Diablo 3
Guides
Support zWiz Guide
Last Updated: July 7th 2024
Share on Social
Introduction
The support Wizard (usually called the zWiz because they do "zero" damage) has been a niche, off-meta, supporter for quite some time. It's one of the tankiest supporters out there, thanks to Delseres Magnum Opus (4) Bonus, and can provide up to:
- +53% damage reduction
- +113% additive damage
- +16% Critical Hit Chance
- and a Pixelpull
It lags behind zDH and zNec in terms of offensive capabilities and has no chance against zBarb in terms of utility provided (no Movement Speed nor CC Immunity). This unfortunately means that zWiz, as it stands, is not really welcome in most setups and you'll have to group with friends/clan members that are prepared and willing to play with off-meta shenanigans.
zWiz's main problem is that it's not immune to Crowd Controls, which means that you'll need an external source of CC Immunity from the group (e.g. Ignore Pain Mob Rule, Laws of Justice Bravery, Inner Sanctuary Temple of Protection) or you'll have to equip Invigorating Gemstone. Additionally, if incorrectly executed zWiz can be extremely detrimental to the overall group performance, a good understanding of Crowd Control Resistance mechanics is required. Black Hole and Frost Nova as well as Energy Twister + Ranslors Folly all apply hard CC or knockback effects to their targets.
A novice zWiz player might very well lockdown entire screens of monsters making it impossible for the group to create significant pulls. This will be a nightmare to established zBarb players and will likely lead to conflicts within the group. The guide at hand is meant to steer you in the right direction to understand zWiz, its capabilities, strengths and weaknesses.
Very Tanky ✔
Extremely Mobile ✔
Provides Incredible Defenses ✔
Little to No Cooldown Dependency ✔
❌ Complicated Mechanics
❌ Sensitive to Crowd Control
❌ Out of Meta / Hard to Find Groups
❌ Detrimental if Incorrectly Executed
Core Setup
Items
- Delseres Magnum Opus (4) Bonus is incorporated in all versions due to the 37.5% damage reduction it provides to your allies. It requires you however to play Slow Time.
- Captain Crimsons Trimmings gives an incredible 20% Cooldown Reduction and 20% Resource Cost Reduction along with additional damage reduction.
- Crown of the Primus grants you all runes of Slow Time besides Point of No Return which we don't want anyway. The relevant ones are Exhaustion, Time Warp and Stretch Time, which provide some great bonuses.
- Ranslor's Folly grants an incredible pixelpull ability to our Energy Twisters.
- Strongarm Bracers provide 30% additive damage, which can be triggered by Ranslors Folly with Energy Twister or, in some variants, by Black Hole.
- Nemesis Bracers to spawn additional Elites on Pylons if nobody else in the group can wear them.
- Oculus Ring is included in any support setup and provides 85% multiplicative damage to teammates standing within the circle. The effect does not stack with other Oculus Rings.
- The Flavor of Time doubles Pylon duration, which is especially useful for Conduit Pylon.
- Ring of Royal Grandeur allows us to equip two additional items.
- Lastly the Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac which helps us reset our cooldown abilities to provide better uptime of our buffs and debuffs.
- Recommended Potion: Bottomless Potion of Kulle-Aid to further assist your party by destroying walls.
Season 32 Ethereals
Ethereals are powerful rare weapons that can only be found during Season 32. They were initially the Season 24 Theme. They have incredible stats, a random Legendary power, and a free passive for your class. Read our Ethereal Mechanics Guide for full details on how they work and our Ethereal Farming Guide to learn how to acquire them. What you should prioritize on them is the following:
- The Ethereal Itself
There are 3 different weapons available to us but only The Oculus is really interesting for zWiz as it allows us to apply a 25% damage reduction debuff on monsters to support our teammates. Wizardspike can eventually be used for its high Attack Speed and Arcane Power Regeneration while Mang Song's Lesson is not any useful. - The Legendary Power
This build requires Aether Walker and Echoing Fury to be functional. We need our Ethereal to roll one of these powers so we can cube the other. We also want a good roll on our Legendary power if it has a range. For speed content it is always helpful to have Ethereals with In-geom or Messerschmidt's Reaver powers, so keep those if you find them. - The Ethereal Stat Rolls
Each Ethereal comes with its own fixed set of powerful affixes. While some have a static value, many have a wide stat range. This means the difference between good and bad rolls is significant and something you should look for. - A Useful Passive
This is just icing on the cake because a fifth passive is not going to make or break your build. You're better off hunting for the things above. Check out the Passives section down below to see which ones you're looking for.
Global Stat Priorities
zWiz does not have any specific Attack Speed Breakpoint that you must hit, however it helps out greatly in speeding up our casting animations, which is why each item that can roll Attack Speed should do so. We are, at least in most variants, not reliant on long cooldown abilities, which is why Obsidian Ring of the Zodiac will suffice most of the time. Resource Cost Reduction (RCR) greatly increases our toughness via the Captain Crimsons Trimmings (3) Bonus and additionally allows us to spam our abilities more freely (especially when you choose to play a variant with Teleport and Aether Walker to increase your freedom to move around).
Variants
GR Speeds
GR Push
Echoing Nightmare
Concept
Support Wizard is a great incorporation for Speed Greater Rifts to farm both XP and gear due to its high mobility and its wide variety of defensive and offensive buffs.
Gameplay
When entering a Nephalem Rift cast Slow Time once to gain the 60% damage reduction, and activate Ice Armor Frozen Storm. Afterwards you rely on Teleport to travel and body pull monsters via Frozen Storm. Once you find a DPS location, cast an Energy Twister on an elite, drop a Slow Time on top of it, cast Frost Nova and then Black Hole. This sequence applies all the buffs and debuffs for your group. You ultimately want to be ahead of your group, preparing pulls right before they appear and move on right before everything dies.
Setups
There are two noteworthy setups for the weapon cube slot: Echoing Fury and Yangs Recurve.
With Echoing Fury you'll gain up to 75% Attack Speed, for shorter and faster animations, and up to 25% Movement Speed. With Yangs Recurve you'll gain a significant amount mitigation due to its huge 50% Resource Cost Reduction primary affix via Captain Crimsons Trimmings (3) Bonus as well as Aquila Cuirass. This means you need to equip it and cube Aether Walker. Lastly, since you forfeit Cosmic Strand, you should change Safe Passage for Wormhole to re-gain the additional mobility.
Select Build Version
Standard Variant
Concept
Overall support Wizard is very tanky, thanks to Delseres Magnum Opus (4) Bonus and Orb of Infinite Depth, and fast-paced providing some great mitigation and decent damage bonuses to your group. This variant only plays smoothly with a decent investment of Resource Cost Reduction for the damage reduction from Captain Crimson's Trimmings (3) Bonus and the Aquila Cuirass uptime, so make sure to prioritize these rolls according to the Item Stat Priorities section above. Additionally, we use Energy Twister Wicked Wind to keep some control on the pixelpull position and avoid unwanted pulls.
Gameplay
When entering a Greater Rift cast Slow Time once to gain the 60% damage reduction, and activate Ice Armor Frozen Storm. Afterwards you rely on Teleport to travel and bodypull monsters via Frozen Storm. Once you find a DPS location, cast an Energy Twister on an Elite, drop a Slow Time on top of it then cast Frost Nova. This sequence applies all the buffs and debuffs for your group.
Ranslor's Folly is great to complement zBarb pulling abilities. You create the initial pixelpull on top of an Elite and the zBarb brings more monsters and Elites in the pull using Ancient Spear Rage Flip before Ground Stomping during the DPS rotation to regroup monsters even more and maximize Area Damage.
Don't forget to cast Explosive Blast, not only to keep Orb of Infinite Depth active, but also to continuously apply Conflagration and aggro enemies. You can rely on Teleport to travel and bodypull monsters via Frozen Storm and Explosive Blast.
Setups
zWiz is extremely versatile and there are a lot of variants possible depending on your group composition or preferences. If your group does not have any Necromancer for Frailty and no support that can use The Executioner, then you have to swap out Echoing Fury for The Executioner in the weapon cube slot.
Black Hole Variant
If you play in Hardcore or push tier by tier at your DPS ceiling (clears in 15 minutes), you might want to incorporate Black Hole Event Horizon to soak Elites Affixes to greatly reduce incoming damage. In that case, you want to swap out Explosive Blast for Black Hole and change your Energy Twister rune from Wicked Wind to Gale Force to proc Conflagration.
Doing so, your Twisters will be wandering around, so you want to remove Ranslor's Folly if you're playing with a zBarb or a zNec in order to avoid random pulls on monsters. Take care to only cast Black Hole Event Horizon when it is absolutely needed and after the monsters have been grouped together!
Also, because you're dropping Explosive Blast, you can equip Yang's Recurve and cube Aether Walker, removing Orb of Infinite Depth in the process.
Setups
zWiz is extremely versatile and there are a lot of variants possible depending on your group composition or preferences. If your group does not have any Necromancer for Frailty and no support that can use The Executioner, then you have to swap out Echoing Fury for The Executioner in the weapon cube slot.
Concept
For more information, check out our full Echoing Nightmare Guide and take a look at our Echoing Nightmare Build Tier List and our META post for the best builds and strategies! This build is a support build. Typically we utilize a Greater Rift pushing build with a few tweaks.
Changes
- Use the Black Hole & Strongarm Bracers variant since you cannot pull monsters with Ranslor's Folly.
Gameplay
- Click Speed Pylon instantly to boost your mobility and dodge Green Meteors.
- Around Wave 90, click Channeling Pylon and Power Pylon.
- After Wave 100, use Conduit Pylon.
- At Wave 122, stop attacking and run to the corner to let the timer run out.
Cast Frost Nova right before you expect your DPS players to actively start damaging the pull. If you don't have to remove dangerous Elite Affixes with Black Hole Event Horizon, cast it so it clips the pull (not exactly in the center). Any enemy that Black Hole attempts to suck in will be debuffed with Strongarm Bracers regardless if the target is moved or not. Cast Energy Twister Gale Force in the center of the pull to apply Conflagration.
Video Guide
Mechanics
Summary
- A niche supporter that unfortunately can't compete with META supports currently.
- Has one of the strongest pixelpulls in the game with Energy Twister + Ranslors Folly.
- Be aware of Crowd Control Resistance rules!
Cheers!
Credits
Written by Chewingnom & sVr.
