) as my destruction skill is currently at 35 .

On another note, using Ward spells from Restoration to block consume mana, take time to charge up, and can break.

-> Again, this is from a non battlemage/non spellsword perspective, just dagger and robe mage.

 

Hint: Legendary difficulty setting will burn you out as Destruction is even more useless.  Everything has way too many hitpoints and can oneshot you.  It takes forever just to kill a standard entry level Dragon.  Practice on Expert.

 

So: pick your choices in terms of usefulness.

 

0)  Treasure any found staff!  They are lifesavers early on, you just need to charge them every once in awhile.  Found scrolls can be handy as well. Scrounge for soulgems.

 

1) Restoration : Unless you plan to buy every potion in the game or craft it yourself, this is self explanatory.  From a pure mage perspective, chose the recovery perk for mana regeneration.  Ward spells can are useful if well timed.  If you use a tanking follower (recommended early on) you can level it by healing your follower.  **

2) Enchantment: If you ever plan to achieve anything as a mage (or, generally, as anything in Skyrim), focus on this skill.

3) Alteration: Vital to your prolonged existence.  A cloth mage needs mage armor/perks. Magic resistance is a boon. Even light spells are essential. 

4) Conjuration: Spam minions, simple and effective.  ***    Soul Trap is essential, but it may be best to give a follower a bow enchanted with soul trap, some gems, and let them hunt.

5) ... Destruction: Because you do need to shoot things at some point.   I wish I had impact already.

 

6) I forgot Illusion: It seems immensely fun and situational.  The mind affecting spells are super-powerful to a point if specced right (example: pacify spell works on mobs up to level 87 if specced right). Those are highly situational.  Muffle is an easy way to level stealth and along with Quiet Casting has its uses.

 

Others: 

A) Smithing: yes, for the sake of boosting your followers, just get it to 60 and put 2 points on it to get arcane smithing.  It's very easy to level if you buy leather straps/leather from smiths and craft leather bracers.   This way, you have some skill at tempering their gear and can improve upon enchanted loot.

Alchemy is useful for making potions that boost Enchantment/Smithing and making mana/heal pots (or stamina pots for RUNNING)!

 

! Make a Mad Dash for the 'Lord Stone'.  Then work on quests that permanently increase your defenses/offense. (Agent of Mara. Not sure if Agent of Dibella also does extra magical damage to the opposite sex, but it's worth a shot).

 

** I recently got 'Volsung' at < level 15 [i had it on Legendary, wow] , by mountain climbing and having my follower shoot arrows at the dragon priest while I healed her.  Note: Barbas was along for the ride and was most useful.  If a dog takes you for a ride, make sure to turn the tables to get the most of it. [side note: Dragon Priest masks are mostly useless in combat from a Cloth/mage armor caster standpoint.  But I can swim like an Argonian with this one, and carry a lot of fish.]

 

*** Do not underestimate the usefulness of 'Conjure Familiar' (yes, the weak glowing wolf) over other summons.   It is a novice spell with a low mana cost (you're going to put a point into it anyway).  It is low cost, casts quickly, and will run instantly towards your attacker.  It can be used to halt the Orc with the two hander that has been chasing you (wolf will die of course), buying you time to heal or regenerate mana for a better spell. It can flush out enemies on unexplored dungeon corners.  If something shoots at you in a dark forest at night, summon wolf, it will show you the path towards the attacker.  My follower became stuck on a tower during the first summoning of Potema in Wolfskull Cave (there went my backup).  Instant wolf was often more useful than Flame Atronarch as it bought me time and rushed the attackers (got it done with wolf and a bit of fiery friend).  There is a certain comfort in having a useful spell  you are not afraid to spam because of its low cost.    If the Riverwood Trader happens to sell Conjure Familiar when you reach Riverwood on vanilla, Buy it (chop wood if you have to, just buy it.  If you're a Breton, you already start with it).  You can do Bleak Falls Borrows at < level 3 with wolf (the bandits at the beginning are a bigger challenge), Giant Spider is a joke with a few spams of wolf (save the scrolls for the tougher draugr when you go for the tablet). [You can actually get the golden claw and the tablet in the same run and then present it to a surprised Farengar].

 

Summary:  RUN, Spam Wolf, Run Away...

 

'Disclaimer'  This is not a paid endorsement to the Conjuration school of magic, though I can't wait till the day I can spam 2 wolves (just cuz i can).

 

 

 

 

[afa]

As weak as it is magic works fairly well.

The crux lies in how fast can you get to enchanting up to get 0 spell cost.

 

All build will eventually go toward smith/alc/enchanting, then restoration (heal) and alteration (magic defense), and sneak+Illusion (stealth) with a choice on offense and defense.

Mages can kind of skip smithing as long as Alteration keeps up reasonably well, temper armor doesn't really get insane until you start mixing all three crafting skills, and at the top of Alteration Dragonhide basically does the same thing also Alteration is easy to level. Plus mages can wear armor if needs be then stack armor spells on top early on.

 

Again Impact on Destruction is straight up broken and all you really need are the augmented perks and expert spells to really "complete" the build which is available at I think 70 destruction? Master spells are pretty bad. Dragonborn DLC helps.

 

The thing with magic is that it actually requires very little to get going and max out early.

[Shadowhawk827]

OK, I've tried writing this three damned times and the website keeps eating my reply before I can post it,  One last try though. >(

 

First, yes the complaining in above posts is right, mages are weak at low levels.  So are AD&D mages and mages in many other games.  You have to use your brains to survive until you get to higher levels.  That's what makes it fun and challenging.

 

Ok, so I've seen great advice on mods and such but not much on general tactics.  Let me see what I can add to the discussion in that regard.  I'm also going to write this based on a vanilla mage.  There are tons of mods out there that change magery a hundred different ways, so it'd be problematic to cover all the possibilities here.  Besides, if you get the basics down, the additional options from mods become easy.

 

Some, perhaps most, of this stuff will be fairly basic too.  It bears repeating and being put in the context of playing a mage character though.  Likewise, becoming a master of anything starts with mastering the basics.

 

THE VERY BASICS:
First, keep a steady supply of health and magicka potions handy.  Nothing worse than dying from running out of magicka and being unable to defind yourself.  This means alchemy is going to be an important part of ANY mage's skill set, and that you'll probably never want to pass a mountain flower without harvesting it, lol.  Remember also that eating ingredients can substitute in a pinch if you run out of potions (same with food for healing).

 

Pace Yourself: I've seen mages forget that they are mages and charge down dungeon halls like a twinked out tank screaming "Raw Meat! Raw Meat! Raw Meat!",  Remember you're a glass cannon at best.  Slow it down and take the time to let your health and magicka recharge after each encounter.  Use a heal spell to restore health after each fight also, unless your health is so high it's not worth it.  Doing so builds your Restoration skill.

 

Keep Your Spells Current: The vast majority of vanilla Skyrim's spells are are tiered variations on the same handful of spells.  They become less and less effective as you level also.  Buy the books for the latest teir.  A cheap mage is a dead mage.  You want the strongest spell that you can cast without seriously draining your magicka.  That GENERALLY means tbe same tier as your spellcasting skill for that school based on your skill points (ie 25 points = Adept).  If you've sunk alot of perk points into a school's tree, you may be able to go one tier higher.

 

Keep Your Best Spells and Health / Magicka Potions on Your Favorites Menu:  Trust me, it makes life much easier

 

 

 

PROTECTION:
No NOT the Sexlab type of protection, lol.  Seriously though, this is fundemental enough to merit discussing early on, even before my section on combat in general.  You're essentially going to have two variations on defense here, even with mods.  First is armor, and the second is protection spells.

 

          1) Armor: Not purist in the AD&D or Tolkein sense, but mages wearing armor has been a part of The Elder Scrolls since  Arena was first released.  Imperial Battlemages in  

          particular wear (wore) heavy armor.  Point being it's NOT a crime against humanity to be an armor wearing mage.  Bonuses are that armor holds a wider variety of

          enchantments than clothes and those are generally the good protection ones.  Two more pieces to enchant also.  Drawbacks are additional weight, your Mage Armor spells

          will be weaker, and IIRC your magicka recovers slower also.

    

          2) Mage Armor Spells: More AD&D purist, challenging and fun.  These spells improve your armor rating as if you were wearing armor.  The two unbreakable rules here are

          Always cast the spell before ANY combat and make sure you have the best level of armor spell that you can cast without depleting your magicka.

 

         Why cast before EVERY combat you ask?  First, it has to become a habit.  Secondly, Murphy's Third Law of Magery states that when you take that wolf 20 levels below you

         for granted, he'll turn out to be a distraction for a angry giant 20 levels above you.

 

Beyond that, there's Wards.  I'm not a big fan of them myself.  They drain magicka like crazy and the game is very good at baiting you into using them excessively if an enemy sees you using them.  Their protection is limited against physical damage also.  My personal advice is to get good at footwork instead, and if you use them, practice keeping them up just long enough to block attacks.   

 

 

FOLLOWERS:
Their AI can still make them a pain to deal with but followers are much more useful for a mage character.  You only have to think of the standard AD&D party to realize why; they're meat shields for you.  That being the case, the type of follower you want is generally going to be one with strong armor and a high damage weapon so they hold aggro and survive the process.

 

Keep your follower(s) healed too, At least between encounters if you're not a dedicated healer.  They're your bodyguards and again, it's building your Restoration skill.

The only other thing I can add here is to remember to manage your own aggro carefully at the beginning of a fight.  In non-MMO terms that means do NOT lead off a fight with a master level fire AOE spell unless it's going to clear the room.  Otherwise the bad guys are all going to ignore your meat shield and come for you.  Better to lead off with something more stealthy & devious.

 

 

 

GENERAL COMBAT:
The biggest skill a mage can actually have is footwork.  This is especially true when it comes to ranged combat where vanilla missiles and spells fly at obscenely slow speeds.  Footwork can be broken down into two general techniques:

 

          1) Backpedaling while Attacking: This is a life saver, literally.  Anybody who has PVP'ed in WOW against an experienced rogue knows how damned annoying it can be to be on

           the other end of it too.  The best ones can backpedal in circles constantly while attacking.  Other than a little practice, the main thing this skill takes is situational awareness.

           You have to keep mental note of the terrain and where obstacles are.  That way you won't back into a wall instead of through a door, etc...  Third person view helps here.

 

          2) Sidestepping or Strafing: This is a cheap and easy alternative to wasting magicka on ward spells.  Distance attacks are woefully slow if the game is unmodded.  It's an easy

          skill to master too.  The main barrier for most folks is obsessing over offense instead of a balanced strategy.  When you get good at dodging distance attacks, work on melee

          ones.  Most power attacks telegraph horrendously.  You just have to watch NPC body language.

 

          Learning those skills can save you a ton of hit points, and by extension, a lot of magicka points by not needing healing spells or potions.

 

The RIght Tool For The Job: The next thing that's sometimes overlooked is choosing the right destruction spell.  Several enemies have a weakness to one of the three types of vanilla destruction magic.  Electricity is good against mages for example, becuase it depletes magicka also.  Undead (most of them) have a serious vulnerability to fire, but shrug off cold like a Nord on steriods.  Learn what spells work best on which foes and be ready to switch as needed.  This also means hitting the specialization paths on the destruction tree should be secondary to the other perks on that tree.

 

The Right Accessories: I probably should have put this in the protection section above, but related to that, make sure you have a Doom Stone, enchanted jewelry, etc... that add to your spellcasting ability in some way.

 

Learn to Use a Weapon:  Tempting as it is to reply only on your magic, there will be times when magic isn't that effective (dragons, for example, have an annoyingly high resistance to lowbie magic), or despite your best plans, you run out of magicka.  Being good with a class of weapons and carrying one of that weapon type can be a vital backup.  If nothing else, remember your weapons skill is going to effect how well you can use a conjured weapon.

 

Staves: Relating to weapons, keeping a good staff as a backup can be a life saver.  Remember that the charge level of a staff correspoonds to the skill of it's user.  That means a high destruction skill gets more use out of a staff of fireballs and a high conjuration skill will get more use out of a summoning staff.

Anything else I could add here is going to best fall into other categories.

 

 

 

FIGHTING DIRTY / USING YOUR BRAIN:
Sort of an extension of the general combat section, but it merits it's own section.  I see too many mages in all manner of games that get obsessed with simply trying to out DPS (damage) their opponents.  It kind of reminds me of the stereotypical twinked out tank who runs from mob to mob chanting "Raw Meat! Raw Meat! Raw Meat!" as they go.   yes, I literally saw that once also with an entire party in an AD&D game that got out of hand.

 

Mages, until they get high level, are generally better off thinking like a devious stealthy character.  Use the Detect Life and Detect Dead spells to scout the areas ahead for example.  As another example of devious, if you find a room full of bad guys, set down some rune spells and lure them into them while backpedal attacking.  Nothing like luring your enemy into a mine field.  Likewise there's the previously mentioned Frenzy spell covertly cast from a safe distance.

 

As with a stealthy character, there's nothing wrong with luring enemies into traps within a dungeon either.  In Bleak Falls Barrow in particular, I make use of almost every trap in the dungeon.  Always laugh my rear off when that first Restless Draugr manages to survive to trip the swinging spiked door and goes flying as it knocks him across the room.

Use terrain to your advantage too.  Find a high spot and rain down fire (just make sure to take out the archers first).  Use rocks as cover between attacks or while healing or summoning, etc...  Hell, find a high spot and conjure atronochs into the air in front of you so they drop down into the opponents' location.

 

Bottom line, Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap should be your theme song and you should always be looking for devious and creative ways to use your magic.  Get good at this mindset with the vanilla spells and most of the mods I've seen otut there will lend themselves even more to this kind of devious gameplay.

 

OK, lets take a look at specific schools and / or play styles.  I see Coppervane just posted something along this lines with some good advice, but I'll carry on.

 

 

 

DESTRUCTION / OFFENSIVE MAGERY:
This has pretty well been covered.  The main things are to use the the right damage type for the right opponent, and to have a bit of versatility beyond your offense.  Being a one trick pony is a recipe for trouble

 

ILLUSION:
Coppervane wrote a pretty good overview here.  Muffle can really help keep you hidden while you're setting up spells and exploring.  It also builds your Illusion skill level pretty quickly.  Invisibility is helpful but has fairly short duration at low levels.  Best to use it with Muffle also since the bad guys often seem to hear or sense you otherwise despite your invisibility.  I'm a LITTLE more optimistic about the other spells in this school, but Coppervane is right that the Frenzy, Calm and Fear spells often are available at levels lower than your opponents.  This is more a problem on higher difficulty settimgs.

 

Assuming the spells are viable in your game, Frenzy is good for covertly getting bad guys to weaken each other before you attack.  Fear is good for interrupting combat do you can heal or escape.  Calm is largely useless other than calming NPCs that you didn't mean to hit in combat.

 

Many mods out there add some real punch to this school and make it more viable

 

ALTERATION:  
Alot of great spells here.  Paralysis is my personal favorite.  An opponent who can't fight back is an easily defeated one.  Back in Daggerfall and Morrowind, my favorite magical creation was a sword that drained health and paralyzed on a hit.  I was all but unstoppable.

 

Mage Armor is weaker than regular armor, which makes it all the more important to keep up to date with your spellcasting level.  Cast it before each fight too.  It's better than having no protection, trust me.

 

Alot of the other spells are great utility spells for exploring and such, but don't have much combat use.  You can't fight an opponent underwater and wait for them to drown for example (you're the only one in Tamriel who needs to breath apparently), and you can't Telekinesis an opponent like a Jedi.  That's what unrelenting force is for anyway, right?

 

CONJURATION:
I agree with Coppervane's assessment of bound weapons.  They're OP at lower levels, but outclassed by higher end weapons improved with a decent blacksmithing skill.  I'd say consider it a balancer vs the need for a mage to be extra cautious at low levels.  My personal advice is to stick to one specific weapon that corresponds to your highest weapons training.

 

I'm a bit more optimistic about conjured and raised creatures however.  Summon Familiar for example, may be weak as a solo attacker, but can make a big difference acting as a follower who's actively supported by the player.  At the very least, conjuration created followers make a good distraction.  At higher levels they can be brutally effective.  The biggest drawback is the long casting time which can make them difficult to cast in the middle of combat.  Ergo I'd recommend casting right after mage armor just before entering combat.

 

HEALING / RESTORATION:
Now here is one I can speak with great experience on.  Not to brag but I was one of the best healers on City of Heroes' victory server.  Contrary to what was said in a previous post, Healing is not the easiest school out there.  If it were, MMOs would have alot more quality healers, lol.  Skyrim has it's own set of unique challenges in this reegard too.

 

First, playing a dedicated healer WILL require a tanking follower.  This carries the same problems as being grouped with a bunch of noobs in an MMO.  Your follower MAY dance around and dodge heals, run out of range of them, etc...  MMO players can be trained in this regard, NPC AI is forever stupid however.  Worse yet, Heal Other works on anything, so you COULD potentially miss the follower as they shuffle around in combat and hit an enemy, healing them.

 

The other problem with this play style is that your XP gain is going to be limited.  All you're doing is healing on combat, so the only skill you're improving in combat is Restoration (assuming it's all going good).

 

Now in terms of your own play style, the biggest thing you'll have to learn is what most MMO healers never grasp; Do NOT run like a screaming little school girl at the first sign of combat.  Instead, drag your opponent (bait them into following you) to your follower and let the follower deal with them.  You have to remember your job is to heal,  Of course if your follower i ends up being useless and going after other opponents, then you're left with no choice but to go offensive.  Hence my adovcating for playing a general purpose mage instead of a specialist.

[Varithina]

When you get there paralyze is your best friend as a mage, and from what I remember from my last mage it works on dragons, though they may well resist it, chain lighting, lightning are good general combat spells as most mobs don't have resists against it, but do have cold/fire resists.

[Coopervane]

Yeah, electricity spells are good all-rounders, so when it comes time to choose your first destruction booster perk, electricity may be a good choice. Few enemies have a resistance to it (Storm Atronachs come to mind, but those are very rare and you'll only see them at high levels) so you'll pretty much do the stated amount of damage against most enemies, though not many have an actual weakness to electricity either (you could argue enemy mages, but eh.. it doesen't seem like you can fully drain them of magica the same way they can do it to you, so it's not as effective against the AI as it is against the player), so there's not a lot of bonuses to get. But yeah, a good allrounder that will do the stated amount of damage against most things.

 

Fire is the second most usefull. Most enemies you encounter in Skyrim will be a Nord or an Undead, Nords have no resinstance to fire, Undead have a weakness to fire, so it's quite usefull. The fly in the soup there are the Dunmer and their 50% fire resistance, you go up against Dunmer and your fire spells will suck. But you can easilly fall back on electricity in that case.

 

Frost.. it's got it's uses, especially a high levels when you can give it a good chance of briefly paralyzing the target, but the problem there is Nords, and how Skyrim is populated mostly by Nords, and frost doesen't work that well against the undead either, so there are much fewer enemy encounters in which frost spells really shine. Ergo, it should be the last branch you focus on.

[w33beast1e]

Mage has always been my favourite class in any rpg but sad to say I agree,  vanilla magic's a busted flush. All glass and no cannon basically. 

 

You'll probably want a dedicated rebalancing mod like Better Magic or similar , maybe Apocalypse to add some variety and handy spells like Ocato's Recital, consider also Wintermyst for some proper decent mage orientated enchants.  And definitely a hotkey mod - I recommend Hotkey Plus Plus.

[Nergui]

This mage mod - Better Magic

It doesn't add much as far as new spells or new perks, but rather improves the existing spells and perks so they are a useful alternative to melee and armour.

 

One other piece of advice I have. While there isn't an in-game spell crafter in Skyrim like previous games, there's nothing stopping you from creating them with the Creation Kit.

 

 

[Shadowhawk827]

This mage mod - Better Magic

It doesn't add much as far as new spells or new perks, but rather improves the existing spells and perks so they are a useful alternative to melee and armour.

 

One other piece of advice I have. While there isn't an in-game spell crafter in Skyrim like previous games, there's nothing stopping you from creating them with the Creation Kit.

 

Actually there SORT OF is...  Spellmaking in SKyrim; The Last Altar by KhalEdos adds a spellmaking altar to the game.  It comes with some major catches though.  You have to become Archmage first and then go on a pretty wild quest to find the altar.  Really fun mod. and it actually makes becoming Archmage mean something, BUT not practical for low level characters.

[Shivalala]

Wow, some really insightful information here, thanks to those who took the time to write it! I will give my mage a second chance!

[Coopervane]

All glass and no cannon basically.

 

That's the problem in a nutshell.

 

 

There's quite a few flaws with how magic is handled in Skyrim, but with just one exception, none of them are game breaking, you can get around all of them just by playing smarter (and it can even be a nice challange to do so). Unfortunately, that one exception is the entire Destruction school, it's completely and utterly borked.

 

At the end of the day, it doesen't matter how smart you play if you can't do any damage, and that's precisely what happens. Destruction starts out as the weakest weapons in the game, and unlike everything else that levels with you, and can be improved to do 6x more damage, Destruction doesen't level, and you can only make them do 0.5x more damage. The game was designed with that massive physical weapon over-leveling in mind, enemies get so much health later on in the game that Bethesda clearly intended for the player to go nuts with the Grindstone to keep up, but they didn't put any thought into Destruction.

 

 

Thus, the only thing you need mod-wise to play a mage is something, anything, that fixes Destruction. Anything else is just icing on the cake. It doesen't even have to fix Destruction itself, mods that add a passive damage-boost to the player will also do the job. But you do need that much, or else you'll be playing the Benny-Hill chase-scene version of Skyrim..

[criswolf09]

Aside from the 50% damage bonus to each element from the perk tree, if you have the Dragonborn DLC, you can kill three Unique Dragon priests to loot their masks, and each one gives 50% resistance against each element, plus a 25% damage bonus to fire, frost or shock. The only downside is that all masks are heavy armor.

[Coopervane]

Dragon priest masks? Heavy armour? Nope, not wearing that, no way and no how.

 

Besides that still only adds up to a 0.75x boost, which is nowhere near what you can add to a sword or bow, and certainly not enough to fix it.