He is, IIRC, Dean of the Lunar College of Magic? That sounds to me like the sort of position that only an Imperial Citizen could hold.
.
I was always of the mind that gaining and holding this position (Dean of the
ICoM) would mean that Tatius would have to be able to direct the
considerable magical and mythical machinations of the college. It seemed
straightforward that he would be qualified to teach, direct research and
come up with ways to resource the Empire's magical agendas.
This was back in the days before I realised that nothing is as straightforward as it may seem.
Today, I looked up 'dean'; it was probably because of Jane's reference to Discworld, remembering the Dean of *their* 'college of magic'. :)
dean
Is it possible that you don't have to be 'the best magician in the empire' to be the Dean?
This thread has a wealth of good information posted by the Gloranthan illuminati. Here follows the things we are not disagreeing on, collected: (with any significant unresolved disagreements, juxtaposed)
Starting with Jane's Ball Rolling feat:
Sounds like we have several different views of Tatius, and it might not be a
bad idea to get them ironed out for the purposes of this joint project.
We know he's more intelligent than his cousin Euglyptus.
... Tatius is primarily a politician, and secondarily a magician. His
military knowledge has up till now been theoretical. But then if a very
bright guy spends a few weeks reading through the world's best military
library with the intention of learning strategy as fast as possible, you may
well end up with a competent strategist. [or at least with someone able to
lead and keep up with the strategist heroband, the General Staff? -Ed]
Tatius is very radical (in the sense that he is knowingly trying to kill Rebellus Terminus and change Glorantha - a pretty radical goal ..) and very extreme.
.. not sure this makes him a Lunar zealot, that implies an overriding
religious motivation. I think he's got far more interest in political and
economic success and sees killing Orlanth as a means of achieving that.
.. Tatius is an initiate of the Karvanyan "White Sun Lords" which is noted
as being an Illuminate School in the Fortunate Succession. That is enough to
qualify him as an Imperial Citizen (in legal status) even though he does not
worship the moon, considers his wisdom [comparable?-Ed] to Nysaloran
goobledigook, scorns Lunar Illusionists etc. The Lunars tolerate him
because he is so good at what he does. [tolerate and make head of the
LCoM?-Ed]
He's a Yelm Imperator worshipper ..., and probably an Initiate level. ... too busy for something like Devotee, just like Kallyr.
Tatius has to be an Imperial Citizen, even if the qualifications have to be bent to allow for it. Otherwise you have someone who isn't an Imperial Citizen having higher status and influence at the Imperial Court than most courtiers who are. Then again if he has any significant Lunar magic he's going to be at least an initiate of one of the Lunar cults.
Pragmatic is not synonomous with "competent". ... Tatius ... is the antithesis of the pragmatic politician - he's a Dara Happan radical and a Lunar religious zealot of the first order. That's irrevelent to his skill or lack thereof as a military commander.
... he's a "keep throwing more stuff at the enemy until they're overwhelmed"
type of leader. It works because the Lunar Empire has the resources and he
has the political clout to get them. Equally it's why Kallyr is successful
against him, she uses limited resources to best effect while waiting for
something to happen which will defeat him.
As a magician, do we see him as concentrating on the mythical manipulation - Compromise, god-killing, etc? Or on the more "technical" side - my fireball's bigger than your fireball, and look what happens when I combine this number of sorcerors in this configuration, sort of thing?
... he's more of an administrator than a magician, he pinches ideas and
takes the credit if they work. His contribution is organising the resources
to try them out. He must have some sort of Lunar magic but it's probably to
do with getting magicians of various styles to co-operate with each other -
the magicians equivelent of the YT ability to get soldiers of different
traditions to operate together.
CHoDP page 151 - "he was no lazy administrator, but a skilled strategist and tactician, and a skilled person in personal combat. He was highly placed in the Church of the Sun, and traced his own lineage to the Emperor Yelm"
.. he's intelligent and tough. He is likely to be extremely autocratic and
a xenophobe. If you aint Dara Happan then he is likely to look down his
nose at you, at best. I wonder how he feels about women?
.. we are dealing with a very bright guy with a bias against the most recent
contributor to "The Light of Action". Tatius apparently cannot stand Fazzur,
so everything Fazzur has to say must be wrong.
... Tatius is a chess (or Ouranekki) player rather than a tactician. He is
overly fond of sacrificing units for a minor gain.
Again, he has all the makings of a chess player. For some reason or another, the units he designs as sacrifices in real life have a tendency to avoid these designations. Can't they see it's for the greater good?
Once Tatius made his play for power at Whitewall, the writing was on the
wall
for Tatius.
Joerg wouldn't be surprised to meet Tatius in a backstabbing game of Junta.
He would have Sarcasm 10W3
hth
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