Terrible things

[Paradox]

Yeah, her mass vassaling plan. *shudders*

[DanielH]

It's a good idea if you go by some simplified and unrealistic assumptions which boil down to “the lawmakers have people's best interests at heart and don't make mistakes”. Since the primary lawmaker is the Lord Ruler and Promise already knows she doesn't like his decisions, that doesn't work out in practice.

I would bb fine with mass vassaling if the only order ever given was “Do not rape or torture anybody”. I doubt I would trust more complex orders, including not harming somebody unless they consent or in self-defense.

[Alicorn]

Promise knows she doesn't trust the Lord Ruler's priorities and doesn't mean to allow him to go on ruling this population unchecked. She is discovering that ruling large populations is sort of complicated, and thinking through her options for doing it better than he has been. Mass vassalization is one of them. Any orders she distributes en masse will be worded very carefully with escapes and so on.

[Shoal]

it is still pretty immoral.

[Alicorn]

Bells do not share my doing/allowing distinction very much.

[Bluelantern]

I suppose Promise is sort of more used to the concept of mind control, since she lives in a world with it since the day she was born and she can't escape it...

I'm willing to do some boybell/ari sometime somewhere but I wasn't feeling it right there, so, straight Rev.

*waits until starts raining*
*goes outside*
*falls on knees and scream* NOOOOOOOOO!

(there is no such thing as half-assed melodrama xD)

[DanielH]

You waited until it was raining to shout. I thought Ice told Cypress that didn't actually happen.

Bells seem more consequentialist than my model of Alicorn, with the doing/allowing distinction being a special case. Also keep in mind that vassalization is *not* mind control. You can order your vassal to vote Democrat, but they can have opinions as Republican as they want while so doing. Compare to Ella from Ella Enchanted, whose emotions can be ordered around just as much as the rest of her.

[Alicorn]

Bells are more consequentialist than me because that makes them more interesting protagonists/world rulers, yeah. They're not all the way there, though.

[Anya]

Bells are more consequentialist than me because that makes them more interesting protagonists/world rulers, yeah. They're not all the way there, though.

Is Butterfly the closest?

[Alicorn]

Butterfly is under the most pressure. She still doesn't consider options like, say, Yeerking Trouble on an ongoing basis because he trusts her enough to let her do it in the first place in order to get him to stay put and stop falling in love with random teenagers and telling them dangerous shit, and that's not just because it would instantly torpedo his usefulness (she wouldn't do it even if he could still be useful at other times under those conditions).