sfinxCZ said:
Ability to sling fireballs has nothing to do with being a shrewd politician. To claim this is about the same as to claim that extreme fighters will make good senators. Being educated is also not a sure sign because the most important thing is what kind of education they have. A Nuclear physicist who has no experience with the law will not make a good federal judge, does not matter even if he won Nobel prize. Sorceresses are educated in the art of sorcery, and not, as I understand, the areas actually relevant to being a good statesman/politician.
Psychological acuity, ability to read people and understand their motivation comes from experience which only possible if a person finds some sort of value in such observations. People with super-power, or very rich (like in real life) simply do not give a flying fuck about others. The same pretty much goes for sorcerers, especially the members of the Lodge. They are interested only in their vision of the world, how power and control would benefit them personally, and thus they pretty clearly state they struggle for the rule of magic. The strength of the Lodge was in its secrecy. As soon as its existence became known, they were crashed exactly because they do not pay enough attention to some lowly non-magical bastards the rest of the population are. That's why they are easily duped, by Cynthia, by Letho - they are not really interested in understanding people, and always go with what they see on a surface.
They all talk a lot about how politically smart they are, but just face reality. They are always at odds with their rulers, and population in general, which, given that the sorcerers do not produce any material goods, do not grow their own food, and pretty much a part of a super-structure, is simply retarded. They depend on non-magic people in everything, and still pretty much disrespect them and do not take their needs into consideration. Not a good survival strategy. They screw up every political relationship, they are regularly expelled from Northern countries, the Council and the Lodge are crushed, most famous are executed, and we end up with a North-wide witch-hunt (canon according to Sapkowski). How anyone can claim that sorceresses are better politicians than the rest is simply beyond me.
Nilfgaardian sorcerers are a different matter. They are in a society where they have to confirm and become very sensitive to other people's psyche. That's why Cynthia is such a canning girl.
) about the ending of TW2. Yet again I'm fucking devastated about my choice. Just as I thought I was over it forever!