I just made a pure mage and I'm wondering if others use the novice (starter) spells over the apprentice (target/ranged) spells.

I don't want to waste money buying the spells or investing perks into the reduced magic cost yet.

So basically which do you prefer? (Directed to people with pure mage experience)

Bump

can you not judge for yourself -.- SIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIGH

Why waste time/money/perks when I don't have to?

I find that the spell you cast is often dictated by the amount of Magicka you have. So I use low level and high level spells all the time. You're probably going to need those apprentice and up perks sooner than you think anyway so I would just take the perks to reduce Magicka costs. The low level spells have low levels of damage so it follows that they will need to be cast more often and for longer as you level up and encounter harder foes. I reckon you'd gimp your character if you stuck with low level spells only for a pure Mage.

Don't bump your threads unless it's been 24 hours since someone replied. Just be patient.

To me Flames is one of the best spells in the game, and it's novice level. It's constant which means not wasting casting time, and you can back off while enemies attack you while burning them.

For other schools it might be worth investing in the perks though, but you can always use items like robes (or Morokei's mask) for 100% regen and reduce casting-costs. There are always multiple ways of doing things in this series.

You will HAVE to use higher level spell. Since you are playing a pure-mage, why not try out every single spells in the game? it's not like gold is hard to come by.