What's the best 100 gold National mage?

[Nagot Gick Fel]

Originally posted by Bayushi Tasogare:
I voted Other, and I voted for the Daughter of Avalon. If you're looking for a mage, she's hands-down better than the Bard.

An 80g NN Sacred mage is very hard to scoff at. I'm appalled she's not listed.

I find Bards much more useful. Awesome stealth, spying, can instill unrest, standard effect, better stats. In battle I'd use both of these mages for the same thing: reinvigorate their colleagues with spell songs, or cast Tangle Vines, for which the +3 more precision on the Bard comes handy. All this for less than 3 extra gold in upkeep. When I need powerful nature magic I use Crones.

Besides Daughters of Avalon are capital-only, and I prefer to stick to recruiting Crones here. Although I may recruit a Mother occasionally for her specials skills, it's extremely rare. OTOH I really can't see a use in the Daughter.