08-21-2013, 08:37 PM
(This post was last modified: 08-21-2013, 09:22 PM by FireIceTalon.)
UA is good against some of those pesky elite packs when you are leveling or farming. It really just comes down to where you are playing - if you are in an area where the base monster types are not difficult for your wiz, you can probably forego using it for glass cannon, blur or something else. But if you are in an area where the monster types are difficult for a wiz (typically in the mid-later parts of Act 3 - heralds of pestilence, fallen fire mages, demonic hell flyers are some of the most dangerous monsters a wizard can face), you may want to consider using UA. It's not really good for boss fights though, since it has a lengthy cooldown of a full minute, and boss fights tend to be lengthy, so if it gets activated you are probably going to die anyway. Against trash mobs or tough elites though, it can certainly come in handy. I've found it useful in very dangerous places like The Fields of Slaughter, Arreat Crater, Tower of the Damned, or Vault of the Assassin in Act 2.
As for Familiar vs. FW, are you speaking in terms of an Archon Wiz build? I use both on SC, but on HC if you can only pick one for the sake of needing more survival rather than dps, I'd probably go with the latter. Not only cause it gives you an buffering icon, but because it in fact does more damage between the two. Familar with the Sparkflint rune does have a ranged element though, so keep that in mind also.
As for Familiar vs. FW, are you speaking in terms of an Archon Wiz build? I use both on SC, but on HC if you can only pick one for the sake of needing more survival rather than dps, I'd probably go with the latter. Not only cause it gives you an buffering icon, but because it in fact does more damage between the two. Familar with the Sparkflint rune does have a ranged element though, so keep that in mind also.
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"Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of conditions of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property, just as your jurisprudence is but the will of your class, made into law for all, a will whose essential character and direction are determined by the economic conditions of the existence of your class." - Marx (addressing the bourgeois)
"Your very ideas are but the outgrowth of conditions of your bourgeois production and bourgeois property, just as your jurisprudence is but the will of your class, made into law for all, a will whose essential character and direction are determined by the economic conditions of the existence of your class." - Marx (addressing the bourgeois)