Sylvania feels like a done chapter. We've been there, we've done that. Furthermore, the place is damn shitty and feels very lacking in potential. What's the end game?
Did a little checking into things.
I wonder what exactly we'd get, as the hypothetical Elector Count of Sylvania? By my count, Sylvania if broken down into fourths would be:
1) Hunter's Hills, settled (insofar as they are) by our old K8P expedition umgis
--Beyond them are the World's Edge Mountains, containing various types of gribblies and patrolled by Zhufbar
2) Hunger Wood (recently evicted tenants: the Strigoi); patrolled by Stirland's Second Division
--On one side of Hunger Wood is Tempelhof, held by Morr's Black Guard, and on the other is Siegfriedhof (Raven Knight HQ)
3) Mikalsdorf (held by the joke of a vampire, Mihnea), but bordered by Hel Fenn, Grim Wood and Grim Moor
-- This quarter also contains Pfaffbach and Nachthafen (Stirland's)
4) The 'good' territory, if you can call it such: Waldenhof (held by Ioana, the only serious vampire stronghold), Hundham, Thyrnau and Regrakhof (Stirland's), Teufelheim (recently evicted: Alkharad), Drakenhof (sometimes on fire), Castle Drakenhof (ruins of)
--Also one third Misty Wood, one third Tangled Wood and Dark Moor. But it does have good river access, if you can call it that. See below.
We'd get significant access to the River Stir and three offshoot rivers from it: the North Stir, the South Stir, and River Templa. The bad news is that the Stir runs for part of its length alongside Hunger Wood, Grim Wood, and Hel Fenn (not well patrolled). The North Stir runs along the Misty Wood, the South Stir right through the Tangled Wood, and the River Templa runs along the Tangled Wood
and the Dark Moor. The other bad news is that Ostermark probably wants to control the River Stir and the Talabeclanders definitely do, so there's politics involved too.
Sylvania is basically one third hills, one third forest or swamp, and one third useful land, with a crucial river resource that's bedeviled by both monsters and foreign merchants. We'd be completely dependent on Stirland's armies (there's like five Divisions of them in Sylvania right now) to deal with monsters and the EIC to deal with the foreigners.
So the question of 'How win' is to finish off the remaining two vampire strongholds, and then just hold on to the place like grim death in the face of the monster parade and whatever Talabecland's up to these days. The longer we hold onto it, the more they forget being ruled by the terrible fist of the Night's Dark Masters and the more they get used to being ruled by the terrible fist of the Dammerlichtreiter.
