Guidance for Battle Mage build.

[DRRaval]

I have not tried magic much in this game, and want to try it out now. I am planning to do a play through using Battle Mage build. I dont have much insights into what major and minor skills, specialization, favoured attributes and birth sign would be appropriate, as i have played pure fighter and thief in previous plays. The only restrictions that i have imposed are as follows:
Race - Dunmer/Imperial/Nord
One major weapon skill - Long blades
Armour - Maybe light ( Mages dont wear heavy stuff i think)
I am planning to complete whole game with the build, so kindly suggest me appropriate skills, attributes, specialization and birth sign. What attributes should be focused on levelling early in game. I am not a perfectionist or min- maxing player, but i want a good overall experience of game. I will be playing at 40 % difficulty.

[Valden21]

Is this using the pre-made Battle Mage, or a custom class? If it's a custom class, I would recommend going with this:

Major skills: Long Blades, Acrobatics, Destruction, Restoration, Light Armor.
MInor Skills: Alteration, Unarmored, Speechcraft, Marksman, Sneak.

Any of the races you're looking at would be pretty effective with this, so I wouldn't worry about that, especially since you're not trying to powergame this in any way.

[Lobo de hielo]

Maybe a little tl/dr, but here goes.

If this is custom class, what type of battle mage do you envision.
To me there is the heavy armour, blunt weapon carrying destruction or illusion based battle mage. Just enough magicka to lay down a large destruction or debillitating spell and then steam in with weapon.

There is the light armoured/ unarmoured (difficult build, only get 60+ armour rating at 100 unarmoured. Need to be high enough level to risk mournhold and then enchant all gear so you can have 200 unarmoured - this gives roughly the same armour rating as a full set of Daedric armour).
Light armoured is more Breton, Altmer with blunt/ staff and a lot more magic based.

What I like to play is more of a "utility" Battle Mage, more balanced, no need for Destruction as Mysticism covers that aspect.

Going with a race like Nord.

Nord - Male (extra Endurance - willpower is a mweh attribute when using the birthsign below)

Birthsign - Atronach

Intelligence - Agility

Majors

Axe
Light Armour
Mysticism
Restoration
Alteration

Minors

Heavy Armour
Blunt
Mercantile
Speechcraft
Enchant

This build does not concentrate on 1 type of armour. Instead of trying to get 100 in a skill, 60+ in light and heavy not only raises agility/ endurance but takes advantage of all the best ingame armours.
i.e Saviours Hide - light armour, Randaglufs fists (sure spelt that wrong!) - Heavy armour.
Also armour rating for the first 7 or 8 levels is neither here are there, so take advantage of the first Dark Brotherhood Assasin.

I will mention spells, maybe in a spoiler, as utility spells at the start are what a Battle mage like this is all about.
Mercantile and speechcraft are there just to give some good starting prices but like enchant can be ignored.

I would personally at some early level buy 2 level ups worth of armourer, raises strength and ensures you can carry a couple of hammers to repair while adventuring.
Also at some point I will buy a level or 2 of illusion as I like to use "night-eye" and you need at least 1 illusion to have a 50% chance to cast.


Utility spells I buy then spellmake my own.

First in Sadrith Mora Imperial Cult - Absorb Health. This is your back up killer. It can be OP'ed. I have even used this early spell on Daedra at level 14, just beware of those that reflect spells, can wipe you out easily if you (like me) do not rush to 100 in endurance.

Levitate - make spell magnitude 1 20 secs. Mountain hopping, getting up high etc.

Restore Attribute (any) - make spells - restore strength 10pts for 1 sec and restore endurance 10pts 1 sec. Forget all about greter bonewalkers etc.

Buy or have an Open spell - make Open lock 100 pts on touch. enough said.

Fortify attribute (any) - make spell (I call Alchemist helper) fortify intelligence 100pts for 2 secs.

There are lots more, but you get the point.
You will not get a 100% chance to cast most of these till 45+ in the respective skills. But 70 to 80% chance always seems to work.

If you want or need to grind a few levels make 1 second spells i.e water walking 1 sec. No need to aim the spell it just levels you up.

Anyway if you had a different vision of a battlemage, I will attempt to put down how I have played that type in the past.

[The Great Cornholio]

You can just pick the battlemage class. No need to overthink builds in this game since you can buy training in every skill.

I like the Mage birthsign for any character. Nice mana bonus with no penalty.

Battlemages do wear heavy armor in the Elder Scrolls universe.

[Innocent]

A note on going Unarmored, since I'm currently playing an Acrobat/light mage: it's very hard to get that 60 armored rating early in the game, unless you are prepared to tediously let some Mudcrabs hit you for days (and I mean for days). Caius Cosades can train your skill up to 70 and that is by far the best option early on. I haven't found the master Unarmored trainer but I'm looking for him :) (please no spoilers).

The Alteration Shield spells are decent value early on since they easily double your armor rating, but loose value quite quickly. The best thing I did for my armor was buy a Devil Cephalopod Helm (Bound Body Armor for 60 seconds). That boosted my armor from like 10 to 60 in an instant. You can't cast an equivalent Shield spell until you have very high Alteration, and it's probably going to drain all your Magicka.

tldr: for a light mage, better to mix some Light Armor with Unarmored and go for a mix of Bound Armor items and Unarmored. It's much better value.