Excerpt from Arcana Arcadenum Volume 3, authored by Siege Rigel

Long standing there have been countless comparisons between what defines one magic class from another, but none so common as the comparisons between sorcerers and wizards, two of the most common types of magic classes in the present world at the time this was written. While most magic classes have stark differences such as how shamans commune with spirits to use their magics compared to acolytes who commune with a divine power, wizards and sorcerers both seem to have their power from a pure source of solely mana to fuel their spells. 

To clarify my own understanding that has been confirmed and discussed with my other colleagues over several years, a wizard improves mainly through their studies, while a sorcerer improves through their usage and molding of themselves towards their magic. Sorcerers magic comes from an innate understanding and usage, and as such relies on a user's body, spirit, and soul. Most contrastingly is how wizards use spell circles to formulate their spells, while sorcerers do not. For sorcerers their own being is the mold through which their spells are formed, while for wizards, through countless years or even decades of research are spent hypothesizing, testing, and deliberating their own creation and altercations to spell circles as a whole. 

Despite these intrinsic details, an outsider would view how the two often have similar spells and deem a fireball from a sorcerer the exact same as that from a wizard, but the entire process is very different. Yes both use mana, yes both shape it into their spells, but while one is innate, the other is formulaic. 

Due to this, often sorcerers will shape themselves to better suit their particular field of magic, allowing an ice sorcerer to grow leaps and bounds in ice magic, but will also in the process be more restricted in their usage of other types of spells, such as losing their potency in fire magic. Wizards on the other hand, so long as they are diligent in their studies and training their mental faculties, will be able to cast whatever type of magic they have ever learned with the equal or above efficiency from when they learned them. 

This has led to overtime, wizards becoming the popular class, due to the increasing available research papers, and growing infrastructure for mentoring young mages such as the academies. Wizards are able to utilize catalysts and magical tools to help perform stronger magic spells than would normally be possible for their current levels, allowing for accelerated experience to be gained as well. 

Sorcerers from what I have seen, while able to enhance their magic through certain magical tools, are mainly restricted by how their magic is an internal process most reliant on their own body, spirit, and soul. Coupled with how sorcerers gain from research and studying pale in comparison to wizards, leads to most focusing on honing their skills and improving their levels in battlefields or in dangerous monster territories. 

It is my current belief that wizards will prove to be a far superior class to undertake with much greater results in the future, so long as the institutions allowing for greater magical studies development continues. 

But at the same time, if there were ever a dire age, one void of such luxuries, the innate and instinctual nature of sorcerers would vastly outstrip the slow gradual growth of a wizard's power.