So I'm about to head to sleep soon, so let me try to articulate why I think being part of the Sylvanian campaign is important for us. First of all, let me clarify my belief that Sylvania is officially done after this. Whether we help or not, we won't have anymore fires to put out in Sylvania. No more action sink. It is done.
Now that being said, this is a full mobilization of the colleges of magic. The campaign goal is the goal we ourselves chased for half the quest. It's the goal that Abelheim literally died for. It's in the area that was ours to govern for half the quest and it was started because of us. So now we bugger off? That feels deeply unsatisfying to me narratively. Can we not spend a turn more to properly conclude this portion of the quest? The last time Mathilde was in a campaign in Sylvania, her lord died and even though she won, she lost. This is the sort of campaign where upon it's conclusion we can go to Abelheim's grave, stand with our heads held high and not just say we changed the world but that we've accomplished his dream. No ifs or buts.
It's also her duty to go and help in a way. No one would call her out if we decided to rest and her oath is now to K8P not Stirland. But if we go there, we won't just be Magister Weber. We'll be Dowangr Weber who was the cause of the entire gathering and everyone will know it. We'll be Dame Weber who ran a successful spy network in Stirland and collapsed Castle Drackenhof. We'll also be Shareholder Weber who owns the company that'll likely be supplying the entire army. This is the situation where our presence is worth far more as a political entity and commander than as a individual magister, though that is also important. We are the one person who knows the most about a Stirland and Sylvanian campaign, far more so than Roswita. We are the best person to help coordinate all of these disparate factions, so as a grey wizard shouldn't we go? No one would blame us if we decide not to, of course.
Let's look away from the narrative for a second and look at what concrete we can gain. I would say that being part of such a gathering always has something for us to gain, but this is a bit special. We'll be rubbing shoulders with Matriarchs and Elector Counts. We may even be called upon to speak to the emperor as the local expert. In terms of name recognition, rep boosts and overall usefulness to an empire campaign we will never get anything better than this. We'll get a chance to work with and observe the best mages in the business. We can learn from them and teach them too. Mechanically, this is also the kind of victory we'd get traits for having a hand in. Getting advanced greatsword got us a trait? This is far more narratively intertwined with Mathilde's past and the shadow of Abelheim's death still haunts her in her disdain for Sigmar and her choice of bound spells.
Besides narrative and mechanical reasons, let's look at pure cool stuff. There are battle wizards here. The best of the empire. We'll get a first hand view of what they can do. Just imagine the pure sheer awesomeness in text present here and how it'll be represented in text. I really want Boney write that.
Overall there are many reasons for Mathilde to go for Stirland for at least one more turn and I'd personally would find it incredibly unsatisfying if we couldn't. It'd be a final thematic book-end to our links to Stirland and would also help us a lot in our future career.
EDIT: Also? It gets us more chances to get Great Deeds. I don't think I need to say more on that.
Grey Wizards putting mind control spells in the water supply!!!
