How to mage

I am one of a very few people in my guild who have a mage as their main. In fact, I have noticed a disturbing trend among my guild mates where the mage class is abused as a bank/ah alt. There might be 50 mages in our guild; most of them are about level 2. My campaign for SHaME (Stop Hating Mages Everyone) will have to wait for another day, though. I am still waiting on 9 other people signing the charter and anyone who has ever been through that particular brand of hell knows exactly how long that could take.

In the meantime, I thought it would be nice to give a few helpful hints on how to properly mage.

• Be surly. Everyone seems to think that mages are all about rainbows and unicorns and smiles. Disabuse everyone you can of this notion. We are not around for everyone to lean on for food and drinks, no sir. We are around to kick some ass and take some names.
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• Stand waaaaaay in the back. This is not because we are afraid of getting hit by the mobs. We just don't want all those idiotic huntards who are supposed to be helping us out instead sticking us with arrows and then doing a /lol /friendlyfire /lol routine. 
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• Make several macros. Unless you're short on space if you have a crappy bar mod. Then simply putting together a one-shot response to all the inane questions you get should go something like this: "/r No, I will not give you food/water/a portal/Focus Magic. I might, however, let you pay me 10g for it." If you have the space, I recommend getting a bit more specific. Make replies such as: "If you're going to ask for a portal it would really be super helpful to tell me both where the hell you are and how much you're willing to pay." Or: "I am not a goddamn vending machine." Note that this will also help you be more surly. 
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• Avoid ever speccing frost. Your dps will blow, people will make fun of you and, honestly, the warlocks and hunters should be taking care of mana replenishment in raids. You have better stuff to do, like own the damage meters. 
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• Assure people that you'll give them levitate slow fall (holy crap, I'm a nub!) before taking a falling shortcut off a cliff or building. Fail to do so and then blame it on the fact that you don't have any light feathers. If they ask you about the minor glyph that takes away the need to use a reagent tell them you have better things to do with your minor glyphs. You don't, of course. But they won't know that because their mage is probably a level 2 bank toon.
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• If you're raiding and your tank and healers are holding up the show, give things a gentle nudge in the right direction. I like to do this by going invisible, walking into a pack of trash and doing a frost nova/blink combo back towards the raid party. If no one reacts quickly enough to pull the mobs off you, you always have ice block! Everyone you play with, especially other clothies, will be amused at your antics.
  
  
• Other players will sometimes get a little cranky about their health and mana bars, especially in scenarios like the one I described above. A good thing to keep ready to come back with is reminding them that you have provided them with all the health and mana refills they could possibly need. After all, it's not your fault they run out every other fight.
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• Get good at sheeping. Get even better at chain sheeping. A fun way to practice is to duel a warrior. You might also want to make a macro for when you sheep since 9 out of every 10 players are too stupid to pay attention to the fact that one of the mobs just got all white and woolly. I suggest threats be used for this macro. I have found "Break my sheep and I'll break your face," to be fairly effective. You might also threaten to withhold buffs, food and portals. Have fun! Be creative!  

Those are just some helpful tips to get you started. I'll be back later with some thoughts on the best builds for leveling and some delightful recipes for roasted lamb.