refuting common wisdom on scales everybody knows

[dirtywick]

quantum_mechani said:

Your own argument about reckless expansion seems to work against you here, taking order is the safe way to keep parity with fast expanding nations without spreading yourself too thin. And that is beside the fact, there are almost always something less important to dredge points from than order, given the large degree of diminishing returns where pouring more points into bless/pretender does not speed expanding.

If you're taking turmoil, you're taking equal or greater parts luck. Nations that have cheap mages/nationals or that can take advantage of gem diversity makes it an appealing choice.

But to free up points for a bless or something and not take luck, I think you'd doom yourself to death by random events.