Questionable Questing

So I would say emotion, and how well connected to the spirits a Sorcerer gathers power from. Warlocks in this would be those who make direct contracts of service to act as avatars of greater spirits, while oath pacts, term from Brando, with lesser spirits for familiars are more mutual

And what do the spirits want or receive from their end of the bargain?

Warlocks get someone to run their cult, their occult priests.
Familiars get power, someone to attach to and grow with. Its also something sacred, like a marriage be it sexual or friendship. Power, and a partner.

A bond also allows a spirit to experience the mortal world with greater clarity and immersion, to feel and think with expanded capacity

I would laugh at the idea of giving someone a bunch of power just for the ability to eat pies, but then I imagined a life with pies and it makes perfect sense.

Does the person gain increased senses of the spirit world? Is that even a thing or is just a straight power upgrade for humans?

They gain access to a spirit that can provide a greater connection to the spirit world and a spirit that can attract the ambient spirits like them to further fuel the mage's magic. Seeing into the mystical is a basic skill that grows with further mage training. A spirit familiar can also provide lore on magic and act as a guide and adivsor, as well as a bodyguard

A familiar is different from normal spirit magic as typically spirits are more forces, weather systems, energy patterns. Their the source of power, forming the Aura around a mage but not distinct beings. Unlike a familiar which is a singular entity

So a familiar forms emotional bonds while spirits just roam around basically?

Indeed. Their part of the world, flowing and dancing but never sticking. There are spirits who do form ideneity, like that fire spirit in one interlude with Urt who has a witch wife.

Do they form personalities over time or is there a process for it, like developing a relationship with someone they've made a pact with over several years?

I'd say it happens over time, now that you have given me the idea. Which is like how Syl does in Stormlight which read it dammit. That shit gave us paladins in a new novel way while being as paladin themed as possible and morally nuanced.

As the relationship grows, so does the spirit's complxity as a indiviudal

Are they physical or at-least have the ability to turn physical? A relationship with a spirit could be fun.

That's the big thing. So warlock, not physical because spirit too big. Familar? Yes physical, able to take solid form and interact with the world

Could the spirit potentially learn how to possess a body or a golem and interact with the world that way or is it against their nature to be restricted that way?

Currentlly we have a planned character who's spirit takes the form of the staff snake when she is not a big titted goth magic girlfriend with snake eyes and fangs. Or a giant snake form.

Nagina from Harry Potter was the inspiration for the familar

On your MHA thing, how corrupt is the hero system?

What I'm thinking is that you have a whole generation of people that are pretty traumatized by the whole quirk warlord era, so kind of like the Untied States in the fifties were everyone was obsessed with the image of wholesomeness do to the violence and uncertainty of ww2 and the great depression, a lot of people in MHA are trying really hard to pretend everything's normal.

Which ties into a big issues were a lot of temporary memories that were created to help deal with the chaos of quirks were never properly dealt with. So like the whole private armies they created and the lose rules of engagement that used to exist before All Might finally calmed everything down, all the people who were involved in that were quietly retired and people pretend that they didn't exist.