Basic and Advanced Lightfoot don't share the same cooldown.
Yep, so in dire situation, you can switch your hotbars and use the basic one and once the other cooldown is done, use the advanced one.

Before SM, I'd suggest you to solo. It's boring I know. But it's better.
At FD7, in group, you will gain about 0.01% while the mobs u solo give you 0.08%.
It means that every single guy in the group needs to kill 1 mob at the same amount of time you kill one to be advantageous.
Besides, in group, the mobs are too crowded, and you will tend to aggro more than usual, without wanting to.
Solo is better, party for you, it's mainly for fun factor.

If you want to start a mage as a new character in 9Dragons, don't choose it at first choice.
Take a warrior, then level with it. They kill faster and it will be a lot easier to level.
Then when you level it to around RC8-10, change into a caster.
So you can train some of your skills and can take on higher lv mobs later on.
Bad side of this, if you do this, you may not be able to change your build further on. So think wisely.

Don't use the bleed spells, because once you get FD1, you will get a better one.
So, use only the slow spells for the time being, its effect is better, and damage would be the same.
Besides, using only the slow spell will level it quicker, so it's for the best.

Try not to use your shield, if not in danger. If you are leveling, you want to cut your downtime.
Your shield uses about 3-4 spell-worth of mana.
Henceforth, it's like for each shield you cast, you could have done 50% or more of damage to any mobs' life.
If you need the shield to kill the mob, then the mob is probably too hard for you and you should change the area.

Don't use either Steps or Meditation buffs. Their ratings and damage is something you can live without.
If you got them at cheng 10, they both takes 3 mana/each per ticks.
See it this way, are you willing to trade about 2 wisdoms for 1000 mana?

Level your wisdom buff, it's so awesome at higher level areas.
With more wisdoms, you do better damage and miss less. It's a life-saving buff in situations.
Level it with the hold-the-skill-button tricks when you want to go AFK.