I would argue that a Wizard's best grouping ability is the simple port. You can send tells and form up a group of LFGs from wherever and take them to an out of the way zone like Droga or Splitpaw. With 1700 players on at peak times getting out of the popular zones is critical. Unfortunately a) people are sheep and don't like leaving their comfort zones b) adding a Wizard to the group slows things down substantially c) there aren't that many empty 50+ xp zones.
Wizards are simply weak in Velious (with the exception of Bane encounters). As Motec points out, they are supposed to be a DPS class, and yet they do half as much sustained damage as a Paladin. Really, all of the nuking classes are weak in Velious, and this began to turn around in Luclin with huge mana regen (Spiritual Purity, AA KEI lasting for hours, more/easier FT, horses), nuke criticals, focus items, and eventually more burst fights in Planes of Power. The lack of caster itemization makes things even worse; every 50+ wizard must compete with an epic rogue or monk. The more you try to play around nukes in Velious Era the worse you will be; hence Motec's recommendation to use the stuns and crowd control spells, which is probably correct but takes you to the level of the worst enchanter ever.
Note: 90% of this is fixed if you can acquire a Xygoz/Velketor clicky robe. But as a new player you don't have that option.
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