Maim Wings could work, but it's certainly not something I would really want on my own creature. Definitely not on one of my flyers. We can put it on a non-flying creature meaning it essentially has no effect at all other than to allow us to apply burns, but I'd much rather have something like Rise Again where I actually get a benefit other than the burn trick being discussed.
I might consider using Death Link. It is an optional effect which can be used to your advantage when applied to one of your own creatures. Such as by waking them from a Sleep effect. If the creature has vampiric or regeneration it provides an effective way to heal your mage also without too much stress on the creature.
My main issue with Rise Again is that I doubt I would have the mana to revive the creature, especially if I was using an extra 2 mana every round to apply extra burns. The Infernian Scourger might work for this, though since it doesn't have Flame attacks it wouldn't get a benefit from Smoldering Curses... Also as sIKE said it might be a Dispel target (though that would probably apply to any curse you use to do this, Rise Again is a bit easier to get rid of).
The appeal Maim Wings has to me though is that I could use it on myself and still have Adramelech as my creature (or any future Flame Immune demon, since that is typically associated with having Flame attacks).
It's a bit hard to tell which one is better, though I think I'm leaning towards Maim Wings since it would work in almost any strategy.
I hadn't considered Death Link though. Plagued might be a good option as well if your opponent was playing Swarm. Both of those are expensive to cast though.
