I make no claims to be the best mage in the entire realm, but I am a rather thoughtful one. Concatenating the conversation of PvE and PvP is always going to make the discussion more difficult.
In PvE there are two things at play. One is the actual balance/performance of melees vs mages. People have already covered the many reasons why melee comes out on top regardless of mage weapon rotation. The upcoming changes to resistances help some. But FS clearly outranks other mage weapons in damage potential, leaving mages as a hardcoded dps role particularly impotent in fire mutations until more magical weapons are added to the game. IMO this mutation type should have been held back until that point if AGS wanted to be fair to mages (spoiler alert: they don’t).
The other is the perception that melee is just more viable. This is a problem because even when people bis out their gear, min max their rotations, and actually are a showstopping PvE mage (as many have contested they do), it doesn’t really matter for the situation OP has described.
I would fully expect this exclusionary attitude (which has a mild tinge of toxicity to it) to continue past the Brimstone update. AGS only has soft power over this too. Part of the brlliance of this game is that nobody can predict all the ways weapon combinations will be used and what, precisely, the meta will become based on changes. AGS can’t force people to want mages in their parties, but it’s important for them to know such an issue exists, since it’s evidence of rather glaring oversight.
Now, in PvP, many of the inherent issues against mages from mob resistances and mutation mechanics are not in play. Mages are a powerful and integral part of PvP rosters who can play several different roles. I think the most difficult part is identifying the function you’re best able to handle and the optimal setup for it.
VG dps without blade is completely negligible, it’s buff/debuff/cc. IG has a bit more damage, especially people that can aim spike, or it can be played more defensively with self buff and some cc. FS has more burst potential than most of the other weapons in the game with no defensive capabilities or utility besides burnout. So balance those functions with the right loadout (light for dmg, med/heavy for cc/utility), ensure key gear perks are in place, and you have a recipe for success as a mage in PvP. That’s not to say these are the only weapons available to you (rapier/bb, or even more off meta stuff can be interesting), but these 3 magical weapons make up the core and IMO somebody on an int build without even one of them is kinda trolling (or at least not a “mage”).
Even with a perfect build, positioning is also very important for mages. This can certainly be difficult with an organized party, let alone a group of randoms dropped into an OPR. The one thing I can say for sure about being a mage in PvP is that if you don’t practice, you won’t improve.
tldr: pve mage bad, pvp mage good, so change mobs/mutations not mages
to offmeta or anything which isn’t meta and think that everything else is useless.