Your political reputation affects how likely allies are to trust you, and what kind of deals they'll offer at the negotiating table. There's also some emotional response in there, so factions do bear grudges. Just like the real thing.
I was pretty dead set against ever writing an academic novel. It's always been my view that there are already more than enough academic novels and that most of them aren't any good. Most of them are self-conscious and bitter, the work of people who want to settle grudges.
