Get by? Followers. I use Faendel and Janessa as well as that Strong Arm chick early on when I'm playing a mage, especially Janessa if I'm using a lot of fire. Just have to be careful to not hit them when you're using ranged spells. Evenutally, on Solstheim you can get a perk that keeps your followers safe.
And don't forget flesh spells. You can even get Oak Flesh as soon as you get to Riverwood.
Hmm... I'm going to have to read a mage guide. I can't believe that you have to rely on followers that much.
I also guess that you have to be a jack of all trades type of mage. Maybe specializing in Illusion or whatever, but in the video she was clearly using Destruction lightning. I often try to go pure something and I don't think that's a viable strategy as a mage. You need a little of every tree. Really need to plan my perks out before.
I've played many squishy pure mage types and I never use followers. Pure mages are more about evasion and making yourself hard to hit by whatever means necessary. Personally, I think followers for a mage are all crap, especially if you are running a lot of Destruction magic. You'll spend more time picking and aiming your spells to avoid hurting your follower than anything else.
If you are gonna go pure mage with no followers then you are gonna need Destruction for offense. No way around it really, unless you want to spend most of your time casting Frenzy and watching other people fight. I would suggest focusing on Fire, not only is it the most dependable of the three elements imo, it also augments very well. Not to mention Ahzidal's Ring of Arcana and Ignite. Every mage I build wears that thing. With it... and Aspect of Terror from Illusion plus 2/2 Flame Augment and Intense Flames, you are looking at 21 points of fire damage per second for 15 seconds... do the math, even on Legendary difficulty, Ignite goes to work hard.
Another huge factor is you need to decide what kind of resistance you want. Magic Resistance or Atronach... or both, though that's a lot trickier.
Magic Resistance sources-
Breton Blood- 25% (Racial Bonus)
Agent of Mara- 15% (Book of Love quest)
Alteration Magic Resistance- 10-30% (1-3 perk points)
Lord Stone- 25% (Standing Stone... also +50 armor which is nice for a mage)
Enchantment- % dependent on Ench level (acquired by destroying any Magic Resistance item)
Enchantment- % dependent on Ench level (acquired by destroying Shield of Solitude, more powerful than above)
The cap as far as I know is 87% Magic Resistance, so it's fairly easy to hit the cap using a combination from above. Note also that it's possible to get two separate MR enchants on the same item, but you must acquire Shield of Solitude and destroy it, however the max you can have on one item is 45%, so even if you got the number up to 25% for each enchantment, the item would only grant 45% instead of 50%.
Atronach Sources-
Alteration Perk (Atronach)- 30% chance to absorb spell
Atronach Stone- 50% chance to absorb spell (-50% magicka regen, +50 magicka)
Here's where it gets interesting... we're already at 80% absorption but we can push it to 100% if we want.
Miraak's Robes- 15% chance to absorb (95%)
Miraak's Gloves/Boots- add 5% to Miraak's Robes (100% absorption)
Miraak's Gloves/Boots- add 5% to Miraak's Robes (redundant)
So by pushing Atronach with Miraak's stuff, you can become completely immune to spells and dragon breath and your Magicka pool will get a nice bump fairly often through absorption. Drawback... you won't be able to summon anything as Atronach will also eat your Conjuration spells (just messes up summoning atronachs, reanimation works fine). It also falls a little short against non-spellcaster types as it's more difficult to recoup spent magicka if nobody is flinging spells at you. Also, Atronach is all or nothing, meaning that if a spell is cast at you, Atronach will either stop the entire spell dead or you feel the full brunt, unless you also have Magic Resistance. As far as I know, when a spell hits, Atronach is figured first, if the spell makes it past, Magic Resistance kicks in. Not 100% on that point though so you may want to look it up.
I would also suggest using Shouts to help you evade.
Unrelenting Force- obvious is obvious
Slow Time- Oh the wonderful things you can do when you slow time down to a crawl...
Become Ethereal- aka "RUN!"
Whirlwind Sprint- more obviousness
Those are the ones I depend on early on as those are fairly easy to acquire early on. Good luck!
Oh yea... this is a thread about Restoration.
Aside from the crucial perks the only spell I abuse from Restoration is Poison Rune. Not a popular choice but my Foul Presence build is geared to abuse them and make them powerful so it's a lot of fun for me, but they aren't that great on their own really.