I am having trouble playing as a mage because i don't know the proper major and minor skills to use in my custom class. I like to make short blade one of skills but i always end up relying on my dagger too much when I run out of magicka. Is there a trick to making a good mage character?

The things that I am looking for.

- what sign to use?

- what major and minor skills?

- what are some good artifacts that i could find? (I recently found the location of the Mentor's ring on accident.)

-tips for magicka loss?

When i play a mage class i always use the atronach birthsign because it gives you a higher starting Magicka pool and a 50% spell absorb to start you off. It does make it so you don't regen magicka when you sleep but there are many ways to actually make this work in your favor. One thing I always do is as soon as I get to Balmora I make a short duration summon of ancestral ghost (~15seconds) and the reason for this is because if you attack him as soon as you summon him (takes about 4 swings from your dagger) he will attack you and his first attack is always the fire-based spell which will usually be absorbed by your wombburn ability and restore your magicka. The other added benefit to using this method is that you will gain skill in Conjuration almost at a regular pace throughout your characters career. then there is of course the alchemy route which doesn't need any explaination;).

For Major and Minor skills I usually take all the spell schools placing the ones I will be using the most in my major spots (mine are usually conjuration, Destruction, Alchemy, enchant, unarmored) and my minors (Alteration, Illusion, Mysticism, shortblade, restoration)

Good artifacts? well that info belongs in the cheats, hints and spoilers section, and it depends on if you are specializing in a certain type of magic.

tips for magicka loss....already covered that lol

some other tips would be to get some cheap soul gems filled with mudcrab and rat souls fast and enchant some rings and amulets with low powered attack spells and maybe a short duration summon to distract your enemies if you need to run. The extra damage from the rings and amulets will make the strain a lot less on your magicka pool in the beginning and you won't have to worry about running out of options if you get overwhelmed.

The main thing i can tell you about playing a mage class is that planning and tactics are your friend, always try to take things slow because you are fragile for a while at the beginning.

Should I pick Breton as my race?

try a magicka regeneration mod if you can't hack it without. I use one that gives a minor and gradual increase to magicka basd on willpower, and I find it makes being a mage a lot more fun, while not being too easy. Of course a lot of morrowind people like the original system, so I may get lynched for suggesting such things to a noob : P

You can use whichever race you like really. I like the Bretons because of their racials but in the end it doesn't really make a difference and it's a personal preference.
It would be better for the OP to try the game out first without using any mods especially ones that alter the gameplay like that.
.....you asked for it lol

OTOH, it's his game.
If it's more fun with magicka regeneration, then go for it.

Better to play Morrowind with TGM than not playing it at all.

If short on magicka and playing Atronach, go punch a Scrib, or pay for attribute restoration at an Altar. You have a 50-50 shot at absorbing the spells.

If not playing Atronach, either find ways to stretch your limited magicka (more reliance on Enchantements and Alchemy), sleep a lot, or download a mod.

Fair Magicka Regen is at least twice the rate I'd prefer (or was until I changed it), but works fine. Another alternative is Galsiah's Character Development, which adds magicka regen and gets rid of the annoying level-up multiplier nonsense; I altered it to about 1/4 the default regen rate, which allows it to recover in about the time it takes to walk back to town with a load of loot, but is irrelevant during the brief course of combat.

Personally, I felt that adding Magica regeneration in Oblivion was a good thing, but the rapid rate and shallow pool took away any strategy aspects and turned it into just another generic and mindless "rinse and repeat" combat game mechanism: block until your spell recharges.

One pitfall that I fell into during my early attempts at making mages was the mistaken assumption that my destruction spells had to be On Target, when in fact On Touch lets you do a lot more damage with a lot less magicka. So much so that on a Dunmer with the Atronach birthsign and Intelligence as a primary attribute, I could cast the basic on touch Frost damage spell for 25 points of damage and barely see my magicka bar go down at all at level 1 !

The trade off is, obviously, that you need to be in melee range to successfully cast on touch spells. However, if you're careful and use a shield spell, or paralysis you can mitigate this pretty easily.

My big problem with a mage seems to be leveling up effectively. It seems that I don't use alteration/mysticism/most magic schools more than once in awhile for a utility, and since my destruction spells take on average two casts to kill someone it too is leveling slowly, but it's about the only skill that I've been able to level up. Currently my mage character is level 4, and I'd comfortably say that 80% of his skill-ups are from blowing all of my money on training.

Get Absorb Health and Mysticism will skyrocket. Throw all your buffs up during battles to raise alteration and illusion and toss out a few paralysis/calm spells. Soultrap everything and recharge an enchanted item to get your enchanting up if you have it. As you said, use on touch spells to save mana but it is also good for getting unarmored or whatever your defense of choice is up because you will be getting hit.

Bretons are good if you want to go with Apprentice since the racial resist cancels the signs weakness. Apprentice gives a good magicka boost while still being able to rest to refill. It's particularly good with GCD (Galsiahs) if you're considering mods.

I find it handy to pick up Waterwalk, and have a weaker (and easier) 15 second version made for crossing rivers and streams. Between that and a 1pt. for 25 second Levitate spell to cross between the Vivec cantons, Alteration goes up enough to become useful, but will never be a mainstay unless you frequently cast Shield spells in combat.

As already pointed out, Mysticism can quickly and easily become useful or even overpowered. Between Absorb Health (too cheap for what it does), Soultrap, and the various Mark/Recall/Intervention spells, it's definitely enough to base a character around.

Unless you have an old CRT monitor, or turn the gamma controls down, NIght Eye or Light aren't that useful, but are good for training Illusion.

Thanks for all the tips guys. i'll start on my character and then I'll get back to you. I appreciate.

I dont know how to manually install mod o_o