Quick notes for self regarding different magic branches for my writings and to explain the lore of my creations
Disclaimer: I do not claim to know everything about the actual meanings and practices and I will be later on conducting research on these to be able to fully understand the nature of what I am using as an inspiration and how it works.
If you are a practitioner of one of the below and wish to give me your insight of how you practice your abilities and what for, do message me or send me an ask, I would be delighted to hear your side of it. However, I'd need you to specify what branch and what sub branch you do represent, as far as I know there are sub branches to each and every one of these based on their methods.
Wizard: Uses arcane based magic, not tied to a gender. Wizards are the kind to research magic, hoping to understand all of it. However they often only see arcane magic as being true magic. The most notable wizards have been men and many women who have been wizards have been discredited and mistaken to be witches.
Sorcerer/Sorceress: Uses magic that is called from within, soul magic if you may. They primarily experiment with different components and are avid users of alchemy along with witches, who they often work with along with druids. Usually live alone in some tower where people just keep appearing and asking for an advice without their consent. They know every magic user on the area and the type they yield, being able to give these advice askers to the correct place where to get help from.
Druid: forest magic, often gifted to them by the forest spirits such as the two Finnish Deities; Mielikki and her husband Tapio, who are also widely believed to be closely tied to the Northern elven race (I suggest Forgotten Realms books by R.A.Salvatore), not tied around gender either. Druids are the peacekeepers and protectors of the forest, communicating between it and the mortals.
Shaman: Gets his/her/their power from the ancestors and the ancient ones. They are the leaders of their tribes, asking guidance from the ancestors when it comes to moving to new locations. They use bones, drums and herbs as a medium.
Witch: Their power comes from the earth and its soil itself, the witch is most powerful within the ground of their own home, witches have several branches to them, but their main agenda is to heal and to punish. Being a witch isn't tied to a gender either*
Seers: Chosen messenger of the gods and demons, doesn't posses actual magic themselves, but has a close relation to a god. Not tied to gender. Gives guidance and predictions.
Oracle: Messenger of the spirits, World spirit especially. Gives guidance within the present. No specific gender.
Voodoo master: They walk between the worlds, consulting the demons and the divine spirits of the past and the present, gifting small miracles for a price. Much like witches, they can heal, but unlike the other "light magic users" they can bring people back to life. Voodoo, or Vodun, practicers are the grey area of magic. The gender of the user changes according to tribe.
Necromancer: Much like a sorcerer, necromancer draws power from within themselves, but they mix it with arcane power. They are more interested in using magic as a way to beat death itself or are using it to make their own lives bit easier. They can also use the souls of others as a source of power, most notably draining the life of other person and transcending it to themselves. No gender is marked to be most dominant within this faction.
Warlock: Warlocks specialise in Battle magic, they draw magic from both arcane sources and demonic sources, most of them having a demon servant by their sides. They stand on the back of the lines where they command their summoned troops, sometimes using the arcane power to forcibly twist their surroundings to obey them as they move forward along the army. Actual warlocks haven't been needed to send to battles since the world wars, but they're still very much there.
*Sadly, male witches are increasingly rare as overtime the media has enforced the idea of witchcraft being available only for women**, despite of the fact that during the witch hunts, the Northern countries only burned male witches due to them being easier to turn into the art of Pain Infliction than women were due to the community raising men to be more violent and uncaring as opposed to women who were raised to be the opposite.
**This ideology has also changed the witches themselves, prompting them to turn their male counterparts away from them, telling them to seek out a druid instead. This has caused multiple problems with male witches being unable to control their powers and accidentally causing death and decay on their wake, many even begging the Forest Gods to take away their magic completely, scarred and terrified by their own abilities and the dissonance of their own kind.
R.A.Salvatore ; Dungeons and Dragons ; The Forgotten Realms ; Drizzt Do'Urden - series, Folklore ; Russian myths ; Celtic myths ; Saami myths ; Kalevala mythos, Terry Pratchett ; Tiffany - series ; The witches series, J.R.R.Tolkien ; Lord of the Rings - trilogy ; Silmarillion ; Hobbit, J.K.Rowling ; Harry Potter - series, Elaine Cunningham ; Arilyn Moonblade - Series ; Counsellors and Kings - series, David & Leigh Eddings ; Legend of Belgarion - series ; Belgarath ; Polgara