I am trying to play "naturally" (i.e. no forced RP restrictions) as an Altmer destruction-conjuration mage. I am at about level 20 and so far the game has been entirely well-balanced. I use Lydia and a conjured atronach as meatshields. I keep an atronach always summoned, and I also use a bit of alertation to always keep up a flesh spell (this avoids instant death by a surprise bear sneak attack, among other things). This is a robes/clothing character. Although I do swap out light armor elemental resistance boots for dragon fights. BTW, this character does NO sneaking. A side effect is making encounters a lot more exciting as I get surprised much more often.

I use very little alchemy beyond mixing stuff up to discover ingredient effects. Similary, no enchanting so far except to disenchant, and recharge Lydia's sword. I carry a staff, but have never had to use it. I may ditch it entirely. I do a tiny bit of smithing to improve Lydias equipment to fine.

But, here is the catch. I think it is unnatural to ignore locked things. So this character unlocks chests and doors. He does avoid traps without unlocking them. This, of course, has caused lockpicking to level quite a bit. Also, I think it would be unnatural for this character to avoid selling loot and buying upgrades/spells just to supress the speech skill. So his speech skill is fairly decent.

So in summary, in order of highest to lowest, the skills used are

Highest - Destruction = Conjuration : I keep these skills equal and they get almost all the perk choices. Focusing on the atronach side of the tree and ignoring the necromancy perks for now
Alteration: I am just taking the perks needed to get mage armor, magic resistance, and spell absorption
Lockpicking and Speech : normal side effect of unlocking and sell/buying (plus, I use the persuade checks when available)
Alchemy
Least - Smithing

This character is a lot of fun.

Also, I agree that I use the favorite hot keys much more with this character. And they work SO much better than with my dual-wielding sneaker, who could rarely get the right weapons in his hands using hoykeys. Even dual-wielded spells work better than weapons with the favorite hotkeys. Wouldn't want to play this character on a controller...

My previous Argonian sneak/illusionist/assassin/archer was also a bit of a glass cannon. While the challenge was fun initially, especially judicious use of fury against crowds, at about level 40 with perfect and perked sneaking and leveled archery and one-handed, one hit kill sneak attacks for everything but dragons got boring.

Currently playing a destruction/resto/sneak mage with NO enchanting, NO conjuration, and NO destruction dual-casting on Master. My end game plan is to reverse-pickpocket weakness poisons and blast away.

It's a ton of fun. Bosses 1-shot me (wearing robes) and I run out of magicka v. multiple enemies, so I get a variety of gamplay. My strategies so far have been sneak attacking a sleeping boss then running around a large table while I kill him, killing archers with long range blasts while running from their stronger melee allies. Dropping runes while healing on the run, switching to daggers to finish off an opponent, using a paralysis potion on a boss who successfully closed to melee, and casting fear to give me time to kill one enemy and regen magicka before killing the other. It's far more mobile and far less cheesy than my various attempts at 2H warrior on master (bash or Fus to interrupt, attack, back up to dodge power attack and regen stamina, attack, repeat). I might need alteration or illusion at some point, but so far the former doesn't help me survive any longer and the latter is too weak when I need it, so potions work better.

Categorized Favorities is a must mod for this build. I'm constantly switching spells (runes, fire for damage, ice for slow, healing, muffle, fear, poisoned daggers when I'm out of mana, and when a find a good one - a staff) and the ability to just hit Q and click saves vast amounts of time and frustration. I'm considering a magicka regen mod (reduced down time) and a 3-rune max mod (for fun traps) but I haven't felt the need yet. Don't start with a damage scaling mod, but I don't know if one will be needed late game yet.

Dunmer is looks alot better. 50 magicka isnt big deal since when you be level 25 you will have 450 magicka and destruction spells will cost ALOT cheaper and magicka regenerates really fast.

Altmer racial is good only when you are low level.

Use destruction dual cast, get the perk that staggers enemies, and you'll at least be safe in most encounters. Use alteration for shield spells instead of armor. Restoration to heal and use wards against mages is a must.

Robes are just great because they give a mage what he really needs: more magic and more magic regeneration. You cast from a distance, and if you're smart, you'll have a Summon Dremora Lord spell as soon as you can and a warrior follower, so those two can take the blunt of the oncoming forces while you rain hellstorm from a distance.

Or, if you're a boss like me, use a mystic sword with the soul trap perk and collect the souls of every enemy you kill.

My mage is currently at lvl 18 after 26 hours. He focuses on destruction, conjuration, and alteration. Haven't used restoration much, or illusion at all. Alchemy is used for magicka potions and as a means to make money. Gonna use smithing as he finds gold and silver. Only weapon he's used is a bow, and that's just to try to get a little damage in when fighting dragons that insist on just flying around during a fight. Can't wait till he learns Lightning Bolt. He wears robes and the Otar dragon priest mask for the added elemental resistance. Gonna hunt down the Morokei mask for the magicka regen, and start working on enchanting.

Re: The OP question on race: Just pick the one you think looks/feels the best. Personally, for pure mage (no weapons or armor, only spells) I like an Altmer because I view them as being basically stuck up pansies who are very good at magic but not much else. Altmer is also the only race that gets a magicka bonus in Skyrim and their once a day power is good for a pure mage.

For a mage who wears armor and gets into fights, I use a Dunmer cause they look badass. I especially like Dunmer for nightblades. The extra magicka an Altmer gets really is not a big deal at higher levels, so a Dunmer (or whatever race you like) can be just as good a mage as an Altmer. The Dunmer fire resistance could be useful if you ever plan on becomming a vampire.

Only other tip I have is consider carefully before investing into too many of the spell cost reduction perks. There are a lot of them and 8 points into enchant can get you all the spell cost reduction you will need, so think about that before plugging all your perks into spell cost reduction.

Oh, yeah, one more thing. If you plan to use the calm/fear/fury spells in the Illusion tree, you must put perks into Illusion Animage, Kindred Mage, Hyponitic Gaze, Aspect of Terror, Rage and Dual Casting. Without these six perks, you will reach a point when most of the enemies you face will have outleveled your Illusion spells and calm/fury/fear just won't work anymore. So, consider that when planning your perks.

Good luck and enjoy your mage!

I played my mage to 55 so far focusing on Destruction and Conjuration. I wore no armor and used no weapons. I put almost all my points into Magicka. I wish I had also worked up Illusion but too late now. I put too many points into smithing early on to outfit my tank companion but that was a total waste as the companions just get in the way of a mage. Don't use them as you will be very limited by the spells you can use and any aoe spell will damage your companion and can actually kill them outright. It's so much better to rely on conjuration if you want a tank or helper. If you kill them by mistake you just summon another one. If you do use conjuration make sure you conjure a helper every time you go into combat no matter what it is. Conjuration levels very quickly and the goal is to get the Dremora Lord because he can tank anything for you while you do whatever you want. Sneak is good to have as a mage so things don't get the jump on you.

Unless you want the challenge of being one shot by any high level foe make sure to put some points into health. You can make up for the lost magicka by using gear that reduces the magicka needed to cast spells or gear that adds to your magicka pool.

Having magicka use reduction gear also lets you double cast for a much longer time. Double casting is way more powerful and with the destruction perk you can perma stun single enemies with double casts.

If you are sneaky then Illusion can be immensely helpful against groups of foes. Destruction is almost useless in those situations and it is much better to have illusion spells to make them fight each other while having your conjured helpers keep them busy as well. Then you can use destruction to pick off stragglers. Just make sure you don't draw too much attention to yourself because multiple enemies on you at once is certain death if you have low health and no armor. Work towards getting the perk that makes your spells silent. That is a tremendous help if you are sneaking.

Small update. It's been slow going but I'm enjoying my Conjurer. I'm 36hours in at level 24.

I've pretty much put all points into Magicka with the exception of 1 or 2 into health and stamina. I use BoundBow as my primary offensive so I've had to take a few perks in that [archery] but a lot went right into Conjuration. I had up to 4 perk points unused at one point as I didn't meet the requirements for some perks but since using BoundBow and Atronachs its been rising up faster. I also have a few perks in Alteration to up my defense [wearing DB outfit] and the Necromancer's Amulet all help. I haven't developed Restoration much at all.

When I was on 360, I played quite a few mages. What I did was run around with the spells that I would open combat with, usually a flesh spell in one hand and a summon in the other. I would cast those to start, and then swap to my destro spells, and have my healing spell on the other hotkey. After that skirmish was over, wait for mana to regen, and swap back to the original set of spells. I took a couple of mages to level 50+ working like this, and it was fine.