[Baalz]

Firebird has a great niche of destroying big undead armies using only a low number of fire gems and relatively low level conjuration research. Just don't use them by themselves, obviously. Use it with guys you don't care about going blind (chaff, guys with recuperation, PD) and SCs with high MR and it can be a great bang for the buck when a huge C'tis or Ermorian army shows up and you've not got the mages/research to drop the classic goto spells for that situation. Handy for countering an opponent who is beating you over the head with darkness to.