Diablo® III

So what do you think about this Ice Wizard build?

http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#aZYlfh!YWf!bcaaaZ

^ I know the rune setup is bad, possibly should have gone with the Arcane Slow rune.

Btw how viable do you guys think Ice Wizards will be in D3? They were the most popular in D2 since you basically needed the slow and freeze in Hell. Any thoughts about elemental specific Wizard builds in general?

UPDATE: http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#ZlYRPf!ZXW!bZaYZa

I thought they were popular because of the easy high damage.

I don't think builds are going to be very elemental specific in D3. The one wizard skill that suggests otherwise is of course Cold Blooded. But I think the all-ice build is overdoing it. If Ray of Frost is your damage dealer or if you are in the habit of chilling several monsters all of the time, I think Cold Blooded may be a good passive skill to use. My personal play style doesn't support it.

If the (open) beta is anything to go by, you will run out of arcane power a lot with that ice build. Will you just be spamming penetrating Magic Missiles while waiting for more?
When do you expect to use Explosive Blast? Its nuke effect is very nice (I expect, that of Wave of Force is), but you already have two damage skills competing for arcane power. Consider using the Cold Blood rune in Ray of Frost, making your main(?) damage skill also your spam-while-waiting-for-arcane-power skill.
Or you could hope that Frost Nova, Ice Armor (Chilling Aura), and kiting is enough to defend you and exchange Explosive Blast with Magic Weapon for more (cold) damage, even lessening your need for a nuke.

http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#ZkYQXS!YXW!bYcZaZ

This is how my Ice wizard would look, although for inferno I can't say it will work, I dunno if Diamond Skin will be enough for ranged and magic attacks, I think this build will be able to stay out of melee grasp long enough to kill just about anything, its ranged attacks I am more worried about :P

http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#QlYkfh!YXW!YZaYaZ

This is how i woud go for a cold wizard and since this will be my first char to make this will be my build atleast for nightmare/hell. Not sure if it will work well enough for inferno, but at this time no one can say for sure if anything will.

To start the explanation:

Fist i want to say that i plan on going solo play. Becous monster are leakest and i can benefit most from my follower that way. So this is ment to be a build for soloing normal and nightmare atleast.

Astrall presence is esential(i think to all wizz) since it gives us 20 more arcane power and makes it up to 120. With that we can cast Metero(Comet rune) + Blizzard at once on the pack of mobs, slowing them with the meteor for the first 3 secs so that Blizzard will do more dmg from the Cold blood passive + having the chance to freeze them on his own is a nice combo. After a few secs with that extra reg of arcane power will be time for the next Meteo(Comet).
If any of them survive and get near you, you have cold nova to freez them, aswell as the rune effect from ice armor to slow them down so you won't get hit even once by a melee mob. Pull back a little from them and cast new spells. Here having the chance for slain monsters to cast a new nova i really nice, giving us a nice controll on any melee mobs.
For the range it's just cast on them and avoid any spells or attacks they do.
You can see that i have picked Explosive blast, since i think it will be a nice combo (not if, since there will be a lot of monstrers to reach you) when monsters ar in melee range(or near enough to be effected with nova) to cast it after the frost nova and move away after that. It is a spell that has verry high dmg and aoe, and with that specific rune even more dmg + the nice timer of 2.5 secs. Which makes it perfect just when frost nova is nearly at it's end (3 sec duration) the 2.5 sec timer will go off from the spot where we were (right next to them) killing ( i hope) most of them and we get an auto recast of our frost nova from the rune effect.
And ofc we have telleport( it's in the wrong spot here, better to have metero and blizzard on mouse keys but this is a small detail) with the decoy rune for fast escape when we need it.
The only thing that i can't rly expain is Glass cannon passive, since i belive i will be able to avoid most of the dmg, i am going with it for the moment. But you can aways change in game later on, if you need more survival(with Blur or Galvanizing Ward if you want).

As mentioned in the start, if no monsters are immune to cold, you shoud be able to make it to late hell even start of inferno with this, before you NEED to change something for more survival(just a gues, not sure if inferno will really be that hard).

Hope you won't get bored from reading all that, but i just like to explain things :)
And really sorry if my english is bad at time.

Some comments and maybe tips will be nice just to see if i am going in the right direction.

Don't think any heavily single element build will be viable later up, imagine some frost resistant elites appear... uh-oh.

IMO, this one will be better overall: http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#aZQklm!YWX!YZZYYc

You get pro cold nuking and if something resistant appears you pop up Archon and blast it to bits with massive arcane damage.

Ray of Frost for single target, Blizzard area for more chilled stuff and Comet is for AoE. Teleport is to kite stuff or just GTFO and Archon is all purpose, both for resistant things and to blow !@#$ up, when needed.

Equip staff to get the most bang out of Arcane Presence buck

Another option is: http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#UZQklm!YWc!YZZYYc

This way you get another element and Electrocute is just more useful overall, besides you will need something to kill enemies with, since Blizzard+Comet is pretty much emptying all your Arcane Power and I doubt it will kill anything worthwhile.

TBH... If you think about it, Blizzard+Comet is not really doing that much damage, I built DH build that pretty much does damage equal to chain casting Comet and she can keep it up for like 10 seconds, before running dry. Did I mention that while it lasts she is immune to damage and does it all on the move?

Here: http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/demon-hunter#aeXVil!aeb!bccbcZ

I would try going for this: http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#bZYlfP!aYW!abcZYc once the game is out ( really curious to see how it would turn out ).

I have an ice wiz build I've been working on for a bit. Let me know what you guys think.

http://eu.battle.net/d3/en/calculator/wizard#ZYhlfm!YXW!bcZcYc

I have Ray of Frost for my main skill cuz with the Cold Blood it reduces the casting cost (pretty sure 0 is a typo, but still should be reduced low enough to have as a main skill). The Frost Nova and Explosive Blast combo should work well for clearing mobs. Head in there and let of a Nova then while they're frozen go for an explosive blast (with time bomb) to do serious damage to the frozen bastards. Blizzard's in there too of course in case there are any straggler, plus it should be a pretty power skill on it's own. The Ice Armor will add to the freezing/slowing element I'm going for along with giving me a bit more protection since Glass Cannon will be leaving me a bit more vulnerable and since the wizard isn't much of a tank anyway. With Glass Cannon (15%), Cold Blooded (20%), and Improved Archon (25%), I'll be getting a 60% damage increase and if my Frost Nova froze them then there'd be an added 15% from Bone Chill for a whopping total of 75% damage increase. I have Astral Presence in there in case I don't have fast enough AP regeneration from items/abilities. I was also planning on have a Templar with Inspire to add to my AP regeneration even more.

TL;DR: Frost Nova/Explosive Blast combo for mobs, Ray of Frost w/ Archon and other dmg boosts for single targets. Please let me know if you see any major flaw in my build, I'm certain there's plenty wrong with it that I just can't see. And thanks ahead of time for your comments!