I have two that I've really wanted to use, Watery Sphere and Scatter, but haven't played a high enough level Wiz since Xanathar's came out to use them.

I think love the idea though of being able to teleport all your enemies into the path of a big AOE, or having your party willingly fail the Scatter save to reposition them and turn the tables on the enemy. 

Watery Sphere I love cause i have a mental image of how cool it would be to float it around, collecting enemies and then nailing the sphere with a lightning bolt. 

What kinds of tactical spells do y'all like? 

My favorites are all relatively low level spells that have a lot of utility.

Bane simultaneously protects the party while making enemies more susceptible to save-based spells.

Levitate only gives enemies one save and leaves them with no options if they lack ranged attacks. It can also be used by the caster to stay out of harm's way or to reach high places.

Command doesn't require concentration and can rob enemies of a turn. The "approach" option combined with grappling is an effective way of dealing with flying creatures too. Ensnaring Strike gets an honorable mention too; requires concentration, but doesn't require your action to cast.

Earth Tremor is nice for crowd control in close combat while Warding Wind is great at shutting down ranged attackers. Likewise Entangle and Spike Growth make huge areas of the battlefield difficult terrain.

Fog Cloud can help the party retreat or run past enemies without having to disengage and blocks counterspells.

I agree with most of IC's list.  

Some that I would add: Suggestion is a wonderful spell for incapacitating several foes at once.  Even moreso if Twinned by a Sorcerer.  While it takes concentration, it can save you from bad tactical positioning or open up some tactics to be used on your foes in addition to taking a few opponents out of the fight for a few rounds.

Minor Illusion and Silent Image could be classified as control spells if your DM is okay with allowing rule-of-cool and creative hijinks.  Extremely flexible with use on and off the battlefield.  Unfortunately, Silent Image requires concentration also.

Web is fun, too.  Combined with a Warlock using Repelling Blast or an Open Hand Monk, you can re-stick opponents that manage to evade or get out of the original casting.    

Unfortunately, I haven't had to chance to use high level control spells, either.  Really looking forward to combining stuff like Plant Growth and Bones of the Earth with atypical movement speeds someday.  

One of my favorite control spells is sleep.

Forcecage using cage effect to still target inside. Sickening Radiance inside cage. 

Snare + Cloud of Daggers is a good low-level combo if you have a minute to spare. Set the snare, when it goes off, cast the cloud of daggers. Automatic damage every turn and no saving throws against the daggers. 

Demiplane + Wish is a very powerful combo as you can create a demiplane full of Symbols or a bunch of Glyph of Warding. Can use to make a room that provides lots of buffs or a room that could kill the Tarrasque easily. The issue for using it as a trap is trying to get the enemy into it but spells like Polymorph, Suggestion or the Dominate spells can really help, as can Telekinesis or anything that can force movement. Requires high level and a lot of time to set up for a single-use but worth it. 

Disguise Self + Charm Person + Nystul's Magic Aura / Arcanist's Magic Aura + Distort Value + Creation = become rich. It's a lot of spells and therefore takes a lot out of you. However, you're basically creating utterly flawless diamonds, bypass any magical detections on it, easily convince the buyer to part far more than normal and get away with all of it because they won't know who you are. Works wonderfully for those who have a Charlatan background. 

Quote from Cyb3rM1nd>>

Disguise Self + Charm Person + Nystul's Magic Aura / Arcanist's Magic Aura + Distort Value + Creation = become rich. It's a lot of spells and therefore takes a lot out of you. However, you're basically creating utterly flawless diamonds, bypass any magical detections on it, easily convince the buyer to part far more than normal and get away with all of it because they won't know who you are. Works wonderfully for those who have a Charlatan background. 

An observation for anyone considering this: Identify will completely ruin this.

Quote from InquisitiveCoder >>

Quote from Cyb3rM1nd>>

Disguise Self + Charm Person + Nystul's Magic Aura / Arcanist's Magic Aura + Distort Value + Creation = become rich. It's a lot of spells and therefore takes a lot out of you. However, you're basically creating utterly flawless diamonds, bypass any magical detections on it, easily convince the buyer to part far more than normal and get away with all of it because they won't know who you are. Works wonderfully for those who have a Charlatan background. 

An observation for anyone considering this: Identify will completely ruin this.

 
Shh...

<.<

>.>

I think Magic Aura wins over Identify. From Magic Aura, "divination spells reveal false information" and Identify is a divination spell. A 2nd level spell that requires a slot should be better than a 1st level ritual. If someone is buying a diamond of that size they'll need to have a wizard on staff to Dispel Magic first. 

Hold person is great if you have a few melee players in the party.  A Cleric with inflict wounds can do a huge amount of damage on a paralyzed target.  A Rogue will love getting advantage for Sneak Attack, and getting to roll twice as many Sneak Attack dice.  

Transmute Rock. Works in most dungeons/caves. Your DM will hate you.

Actually it doesn’t. Nystul magic aura is in there specifically to keep that from happening. magic aura allows you to set the properties of an item revealed by divination spells. And wouldn’t ya know identify just so happens to be a divination spell. 

Hypnotic Pattern  Incredible spell, one save to stun them.

Bigby's Hand  Can push people around.  Better than a wall.

I keep wanting to use Watery Sphere - looks perfect against a bunch of medium or smaller creatures, but I never seem to get a chance.

Also a Home Brew spell I created called 'Visions of the Far Realm'-  posted in Home Brew D&D Beyond.   (Note I created it and posted it BEFORE Wildemonte came out.  I do not think they actually stole the name of my spell for the effect in Reality Break, just a happy coincidence)

^I second Bigby's Hand. Wizards can have a hard time contributing to Party v Dragon fights with all those legendary resistances. Give the lizard the bad touch, drag em to the ground and skip all that.

Just used scatter Sunday.

Scatter TOTALLY screws with a lot of ambushes.  Enemy archers hiding behind 1/2 cover  SURPRISE here comes our fighters!  (pissed off one of my own fighters that way, too bad.)

Quote from juugo2017 >>

Actually it doesn’t. Nystul magic aura is in there specifically to keep that from happening. magic aura allows you to set the properties of an item revealed by divination spells. And wouldn’t ya know identify just so happens to be a divination spell. 

Absolutely nothing in Magic Aura prevents Identify's ability to reveal what spells are affecting the object, and having Magic Aura on an object is a dead giveaway you're trying to fool them.

Stupid though it is, InquisitiveCode is correct. Identify would make the object "seem" nonmagical, to anything that detects magic, like Detect Magic spell. However, Identify would still reveal what properties, including magical ones, are on the item - it doesn't use auras so it bypasses Magic Aura.

I'd consider it way more stupid if there isn't any way to detect Nystul's Magic Aura at all and buyers have to spam Dispel Magic a few times and hope for the best when testing for counterfeit magic items. Considering the fact that Dispel Magic is more broadly useful, I think it's perfectly fine that a niche spell can potentially counter another niche spell and that Nystul's Magic Aura only holds up to casual inspection.

Not really a control spell yet Dominate Person has no rules against making the target kill themselves or jump of cliffs, which can be very useful against humanoids in certain situations. 

Quote from WhyamIWillByers >>

Not really a control spell yet Dominate Person has no rules against making the target kill themselves or jump of cliffs, which can be very useful against humanoids in certain situations. 

 
It's literally the definition of a control spell.

Tiny servant + Pyrotechnics

Load some candlestick up then light em up. Spread them out then pyrotechnics some of them to give them all cover while they all have blindsight.  The way my DM interprets it the smoke spreads from the first so it moves with the candlestick without concentration :)