I've noticed that too, and was always a little confused by it.
The pure and simple fact is that we're fighting wars. Not adventures, not duels, not missions, but actual fucking wars. And in wars, a lot of people suffer, and a good amount of them have nothing to do with any of it.
That's just a fact of life. I remember
@TalonofAnathrax raising a stink over all of the Lyseni 'levies' that were going to die in the battle, and to that, I could only sigh. What, do you think the Tyroshi guards all had it coming? All of the families of the magisters we executed deserved being impoverished and orphaned? You think slaves haven't been caught up in reprisals for the hysteria we've stoked, westerlanders haven't starved because of us unleashing the fungus, and thousands of innocents of all creeds and race won't be slain in the wars we've yet to unleash?
We're conquering the fucking world. I completely sympathize with Azel being enraged at people suddenly balking at the cost that they've been happy to ignore so long as it was offscreen and they didn't have to think about it.
That's rich!
I noted the dubious ethical implications of Viserys' Lyseni war far before the last minute (way back when we started the plan, I believe). I too am often annoyed when people try to change
@Azel's plans at the last minute.
I understand that this is a war and that people die. I'm not mourning the innocents who lost their livelihoods when we unleashed bioweapons in Lannisport.
But the Lyseni war irked me because it was incredibly unnecessary. Very cool OOC, but very unnecessary. This isn't "kill a few dozen semi-innocent pasties to kill major devil-worshippers in KL" (I don't care about that), or even "kill a few dozen innocents when destroying the Rock for PR". No, this is "start a war and kill thousands just for PR" when we could have used intrigue and mind control/murder to achieve the same result. Heck, we could have pulled a well-prepared Tyrosh 2.0 and just used propaganda and stories of the Legion breaking Unsullied to get good PR!
Anyway. What's done is done, and the PR benefits are utterly amazing anyway.
OOC I found the Lyseni plan rather cruel and dubiously efficient, but amazingly fun. Intrigue and showing off? Hell yeah!
Still, I would at least have added a little magic to break them faster. Fear effects, Draconic fear aura, ect. They'd have been attacked by raiders, they'd have struggled to push through legionnaires, and then Fear (and magical leader-murder) would have finally broken them and channeled them away. Would have been a more humane plan, requiring minimal changes and still letting us have our amazing victory and PR gains.
In any case, nobody seemed to want to alter the plan or even talk about the human cost, so I let it lie and enjoy the show.
I AM NOT SALTY ABOUT THIS. To be clear, I don't want to start a salt debate again.
This isn't a massive issue for me, and I can live with a more ruthless "if it contributes to my rule then it contributes to the greater good" Viserys.
Also, my position of the Viserys mindset debate:
- Children and vulnerability are hot-button issues for him. Irrational, but hey! People aren't rational!
- Viserys isn't incredibly personally saddened by killing, although deliberately causing massive slaughter still hits him emotionally when he sees it
- Viserys is a little tired of slaughtering idiots who won't bend the knee, but will do it
