Like mages in most other games the mage in WoW has low HP and defense which means if you are an inexperienced player you will fall quickly in battle; not being able to have a tanking pet makes this a bigger problem.

It is important to remember that if you want to play a mage you have to burst all the damage possible while keeping yourself safe from attack. A mage in a party will be very helpful since they have crowd control abilities and high DPS spells. How you play the game will depend largely on what talents tree you focus on.

Arcane Mage
As an Arcane Mage you have high DPS (damage per second) that surpass even the heavy fire mage which has high fire damage. It doesn’t come without price though, you need proper gear and large amount of mana to support this build. Here are the basic playing styles of an Arcane mage:

1. Arcane Blast will be your primary spell from level 64 and up. Using this ability will increase the damage done by arcane spells by 15% per cast, but it costs more mana as well. You can stack this spell up to three times, giving you a very high damage boost. At the third cast, it increase your base damage by 45% and cost around 56% of your base mana, which will make your mana pool suffer if you do it without proper gear.

2. Once you powered yourself with 3 times Arcane Blast, Arcane Barrage will be your choice of spell. Cycling between Arcane Blast and Arcane Barrage will give you high DPS while not having to deal with the debuff.

Overcoming the trouble with mana isn’t impossible; you do have a few things you can use: runic mana potions, mana gems, evocation, and mage armor.

Fire Mage
The fire mage will be expected to deal the most DPS while the rest of the group protects you; while you aren’t using as much of your mana for damage boost like an Arcane mage, maintain enough mana to keep high burst DPS is still necessary. You won’t have the same survivability as a Frost mage so you will need to have more control skills. Here are the playing style basics of a Fire mage:

1. Fireball is your main spell for damage, but you don’t want to spam it because it will deplete your mana pool; use it by mixing other spells to complement this one. With Improved Fireball talent you will lower your cast time, which means more DPS.

2. Flamestrike is your best choice for AoE (Area of Effect) spell; it can be cast from distance which is good to keep you from harm and can be talented to have higher critical rate.

3. As a Fire mage you want to deal the highest level of damage possible so you need to add talents that will increase your damage: Incinerate, Ignite, Fire Power, and Improved Scorch.

4. Having Flame Throwing will increase your survivability since it gives you an extra 6 yards of casting distance. Definitely a must have talent.

The purpose of this build was to increase damage, so the next thing you will want to concentrate on is spell damage gear and enchant boost so you can increase your damage output.

You may notice that those two builds rely heavily on gears, enchats, and items to make it powerful enough. Check the best farming spots where you can stack gold in Northrend to fund your gears and items.

Frost Mage
As a Frost mage, you will have more survivability since you have the spells to kite such as Frostbolt and have less problem with mana since frost spells are quite mana friendly. The downside is that frost spells have less damage than Fire spells, and they don’t have the insane damage boosts Arcane spells have and that’s why you need to be careful how you use your points. These are the basic playing style as a Frost mage:

1. Your main damage spell is Frostbolt, but the spell is not very effective on its own. Complement it with Frostbite, Ice Shard, Shatter, Piercing Ice, and Frost Channeling will get you a nice damage package. You can lessen your cast time and improving DPS by adding Improved Frost Bolt.

2. Take Blizzard along with Improved Blizzard as this AoE spell will have the effect of lowering target movement.

3. Artic Reach will increase your spell range, keep you in safer distance from your foes.

4. Get Frost Nova, it is the gateway to Shatter effect.

5. Ice Block is an essential defense skill; you cannot act for the skill duration but in exchange you will immune to everything, clear almost all debuffs, drop all aggro, and give time for your group’s priest to heal you.

You won’t burst much damage, but by casting Blizzard with Improved Blizzard, Frostbite, and Shatter, you will be able to help your group because you kite a whole mob which will make it easier for the others to kill them.

These builds are only basic WoW mage guide that focusing only on one talent tree; there are various creative build that aim for different playing styles such as Arcane-Frost, Fire-Frost, etc with so much variation on each build. If you planning to start a mage, I recommend that you check Ultimate WoW Guide Review for a fast leveling guide with in game talent guide included.

Note: if you are into spellcasters, you might have interest in playing a Warlock, which has very unique methods to kill his adversaries; learn more about it at world of warcraft warlock guide.