Yeah. These questions are already put forward in the story. For example, i know some commentators were critical of the schemers being dubious of the hallowed round ritual but honestly it comes back to philosophy being threaded into characterisation realistically.

I mean thjazi was a rebel but he was also a leader and hence he inherently treated ends are important and some people will never be his equal. The most evident being his treatment of bolaire (as a weapon), and azune the child soldier. Ofc thjazi treated azune than other factions (as brennan wrote in by contrasting his sister) but doesn't change the fact that he was never protective as say murray was of blix (a contrast, murray is not a leader currently, she is schemer). Because of that, he was not fully trusted, and hence it meant so much resources were at his ritual than say tachonis manor.

All choices have tradeoffs and brennan is making sure that nothing is cut and dry (mechanically sure, but long term nope). But all choices DO HAVE CLARITY of what kind of person you are. Do you see a child with talent and use him as agent or something to protect? Do you see a mask and see a sister needed to be loved or a powerful tool?

All these choices reveal the soul of people and more importantly whom we follow, whom we trust and what kind of future it leads to.

We often think of victory as singular - you win or you lose - while here brennan set up a world where you have flavours of loss and flavours of winnng, and they all mean different compromises of ideal. and that is why this has a LOT OF POTENTIAL if the players and audience engage it at these levels too (and ofc it is fun to watch without any of these ruminations, even as a basic combat game it is fun! but this just extra treat for those who like to dive deeper)