Wanting to go wizard.

[Bweetza]

On live, I played a Wizard. They oscillated between levels of uselessness most of the time. My server was not nearly as min maxed as Project1999. I think my raiding guild had a human warrior as the main tank. Few questions for modern wizards:

1) Race and stat allocation. I ran a Dark Elf Wizard, and would like to again. Am I handicapping myself? Stat allocation recommendations vary from 25 int, 5 sta or 5 str, to some claiming you go all sta. Is there any consensus? Solusek Ro seems like the go to Deity. No real downside other than roleplay and there is a ring only they can use.

2) Are wizards at all useful? Nobody seems to want to group with them (unless it's PBAOE), but I will be soloing most of the time, so that doesn't bother me. Are they useful in raids?

3) Are there any irreversible pitfalls in character construction/skill allocation that I am missing?