First, Pure mages are a pain in the ass to level. Early on, you blast shit to smithereens, but having grinded him up to lvl 20, it takes 4-7 spell casts to 1-3 arrow sneak attacks. Also, arrows are plentiful, wheras mana regens too god damn slowly. Gotta wait for the mod community to tweak magic.
Second, when will people come back to cRPG? WHEN WILL PEOPLE STOP PLAYING SKYRIM? Granted, I'm still playing it, but I take breaks for cRPG.