I tried playing an Altmer mage when the game came out, but I ended up having too much trouble staying alive. I think a few of my issues were that I didn't have enough money to buy better spells as I leveled, I didn't branch out or choose the most ideal perks, I wasn't sure what kind of armor (if any) to use, etc. I ended up dropping that character because it was just too hard. Basically I'm looking for tips on how to make a fun, playable mage character. Any help you can offer in the following areas would be much appreciated:

Early game
* What race? (Altmer or Breton I'm thinking)
* Should I wear armor? (If yes, light or heavy?)
* Which skills should I focus on? (I've heard Conjuration is really clutch. Thoughts?)
* Good quests to do early?
* Good gear to have early on?
* Essential early spells and perks? (+ How to get money to buy spells?)

Mid game
* Armor? (Yes or no? If yes, light or heavy?)
* Good perks to pick?
* Good spells to buy?
* Good quests to do?
* Good gear?
* Vampirism? (Yes, no, save for later?)

End game
* Armor? (Yes or no? If yes, light or heavy?)
* Good perks?
* Best spells to buy/use?
* Vampirism?


Also looking for general strategies, i.e. what to use in my right and left hand at a given time, how to be most efficient with Magicka management, what skills I should use outside of magic (i.e. alchemy maybe, or one-handed just in case), how to optimize my skills and equipment and such, etc.? Thanks for reading and for any assistance you can offer!

tl;dr - looking for any and all advice you can give me to help make a fun mage build for both the early game and endgame.

I got my cash through mining iron and using Transmute to make gold rings, then enchanting the rings and selling them. Conjuration is godly, and you shall want it. I prefer robes over armor when I'm a mage, because of the mage armor perks. Altmer or Breton are, in my opinion, the best choices, so you're right on that. I love vampirism, the 25% boost in illusion spells is highly useful if you ever intend to use them.

Other than that, I can't really answer your other questions because it depends entirely upon your own choices as the player.

Thanks for the reply. I'm definitely not looking to completely plan out my character from start to finish, but I'm hoping to have a better foundation and vision than I did the first time. I saw that thread about how Vampirism can be extremely powerful for a high level mage character and it inspired me to give magic a second chance, but this time I'd like to be a bit more prepared. Any favorite spells you like to use (for lower levels or for endgame, either way)? Or basic battle strategies?

i went with a battlemage character so i don't know if these tips pertain to you

*conjuration is key, it makes meat shields that distract and damage opponents, i used the fire atronach for a long time
*some form of armor you've enchanted with lowered spell costs or extra magic or health
*potions are practically required if you rely on magicka elusively for damage
*battle mage tip, i used the bound blade spell with the perks from conjuration tree, makes for a cheap wieghtless deadly weapon
*followers also make great meat sheilds if you can keep from hittin them

As far as quests go id do teh collage quests, mostly their radiant quests because the actual quest line is like 8 missions.

I like destruction and restoration. If you want to level use muffle in illusion, you can cast it over and over. I used robes until I made light dragon armor. If you double enchant your armor you can cast destruction for zero mana cost and 90% off on restoration which rocks.

it...really depends on how you like to play, though conjuration and destruction are probably going to be the classes used most. Conjure something to take the brunt of the damage, while using spells that your atronach is immune to in order to deal damage. Simple. Focus in one elemental group (no point in boosting damage in all three, really) and then use that as your final spell. You want to get the dual casting destruction perk early on, along with the perk right after that one in the tree that stuns opponents when dual casting (can't remember name right now)

Other than that, it depends on how you want to play. Illusion is used for sneak mages, and can be incredibly useful if you want to turn an entire room of enemies against one another. Restoration is self-explanatory, and heals you. Alteration is your armor. Knowing all of this, you should adapt your playstyle accordingly to how you want to go through the game.

I would use armor casting the armor spells over and over is annoying especially the master spell it has a 5 second cast and lasts for 45 seconds WTF! i wouldn't use destruction its a support skill for conjuration and illusion (you think it would be the other way around )
If you do decide to go for alteration then get paralyze with conjuration nothing stands in your way (literally)
Illusion is also great its the only skill that imo scales well out of all the magic skills for illusion make sure you use the silent casting perk (even conjuration scaling is bad at 50+ its still usable tho)
If your going to use conjuration i highly recommend using http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Dead_Thrall they are godly i have a bandit chief and a bandit marauder mage thrall, the bandit chief does damage comparable to me LVL 100 one handed fully perked warrior and the mage can kill a most enemies in 1 hit ( he killed a dragon priest in dual wield 3 hits) also you can use dead thrall for permanent dremora lords (they keep their dialogue!)

Start with a Breton and get the Atronach sign ASAP. Here's why:

You'll start with 62.5% equivalent resist magicka.
With the Breton power (stacks with Atronach) you'll be immune to magic once a day.
You start with 25 conjuration which means that as soon as you have the money you can buy Conjure Flame Atronach and Soultrap.

With Lydia and a Flame Atronach, you can get through get through the first 15 or so levels easily while you decide how build up your character.

Early game



* What race? Breton
* Should I wear armor? I recommend elven armor
* Which skills should I focus on? restoration and destruction early on with some conjuration. I personally play shield+sword early on as magicka is very inefficient early on.
* Good quests to do early? Deadric staves and permanent stat boost quests are a must.

• 0. Wabbajack
  
• 0. Book of love 15 mag res
  
• 0. lord stone 25 mr or atronach stone
  
• 7. azuras star
  
• 7. Mace of malog bal
  
• 10. A deadras best friend keep barbas
  
• 14. Sanguine rose

* Good gear to have early on? Try shopping for elven armor pieces with enchantments such as fortify destruction/restoration, health, magicka.
* Essential early spells and perks? recovery is nice for mages and counteracts atronach stone. impact will let you stun lock most foes but requires a lot of magicka. Youll likely just be using your tier 1-2 destruction spells and running around while magicka regenerates
* money:

• gloombound mine: 60 per, 60*60 = 3600 gold.
  
• Kolskegrr mine 2700 gold.

• black briar lodge – steel plate armor
  
• Froki’s shack - diadem of savant 1200
  
• N shrine of pyrite – 1000 gold
  
• South kolskeggr mine – flawless diamond, ruby , other

Mid game
* Armor? light armor
* Good perks to pick? augmented
* Good spells to buy? tier 3 destruction/restoration spells
* Good quests to do? nothing of great benefit past this point
* Good gear? dabble in smithing and/or enchanting to create custom gear
* Vampirism? never used it

End game
* Armor? Light armor smithed to 567 armor rating
* Good perks? twin souls for 2 dead thralls
* Best spells to buy/use? dead thrall and the tier 4 destruction spells
* Vampirism? never used it

Wow this is wonderful, thanks a lot.

And thanks to everyone else as well. There's a lot of great stuff here, more than enough to get me started. (Not that I wouldn't gladly welcome further advice!)