Mage style tips?

[mabus4444]

The best mage spell (other than health regeneration) absolutely has to be the ability to conjure entities. If you are outmatched, you just have the entity do all the fighting for you (and you take no damage at all). Worst comes to worst you use them as decoys and run away. Of course, that's when you're a mere padwan learner, a true jedi master would never do such things .... just sayin :)

[invertedpanda]

I'm level 18, and here's how I've been playing my pure caster:

 

Do the mage college quests ASAP. You'll have a hard time with one of em' (where you're fighting a seriously tough caster), but becoming archmage means you get a nice robe early on (even if it is ugly as sin). Enchant as much as you can with either magicka regen or destruction cost reduction. Once you beat the mage college quest line you're pretty well set.

 

Get yourself a good tank companion, too, and keep him/her well equipped.

 

Spells and perks wise, firebolt, fireball, atronachs, and chain lightning will be your mainstays (Firebolt mostly - be careful with the others, as they can hurt your companion/summons). You'll definitely want the dual casting perk for destruction ASAP, too, as staggering opponents with dual casting will help A LOT (and yes, it does work with dragons). It'll also help to have a good staff that casts something offensive, too, in case you're fighting something that's draining your magicka. Another important perk is under Restoration; it speeds up magicka regen. It's on the right side of the tree, IIRC.

 

Carry a lot of magicka potions.

 

There's some decent mods that bump up the magicka regen, too, which I feel is a HUGE sore spot in the game. Combat magicka regen is severely nerfed, making it incredibly difficult to be a pure mage.

[LHammonds]

There's some decent mods that bump up the magicka regen, too, which I feel is a HUGE sore spot in the game. Combat magicka regen is severely nerfed, making it incredibly difficult to be a pure mage.

You just need to be careful as to what spells you are casting. As I mentioned earlier, fireballs will zap your magicka very quickly and won't get the job done like firebolt. Also, if you enchant each item you can wear with some sort of magicka regen, it will help tremendously. I found a mask early on that I can wear that gives 100% boost in magicka regen. Couple that with a few 20% - 30% regen apparel and you've got a nice pool of magic to dip into...but you still cannot go crazy and waste magicka on inefficient spells such as the fireball.

 

The advice on keeping backup items like a Staff, shield and sword are also absolutely mandatory if your battle drains your magicka empty. Trading a few blows with these as well as using the knockdown / pushback shout is enough to let your mana regen.

 

LHammonds

[Qwal]

I noticed that destruction spells lvl faster with higher lvl magic, example flames take X time but firebolt goes twice as fast, fireball i crap to lvl with(cus u have to hit the target directly doesn't count if u hit the ground before the mob. And infero(third spell i think) lvled my destruction on a dragon from 70 ish to 100(playing on master difficulty). The high end lvl 100 magics suck. for example the fire spell (forgot name) u need to charge it with both hands, but if u get hit you have to start over and charge again (can be deadly!!! very deadly) But once it is charged blasts the entire room or area with fire dmg damaging them greatly and killing all weak mobs.

 

Blizzard is very nice since it damages all in it's path not just 1 character.

 

But chainlightning is my fav, very sweet with dualcast and several enemies :D:D.

 

Ward is useless. i got 460 magica with bonus from gear atm and ward drains it's mana wayyyyy 2 fast. better to go melee with a wooden sword and power attack then using ward lol.

[Kagemitsu]

Thanks everyone for the replies. :)

I found the key to solve all my problems in Conjuration. Either by summoning atronachs or reanimating corpses, I have someone doing all the dirty work, or at least someone to tank while I poke the enemy with a Bound Sword (+ a Shield) or Bound Bow. I wear Heavy Armor where I can't put something that boosts magicka.

 

So basically I became what, in old times, we would call a Battlemage. :|

[mabus4444]

Actually you can enchant your armour, a good battlemage should always enchant his armour :)

[Rastafariel]

I played a male breton bladesinger (spellsword) from L1 to L56 without many problems at all - I relied on a sharpened enchanted blade sword (cause they did away with the sabre) alteration and its perks! (3x normal armor spell if robed only etc.) and destruction. conjuration is good, but its not as good you can be alone fighting intelligently. The main bummer is having to keep the mage armor spell up all the time. (no shield, single wield)

 

dual cast lightning is key for disabling and damaging dragons.

Edited December 13, 2011 by Rastafariel

[TimF]

Personally, I prefer an unarmored aka pure mage. It has its specific advantages in the beginning of the game already. A mage doesn't have to withstand damage in close combat - he should avoid it - and for that - run fast, unburdened by armor - for example, behind his companion and summon, or just strafing back while shooting. And in the end, magic armor duration and power is greatly expanded, so you can cast it once before the battle and enjoy maximum defence. And it is not only armor, but other useful alteration spells and passive perks you get.

 

In general, top priority school is conjuration, then goes destruction and finally, alteration. And of course, advance enchantment as fast as possible. In destruction it would be better to focus on a single element, to save perks. I chose lightning - there aren't many guys resistant to it, if any; it's perfect for precision, and you can rip dragons with it like some kind of AA gun. AOE spells aren't your friends: they may hit your allies more than they do enemies, and there are rarely more enemies in one spot than the chain lightening can cover. I don't find sense in messing with bound or - god forbid - crude weapons. Staves are bread and butter of an apprentice mage, and they also get all the advantages of your magic knowledge (well, perhaps, except dualcast).

 

The worst time I had was in cramped tunnels: you can't take cover, and your followers cut your retreat instead of covering you.

[mabus4444]

I prefer Enchantment. You need that to enchant items to make you even more powerful (which offsets any loss of training in the other skills right away). Agree with you re lightning but, if i am not mistaken, it's less powerful than frost and fire, so i prefer to focus on fire, coupled with the ability to summon a frost astronach to handle frost sensitive enemies. Early on you want to summon atronachs to take most of the damage and do most of the fighting for you because you are so weak, particularly against stronger opponents. Edited December 16, 2011 by mabus4444

[KratosAurion777]

I started off playing as Conan the Barbarian and was investing everything into Smithing and fighting. However, I quickly found that spell-wielding was very powerful and alluring. So I began to invest in destruction as well as smithing.

 

I now have 100% perks in smithing and have forged dragonbone and daedric armor and maxed their stats out. At one point, I was fumbling around with a spell and kept messing it up and a single claymore-wielding enemy closed in and hit me 3 times killing my well-armored Nord character which exceptional health stats.

 

I went into a cave later and found 5 or 6 bears started to surround me with no hope of escape. Instead of relying on my armor and trying to deal damage fast enough, I took the time to case an Iron Flesh and a Fire Cloak spell which ultimately allowed me to live and defeat all of them. Guess what??? My health was barely dented (excuse the pun) even though they all got in several good swipes at me.

 

One particularly powerful spell I use to kill many of my foes is the Fire Bolt. It doesn't cost a lot but with the duel-wielding perk, you can cast it in both hands and quickly send out a blast that will not only hurt them but stun them. This stun ability allows me to easily take on 2 enemies at the same time, regardless of their abilities...I will not get hit by them because of the stun causing them to stagger. If timed well on a single enemy, you can stun and then get a 2nd shot in before they recover from the 1st stun, and the 3rd shot can stun them again immediately after recovering from the 1st stun. Works great for powerful foes such as the giants. Even though they can gain ground on you considerably fast, the repeated stun blasts from the Fire Bolt will make them completely ineffective.

 

I am currently abandoning all my cool armor in search of some decently-enchanted clothing. Wearing enough items to boost my magic recharge will allow me to keep the pressure on during a long engagement without the need to use any potions.

 

When going into a known big fight, I typically will be able to level up but I don't do it until I need my health / magic / stamina replenished. Using that trick along with the right spells at the right time, I simply do not need to use any potions or food.

 

EDIT: Oh, I'm currently level 39 and when I tried to use the "upgraded" Fireball spell as a potential replacement for the Fire Bolt, I found that it completely drains my magicka for a single shot. And that shot, even though it does a great damage area effect, it does not kill the target. Using the Fire Bolt, I am able to kill the target and have plenty of magicka left over. So therefore, the "upgraded" spell looks wonderful but is quite infective and wasteful.

 

Erm, I believe the iron fletch was useless because the armor is caped to 567 ( 80 % physical dmg reduction ) ... and 80 armor is just a more or less 10% reduction dmg .

Firebolt might be good at your level and your difficulty but the dmg are way to damn low as well as all destruction spell even with all perk and level , the only use of destruction is that the perk upgrade dmg with enchantment to , and i dunno how you "stun to death" but it don't work on me , maybe because of master difficulty and lvl 81 .

And it's useless to upgrade magicka and stamina , power attack are useless ( swing as fast as you can with your sword it's better ) , for magicka destruction//alteration spell are useless and Conjuration don't need much mana with Perk//Conjuration enchantment .