A lowly Telone from the periphery like Bleys won’t be much help in raiding a blood bank – that’s well beyond his scope of experience. Cerlota on the other hand would be full of ideas. 
Right now, I’m not planning for that to be an option. The way you get to the higher levels of INT is by studying Theurgy. Maintaining a high-INT non-Theurge path throughout the series would be too much additional work in a game already full of it.
I want to be careful about how “modernized” any military formation is going to get – even a military genius can’t completely transform the prevailing practices of their time – but arming a whole bunch of your followers with ventisputori should be possible, yes.
The Theurges have a fairly detailed internal hierarchy, beyond the simple “Kyklos” divisions known to the outside world – but you don’t know it yet. When it comes to Wisardry, there’s nothing resembling a hierarchical structure in the old legends, any more than with the stories of Merlin or Atlantes in our own world.
The ability to beat the Thaumatarchy will have everything to do with your ability to mobilize resources and people, and make/break alliances. As for Kleitos himself… he’d kill anyone who tried to steal his Talismans. You may need to rely on someone who brings even more Talismans to the battle.
About as much as an American who left the US to run a WalMart in Canada would be respected and trusted enough to be president. Which is to say: no, the first Nyr you met is not likely to be governor material.
Difficult! They won’t like being part of a(nother) theocracy, and you’re right to worry that hardline Shayardene Xthonists won’t be keen on having unconverted Neres in leadership. If your future realm stays beleaguered and under threat by a more powerful mutual enemy of one kind or another, then you may be able to hold together skeptics and zealots in pragmatic unity. But the more that you succeed in forging a strong new realm, the harder it will be to have both Nyrish skeptics and Xthonist hardliners in it without repressing one side or the other.
They are indeed famous for constant and lethal political wrangling; for their military prowess against Halassur; and for the many precious metals and alchemical salts mined in their mountains. Avezia/Aveche is one of the areas with the best farmland and many of the richest mines. Cerlota would no doubt add their literary, poetic, and artistic tradition, which the Erezziano consider superior to both Shayard’s and Karagon’s.
Cerlota would be absolutely unwilling to serve as governor. That’s work for a non-Theurge, from her perspective.
We’ll see whether evacuating anyone from Nyryal ends up being the way forward or not – at thtis point I’m not sure if it will make sense as a tactical priority.
That would be terrible!
Happily, the experience of individualistic faith movements throughout history (e.g. the modern global evangelical-Pentecostal movement of which I’m a committed member) confirms that giving free rein to everyone to interpret God’s will for themselves almost never results in intolerance and extremism. Like, almost never. Very rarely.
Excellent, I’ll be sure to take it that way in future.
Depends on the size of the mountain and the height of the drop…
Both. You may be able to inspire Erjan and/or his sister Dilek to challenge the system they were raised in whether or not you share their gender or orientation. I won’t say any more about what that would look like for now.
You will encounter the older de Firiacs again, and will have the chance to fence and box with other young nobles. The Leaguer ideology is more or less a product of Horion and his friends.
This is part of any nationalism. There’s no single true answer to the question of how much of a culture is indigenous and how much is “someone else’s.” Hardline nationalists draw lines and try to close their eyes to any arbitrary or ambiguous results. So the Laconniers would say here that the Hegemonic mainstream here is consistent with the historic practices of Shayard (and ignore whatever evidence there might be that calls that into question). As long as the evidence is small or debatable enough to ignore, this is a sustainable response.
The Laconniers are douchey nationalists. Whether or not you can influence them to change… we’ll see!
You will not become an Archimandrite in G2. That takes a whole lot of influence-building – not just being a charismatic backwater prophet. And I’m not going to give details on Phaed’s plans for their role and the future of the Hegemony because, well, spoilers.