i really gotta get around to upping ember's stuff and do her quests. her entire 'eagerness about learning but does not do well in traditional learning spaces' stuff has worn away at me.

sorcerers are the only mages, apparently

Elder scrolls online rarely ever acknowledges the choices/customizations/achievements of the player character. this is old news.

However, every once in a blue moon the planets align, something breaks, and the game actually reluctantly sees the existence of the player character! But because it's eso, it immediately fucks it up.

Take ember's recruitment quest in high isle for example. She's a mage doing a spell and jumps to mage-splain magic at you (in a world where everyone is always doing magic and everyone has access to the slightest bit of magic all the time forever). Her dialogue assumes your character is a magic-dumb warrior vagabond who has never seen anyone do a spell in their life. Pushing aside the fact this choice does not work in the elder scrolls world, zenimax online studios does not give a shit if you are the master of the mages guild skill line, a seasoned member of the psijics, are hauling a magic staff around on your back, have magicka as your max'd out crazy stat, or even if you are specced into all the magic magickyness your class can provide. Zos expects you to be a warrior vagabond idiot. You MUST be magick-splained at.

There is a single exception to this where your character has the option to say 'hey ember, i know about magic, i do stuff, maybe i can help with this heckin spell rather than doing grunt work?'. You know what the qualifications are to be able to have this option? Your class must be 'sorcerer'.

"What's the problem" you might ask, 'sorcerer' sounds like a mage-y class right? Yeah, in any other game it would be; but the problem with eso is the classes do not matter, and every single class has magic and can fill the mage role. Not to mention sorcerers can also fill the warrior role and not be mage-y at all.

So when ember is faced with, say:

all warriors. all magick-less idiots who have never seen someone cast anything in their lives.

but my argonian stamina-based sorcerer bounty-hunter with bow, longsword, fighters-guild skills, and not a drop of magickal expertise in her?

Master mage. Master magician.