[guineapig]

Here are some tips from experience.

Get yourself a staff of Writhing. I know you can't afford to buy one off a vendor, nor can you kill the mobs in solb to get one for yourself. But if you ask nicely and find the right people at Royals they will give you one. I constantly see them being given to shaman pets so donating to a newb shouldn't be that much of a stretch.

Now keep your dex at around 90 (though 100 is even better). Pull mobs with your best nuke (don't bother to root) and alternate between melee and nukes. The mobs will die fast as the 48 damage proc goes off very often on this staff. What little health you loose per pull will regen at a similar rate to your mana anyway. Did I forget to mention that if your 1HB is maxed you will be landing for a max hit of 18 with that thing (in addition to the procs).

Forget what others have said about root. There are plenty of mobs I have found with low enough resists that I can regularly land 3-4 nukes in a row without root breaking. It doesn't get much simpler than that. On the rare occasion that root does not hold, you have the staff for mana efficient killing.

If you are straight nuking solo, you will average 2 kills per mana pool if your gear is decent. If you are not averaging 2 kills per mana pool then you are wearing too much int gear and not enough mana gear. At lower levels the return on int is not that good yet. Check out jewel-crafted Jade bracers and rings for a good source of hp/mana gear at a good price.

Keep an eye on your AC. If you can get your worn ac to 75 or above you will see a world of different on how many hits you can take. Once you are battling mobs in the mid 30's tanking will no longer be an option but you should be able to find plenty of blue mobs you can tank up to around 34 (making the blue con mobs in their mid-upper 20's). After 34 you will probably have to abandon that strategy.

One of the best items I can recommend for the strategy I have laid out (besides the Staff of Writhing) is a shimmering orb. +15AC and +20HP. This is a highly underrated item that you can get super cheap because most int-casters are wussies.

Finally, when creating spell sets make sure you have one where your nukes are in a row based on damage output and I would say have at least 4 different nukes memmed. When a single nuke takes 35% of a mob's hitpoints away, you don't want to cast that 3 times if you have a lesser nuke that does 30%. Do the math, it will help you big time! 35% +35% +35% = wasted mana. 35% +35% +30% = more efficient.

In summary, the goal at early levels is to try and deal with the greatest drawback to soloing as a wizard which is downtime between kills. The more free damage you can dish out via melee and the least mana you use per kill are extremely important. Only waste mana on root if you are low on hitpoints, otherwise it's mana that you will be sitting an extra 12-18 seconds for to regain. This adds up!