I play as the Mages because of their unique city (I especially like the Rakshasa and Titan buildings). And what else can I say... wow... they can learn many spells, they have 3 ranged units, which, in my opinion, have the most unusual abilities – let's just take Golems (enchanted armor, magnetism, or 75% resistance), a race that can tear apart many Mechanoids, a race that casts spells simply amazingly (in terms of spell power, they are the 2nd or 3rd strongest race), probably the second because Necropolis doesn't often venture into Chaos, (I like the Mages this way, although I'm more interested in Dwarves), a race that can easily learn two schools of magic, for example, Light and Chaos (a few mass spells like Bless and Atum's Cold Ring) or vice versa... And finally, the super ability to produce mini artifacts :)