I'm coming back to Skyrim in anticipation for Dawnguard. I'm playing a new Breton Battlemage on Expert. I'm at level 10 at Winterhold College, experimenting.

I wanted to ask other veteran mages what they found to be the most useful or powerful spells. I was forming my own impressions, but what do you guys think?

My character basically only invested in 2 Perks so far, both in Destruction, Novice Casting and Dual Casting. I got lots of Perks to spend, but want to do so wisely.

Thanks in advance for your feedback.

I'm sort of an Advanced Mage.. I always found Conjuration very useful, I always had help wherever I went.

My previous characters were Altmer mages played to level 70 & 55, respectively. I know lots of people swear by Conjuration and seem to enjoy it, but personally I found the summoner AI somewhat broken. My twin Dremora Lords would 'hang back', running back and forth behind me while Falmer stalked forward stealthily from the front; apparently they were waiting for full-on engagement with a target before they attacked? Not what I was expecting: seems to me the summoned daedra should venture forth and conquer, the whole point being to keep me from having to engage in the first place....

OTOH, I found maxing out Illusion, Destruction, Enchanting and Sneak together worked pretty well even though Destruction is still UP at high levels, simply because Illusion owns when it's fully perked. Illusion is an all-or-nothing skill, however, so unless I invested in all the substantive (not the cost-reduction) perks including Master of the Mind, I found the school didn't work so well. YMMV.

I find the dead thrall spell and dremora lords spell to be the best

Conjuration, muffle, firebolt, and frenzy.
I let other people do all the fighting and hide since I can't take much damage. But if a summon needs help I use a dual cast firebolt with impact and aspect of terror.

Conjuration is useful for any character, though a tad boring if you only summon and dont re-animate, and illusion is very handy for vampires.
Most of the rest of the spells are of situational use only.

Paralyze&Fear

As a master Mage in general, Destruction spells were Fireball and ice storm , unless you have time to charge up a master lightning storm... Always have an alteration spell on hand Dragonhide and EbonyFlesh for me...and if youre playing the sneaky mage type you cannot be with out muffle, invisibility, and a bound bow thats my playstyle and I adore it. Idk about you but playing a mage on master difficulty means you run around alot and need to keep quiet and strike from the shadows so always keep a restoration spell in the favorites menu.

- Sincerely the lvl. 81 Master of the College of Winterhold

P.S. a little fun thing you can do is when you get telekenesis pick up weapons and throw them at people

My fire destruction mage used incinerate almost exclusively.
Before that it was fire ball/firebolt depending on the situation.
Would use wall of flame and flame cloak when it was appropriate too.

For me, Conjure Dremora Lord, though the conjuration spells in general are useful.

I am a lvl 81 mage playing on master difficulty (Very frustrating) and I would recommend using become ethereal for your shout. Keep close wounds as a hotkeyed spell along with summon storm thrall (i perked it out so i can summon two and that has been extremely helpful). You may also want to use a high level circle of protection for those tough draugr encounters. For damage I find blizzard is a good AoE and Fire Ball is a good concentrated attack. As for weapons you may want to use spellbreaker when fighting other mages with a lightning spell to drain their magicka...Hope it helps xD

step 1.Dead Thrall chief ymarz and make his armor legendary to full 80% damage reduction
step 2. Dead thrall a volkihar vampire with orcish armor with the damage reduction above
step 3. Sit back like a boss and watch the [censored] happen

Healing ...

Don't underestimate Illusion spells. And Conjuration Spells are amazing distractions.

weakness to magic , frost, shock, and fire, oh wait, there are not this spells in the game!!

invisibility, paralyze, and runes. A spellsword's best offhand friends.

Any spells in the schools of Illusion and Conjuration.

Lightning Storm

If you are playing a mage, i recommend combining "slow time" and "fireball" x2. It allows you to lay down a barrage of fireballs before the enemy has taken three steps.

Lightning Storm's ragdolls are fun to watch. I'm like a young Palpatine!

ice storm
thunderbolt
lightning storm
ice spear

um healing lol

Never underestimate the power of Illusion. It has saved my #$% more times in Skyrim than i care to admit. Especially the pacify spell.

The Illusion spells. Invisibility in particular. I can wipe a trio of Draugr Deathlords in literally seconds thanks to invisibility.
Though, like someone said before me Illusion is an all or nothing skill, you can't dabble. The actually controller spells from the school have saved my ass more than a few times as well.

And close wounds, I get a lot of use out of the first three healing spells.

I normally use incinerate... and/or Ice spear... but lately my game has got a little more laggy (I'm on ps3) so I find the ice storm really useful in tight areas...=)

Paralyze and Incinerate or .