What are Wizards like in your setting tg?

What are Wizards like in your setting tg?

Are you just racking up hats by posting on every board?

Those who decide to think their way through their problems in a way others would consider cheating.

Similarly to how those who cracked stone with a hammer and spike thought jackhammers were cheating. Using intelligence and reason to solve problems rather than natural ability and "common sense", Historically those who understood chemistry and physics could easily pass themselves off as those who worked magic or alchemy. Even 80s pinball players who know the pinball machine well enough to consistently score high were labeled as wizards. Basically anyone who understands and exploits reality more than the vast majority of their peers is a wizard.

It's a title bestowed upon others by the ignorant.

A more appropriate image

They are highly intelligent individuals who have mastered the "programming language" of the arcane arts so as to be able to affect the world in magical ways. They are also researchers of various phenomena and are basically magical scientists, historians, and other professions requiring intelligence.

They make up approximately 0.5% of the population of the world.

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>Team Fortress 2, Veeky Forums edition

wizards in my world are learned men, on par with doctors, lawyers, and engineers are in the modern world

while the truly spectacular wizards are celebrities and legends, capable of ending kingdoms, most wizards are content to use either use magic directly, or their high intelligence and education that they used to become a licences wizard, to provide goods and services to other people

there are even a few self-taught wizards, with spell books cobbled from periodicals, stolen or copied pages from other wizards, and filled to the brim with notes borne out of trial-and-error, however with no diploma, licence, or certification, they are seen as quacks, since these documents are seen as guarantees of quality, and anyone seeking help from a back-alley wizard is truly "buyer beware"

Hunted and mistrusted in most lands. In the city of magic, they pretty much rule the city, having suppressed most other types of magic. Across the planes, mostly food for the far more powerful beings that like souls of the foolish and powermad.

AND THEN THERE'S THESE ASSHOLES, who through dumb luck in the genetic lottery and dumb luck in general can become just as powerful as a wizard WITH NONE OF THE INVESTMENT.

AND THEY GET ALL THE PUSSY WHILE DOING SO.

Goddamn Charisma as a casting stat...mumble...grumble...spent ten years as an apprentice to what I garuntee was a pedophile before I could even cast my first cantrip, THIS asshole just woke up one day and could instinctively manipulate the very frabric of the universe WITHOUT EVEN KNOWING HOW HE WAS DOING IT...OR CARING!

ASSHOLES!

sorcerers need to invest a lot of effort to become effective, they train their magic like an athlete would train his body, rather than like student studying for an exam

unless the sorcerers in your setting are like that, in which case

It's more from the biased perspective of a wizard. Wizards give over years of their life and their very psyches, spend years learning, squinting at tomes by candlelight, trapped in endless rote of repetition and memorizing the "secret codes" of the universe, dealing with the backstabbing and tooth-and-nail nature of wizard colleges or, worse, the total disregard of older wizards for everyone around them, all the while trapped in the knowledge that one day they, too, will lose their sense of right and wrong as they simply focus on MAGIC, THE ART, THE SCIENCE, GREAT MAGIC, THE VERY FOUNDATION OF THE UNIVERSE!

By comparison, to a wizard's eyes, sorcerers don't do any "real" work. They wake up one morning able to cast spells, and they learn how to cast new spells by just casting the spells they already know a bunch. They just kind of do whatever and suddenly have power equal to a wizard - often faster, too, sorcerers both coming into their power faster (RE: the starting age table) and gaining it (as sorcerers are more likely to adventure than wizards, who are more hidebound and cloistered). The universe seems to reward them for dicking around.

LITERALLY.
DID I MENTION THEY GET ALL THE PUSSY.

To answer OP's question somewhat - wizards in my setting DESPISE sorcerers. Sorcerers, for their own part, think that wizards need to get out more.

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People who ride the coattails of the goddess of magic.This also applies to sorcerers, but they tend to be rarer and the result of freak chance mastered by willpower and experience rather than strict study and experimentation.
Clerics are those who champion the cause of a god and are granted magic by doing so.

Look @ the dates OP been waiting all year for this.

A somewhat jerkish secret society trying to change their own internal ley lines so mortal races can cast their own magic without relying on a familiar or focus to handle the rapid changes in magic patterns.
Some have good intentions, sane working practices, and adhere to safety standards. They are in the tiny, tiny minority. The rest tend to accidentally blow themselves up, mutate into terrible monsters, or accidentally create terrible monsters.
The "wizard/sorcerer" divide comes from whether or not your familiars are bound by control runes, contracts, etc. or freely work with you out of friendship. Both have their ups and downs, and by no means is either superior.

Devotees of the Eight Thousand Paths, on the other hand, just charge themselves with enough mana of an appropriate alignment and contemplate philosophy, in the hopes of ascending to deific rank.

Yeah but Sorcs get crap for feats.
Metamagics turn castings to full round actions.
Take longer to get higher level spell slots.

Wizards are uncommon in my current setting.
And usually respected and or feared.

There's a handful of Wizard NPCs.
One's a mid 50s fat bald guy with a memory problem related to a high level curse.
One's an elf spying on the party via ring of invisibility.
One's a mage that they didn't murderhobo and actually rescued.
Going to work him into the campaign more than he is.

People with the ability to near-intuitively understand the mind-bending rules that govern an unknowable force - which can physically alter their bodies and will slowly drive their minds and souls apart from any other sapient being (other than wizards).
This ends when they become an absent-minded near-mutant who, upon misplacing a deadly artifact, will make a few dozen more before physically blasting magic through the bodies of unsuspecting people to make more wizards.

The iconic remote-tower-building, library-growing, reclusive Wizards in my setting are often the most successful; having retired to a life of snorting mana dust and binding succubi while performing the occasional magical research.

Before they reach that point, they're usually the fantasy equivalent of a chemist or mechanical engineer. Being a full-fledged Wizard means you're high on the bell curve for intelligence, and didn't drop out of WIZARD COLLEGE to become a civil spellservant.

In my setting, "Wizards" are more analogous to hermits. They are very in tune with nature, and masters of natural magic.
Mages are the people who professionally study magic
Sorcerers are the equivalent of what half of /x/ wants to be, ie summing spirits and demons
Witches (can be male or female) are a more common version of what a wizard is. They are not as in tune with nature, and often live closer to communities. They mainly practice natural healing.

Similar to this user.

Wizards are like lawyers, you study magic in college, get into a wizarding firm, and then start racking up years and work hours. Early wizards are lumped with "pro bono" work for the firm, and that's how they end up adventuring.

Any spells learned or things looted during the adventure or quest is taken for the firm, and bonuses in pay and prestige are given.

"Hello, I'm Garth moonrunes, second year associate with brightspell, sunsword and associates. I'm here to offer my services to your group as part of our pro bono program. Please sign here if you was to engage our services. Please read the agreement in its entirety. Please be aware that any spells gathered or loot I may gain from my work with you will be claimed by brightspell, sunsword and associates"

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Sauce?

Wizards are a very rare thing, as to become a Wizard one needs to be trained by another Wizard. Nearly all Wizards work for the Wizards' Guild, a greedy organization spread across the entire continent. Most Wizards charge huge amounts for anything, including training, so being a Wizard in my setting is like being a knight back in the Middle Ages. The Wizards' Guild also acts as international peacekeepers, breaking up disputes that look like they could become long term. They'll stay away for a while in exchange for gold and maybe some magical artifacts the kingdom has, but not for long.
Few Wizards can cast anything above a fourth level spell, but each kingdom has a Arch Magus, a wizard of immense skill and intelligence, who is the leader of the guild there, and sometimes possesses power in the kingdom itself, maybe as an advisor, general or even king.
The Head of the Guild is unknown, but is theorised either to be the twin gods of magic, an Aasimir lich of ancient legend, a dragon or a genie of some kind, judging by how often Wizards work with Elementals.

Is that the default LaTeX font?

Scientists

Wow, that's so subversive!

The highest level of society in the Empire, similar to the caste of priests and wise men in Hindu societies. Despite their great wisdom and power, they are not permitted to rule in any capacity. The last magical king was deposed and killed by his peers many centuries ago.

Wizards usually com in 4 types.

Type 1: Cocksure asshole
Some kinda wizard who thinks he's hot shit because they learned a basic fireball spell and can use it to terrorize honest, hardworking folks.
Get a few of these and they're like the ISIS of wizards: real passionate and ready to destroy the world, but so impotent in the face of proper wizards that they routinely get their shit wrecked.

Type 2: Apprentice
Upon attainment of some impressive degree of magical power through study (self-study or tutelage), the wizard is taken to hone his craft with a master wizard.
Apprentices are usually mentally unstable because of all the weird shit their master wizards have them experience or do.

Type 3: "Master Wizard"
After seven years of study under a proper wizard, if the apprentice has both survived and published some contribution to magical theory, they become a master wizard.
Master wizards usually accumulate wealth and influence as members of the various wizard guilds.

Type 4: Ancient Wizards
While the guilds play politics on occasion, wizards have long ago figured out how to attain eternal (natural) life. Wizards who play guild politics will end up dead sooner or later, regardless of how well they did.
The oldest and most powerful wizards are just a bunch of irresponsible dudes with immense cosmic power who fuckin' love magic, but generally don't give a fuck and have little to no ambitions.
Pic related.

They're just people with powerful telekinesis. The ones with the greatest control can reshape matter and the ones with the least reshape their own bodys and are basically the blob

>just a bunch of irresponsible dudes with immense cosmic power who fuckin' love magic, but generally don't give a fuck and have little to no ambitions

They're basically a mix between Jesuits and Hermeticists.

Their magical powers aren't particularly impressive, but it's enough to have let them infiltrate society at every level in a conspiratorial fashion.