Path boosting items for nature will raise the starting point for old age if your mage had nature magic already. Boosting fire will lover that point.
One of the ways to reduce the age problem is taking growth scale. Growth/death scale wont affect the starting point of old age but it will reduce the amount of afflictions the old mages get. For pythium i would take some growth or atleast avoid taking death scale.
I think that best spells to boost are those that get + to the area of effect. For example falling fires have + for area and damage. For some spells the biggest advantage is the reduced fatigue from having higher level caster. Good examples of those spells are blade wind and raise skeletons.
Damn i'm slow
