If we really want to become a dragon for personal reasons, we just need to whip up some Ulgu battlemagic to make the world temporarily forget that we are not a dragon.
If it works on the sun, it can work for us.
The success and the spoils are the creation of a new city, a new community, in this location. We've pretty much excluded ourselves from the Karak Nar society by being all grey-wizard and mysterious - drinking with people doesn't count if we are invisible. We are pretty much excluded from most dwarf socializing by being not-dwarf.
But like, Mathilde hasn't gone full mysterious grey wizard because she's afraid to have genuine conversations with people, she does it because she finds it hilarious.
You can't convince me that the person who did this -
You nod thoughtfully. "Even then, you must be cautious," you say, in the tone of one imparting sage advice. "The walls of Mikalsdorf will be able to withstand cannonfire better than you might expect, as it is certain that the Vampire will rampire."
By the time your words register you're already out the door and halfway through the corridor, but her sigh is still clearly audible, and you can't keep yourself from giggling all the way to your next meeting.
isn't having
fun with the mysterious benevolent authority bit. She stays on the sidelines because she can see such fun opportunities from there, but she's still willing to come down and actually talk to people when it's time for the next meeting of the romance book club. She may not be meeting her social and emotional needs in the same way the average modern person or you or I in particular do, but I feel like a far stronger and more directly evidenced case needs to be made to demonstrate that her needs aren't being met in her
own way.
Honestly, I feel like a lot of your concerns may be drawing from Mathilde's nature as a quest protagonist more than anything else. Like, it is true that most of Mathilde's socials are more focused on the social target than on her, which I imagine contributes to the conception that Mathilde's own emotional needs may not be as well met, but that's a natural consequence of running a quest. If someone votes to interact with Kragg, they probably want to see what's up with
Kragg, so that's what it makes more sense to write. Plus, the
exact nature of Mathilde's motivations and concerns is likely kept somewhat vague since she's controlled by a horde of people with divergent desires and fears of their own. For example, Mathilde's romantic interest in those around her could not be put to text until the recent vote to gather the voters' own thoughts on the matter, despite the fact that, in universe, Mathilde's attraction to Johann and Panpan probably didn't spring up over night. The need to keep a character consistent with a capricious voterbase limits the degree to which their exact thoughts and feelings can be portrayed, compared to NPCs.
Through that lens, Mathilde's competent and slightly aloof, but still mischievous and caring attitude toward those around her makes perfect sense - it allows broad and at times contradictory thread sentiments like hug-the-spider-hivemind and we-shall-be-the-best-wizard and always-more-magical-science and troll-the-elector-countess to be applied simultaneously. It's not going to be a perfect fit for what any individual person wants Mathilde to be, and some people will find the fit to be better or worse than others, but I'm genuinely not sure how one would improve on Mathilde's basic portrayal.
