In an November 23 interview (1999) with "GZ" (one of the devs?) Caster's Realm had quite an interesting QnA specifically regarding wizards, but with interesting wider implications.
I was particularly interested by the following snippet;
"If you use a lower level spell, your chance of fizzle is almost 0, you do that spells max damage, and we knock a bit off of the creatures resistance. Not a lot, but a bit."
I appreciate in isolation this snippet is basically useless, but perhaps a jumping off point for further investigation.
obligatory link:
https://web.archive.org/web/20000125...sp?Article=468