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People post a lot of strategy about "action economy" and "mana economy", but having tons of actions and mana isn't the goal of the game, killing the enemy mage is the goal of the game (of course, a lot on actions and mana could help you kill the enemy mage).
While there are direct attacks on enemy mage, usually mages do use some damage economy (and it is the main economy in rush builds).
There are three main types of damage economy-
1) Things that make attacks (usually creatures, but also conjurations). Examples - Timber Wolf, Grimson Deadeye and wizard's tower.
2) Things that enhance attacks. Examples - Hawkeye, Fireshaper Ring and Armory.
3) Things that deal damage over time. Examples - Magebane, Rot and Idol Of Pestilence.
In rush openings, often the only economy you use is damage economy, and usually most of it is of type 2 (hawkeye, akiro's favor) with sometimes one of type 1 (a creature or a wizard's tower). In long games you usually combine all three (or at least the first two). Necromancers almost always use a lot of type 3 damage economy (and they even have plague master as a mage ability).
Note that you having damage economy doesn't necessarily means you are focusing only the enemy mage, but they could also be used to target enemy damage economy (like when you attack an enemy creature with your own creature).
1) Things that attack. Many mages bring things that attack to the game. When you have a creature, that creature could attack once per round, and that could inflict damage. The more creatures you have, the more attacks you make. The stronger your creatures are, the more damage they make and the longer they stay to keep attacking. One downside of this type of damage economy is that it usually have limited range, so the enemy mage could try to run away from your creatures, or stay in a corner 3 zones away from the wizard's tower. Another downside is that your opponent could use guards to prevent you from attacking the enemy mage. Nonetheless, creatures on the board could also serve as guards, and if you have a lot more creatures on the board than your opponent then you could probably deal more damage each turn than your opponent. There are creatures like the Devouring Jelly, that even after they are on the board, you need to make effort for them to be capable of attacking the enemy mage (or generally the most desirable target), so you need to spend more mana and actions on positioning. There are also creatures like Crevere or Grimson, that could almost always target the enemy mage (or whatever target you want them to attack) unless effort is spent in avoiding them.
2) Things that buff attacks are usually handy. The way you try to damage the enemy determine the type of attacks you should buff. Almost every strategy heavy on attack spells should use hawkeye (and probably some other attack buffs on the mage such as akiro's favor). If you use many Thunderift Falcons then Rajan's Fury should be a usefull buff. If you use a book that makes plenty of melee attack, then you should consider using Bear Strength. If you have plenty of canine creatures, then the Redclaw alpha might be useful. If you are going to use mostly one way of attacking, then you should probably buff that way of attacking if possible.
3) Things that damage over time are great. Except for bleed ant rot, most of the methods to deal damage over time are in the dark school. Magebane is even seen sometimes with non-dark mages, since it is just a quick action, 5 mana and 2 spellbook points, and it usually deal a vast amout of damage unless dispelled early (and if dispelled, it mean that the opponent just spent the same amount of resources you just used to cast it, and took damage on the way). Rot condition is one of the best conditions, and by itself it gives a good reason to take things that remove conditions (such as a wand of healing). Necromancers many times decide to meditate in the corner and play defensively and use Idol of Pestilence to force the opponent into attacking them. Generally, Necromancer is the best mage in using this type of damage economy.
