Animorphs kill-count?

[voodooqueen126]

that is the only reason I disagree with Alloran: he killed the poor bloody Hork's but didn't try a little bit harder to release a virus on the yeerks, how hard could that be? The yeerks like everybody else must be held accountable to their actions, and enslaving and murdering others is the worst possible action.

[DinosaurNothlit]

Very true, but the "defenseless" Yeerks deserve to die more than their poor controllers.

I wouldn't agree with that.  Is simply being born into a certain species enough to merit their death?

At least with controllers, you know that the Yeerk is out to get you.  Yeah, the host is innocent, but you tend not to see that when they're trying to kill you.  It's self defense.

When you're killing unhosted Yeerks, you are doing it for no reason other than simply to kill them.  It's pretty much murder.

It's hard to say which is worse, but they're both pretty reprehensible.

Have to disagree with you there.

By killing a Controller, you'd be killing someone who was forced to do acts against their will. The host is not trying to kill you but they are being made to do so, and will be killed because of the Yeerk's actions, not their own.

Nowhere did I say that being in a certain species merits their death. But regarding the Yeerks, once they began to enslave and murder other species, the bets are off when it comes to their own.

I agree that killing a Controller is wrong.  I'm just saying that it's no more wrong than killing unhosted Yeerks.

You can't say that "The Yeerks came to earth, they're the evil ones, they must die."  Any Yeerks that ever managed to escape their home world were then unable to return, because of the Andalites policing the surface, right?  And a lot of Yeerks were then born, far away from their home world.  They had no ability to return, and nowhere else to go except for wherever the motherships went.  So, while a lot of Yeerks may have chosen to come to earth, a lot more of them were simply dragged along for the ride, and had never had any real choice in the matter.  You can't claim that someone is guilty, simply because of being somewhere that, for all we know, they never wanted to be in the first place.

I think that if you're looking at a body count, it should be the kills that the animorph MAKES, not one's that they're responsible for.

If you're asking for a body count, it means: You shot him, he's yours. A solider gets a body count, not the soldier's seargent, not the solider's general, but the solider. A fighter pilot has a death count, not the navigator who relayed the enemy position.

You bite, you slash, you claw, you kill; you get the count. Not, you order, you scheme, you mention; you get the count.

Indirect doesn't matter when it comes to a body count. If you wound someone, and then they get shot because they weren't fast enough to run away, the person that ended their life gets the kill, not you.

When talking about tallying a body count, only the life you physically stopped counts.

I suppose that's probably the best way to do it, so as to avoid all those ambiguous kills.  It surprises me, though, to learn that the 17,000 would count towards Ax's total.  And, actually, that would probably give Ax a lot of additional kills besides just those, seeing as there are numerous occasions where Jake gave an order and Ax was the one to carry it out.

[anijen21]

I think that if you're looking at a body count, it should be the kills that the animorph MAKES, not one's that they're responsible for.

If you're asking for a body count, it means: You shot him, he's yours. A solider gets a body count, not the soldier's seargent, not the solider's general, but the solider. A fighter pilot has a death count, not the navigator who relayed the enemy position.

You bite, you slash, you claw, you kill; you get the count. Not, you order, you scheme, you mention; you get the count.

Indirect doesn't matter when it comes to a body count. If you wound someone, and then they get shot because they weren't fast enough to run away, the person that ended their life gets the kill, not you.

When talking about tallying a body count, only the life you physically stopped counts.

I don't know how I feel about that. By that logic, the pilot of the bomber plane is solely responsible for Hiroshima or Nagasaki, and as long as Hitler didn't pull the trigger himself, he's off scot-free. It also completely exonerates people who use contract killers.

At the very least, I think we're slowly moving toward the conclusion that war is messy and can't be quantified very easily.

I still think it's something we should try, but we're going to have a lot of asteriked numbers.

[Darth Revan]

You guys are over thinking it. We're not looking for how many deaths are they RESPONSIBLE for, we're looking for how many they ACTUALLY killed. Hitler is responsible for all those Holocaust deaths, and Marie Curie is responsible for the deaths of the Japanese in Hiro, and Naga.

Technically, if you want to delve deeper, Hitler is responsible for every single death in WWII, If he hadn't gone on his Third Reich campaign, then a lot of those people wouldn't have died.

BUT HE DOESN'T GET THE BODY COUNT. (not yelling, just emphasis)

George Bush doesn't get the body count of Scout snipers in Operation: Desert Storm, the sniper does.

We're not counting how many deaths they're responsible for. We're counting how many they took the life of. We're looking for a singular line of causality, He shot he killed. She clawed she killed. He released the air lock, he killed.


For body counts, you need to see in black and white.


If in another thread, you'd like to debate what deaths the Animorphs are responsible for, than do so, you can explain your shades of gray all you like. But here, we're talking body counts. Black and White, no gray allowed.

[anijen21]

You guys are over thinking it. We're not looking for how many deaths are they RESPONSIBLE for, we're looking for how many they ACTUALLY killed. Hitler is responsible for all those Holocaust deaths, and Marie Curie is responsible for the deaths of the Japanese in Hiro, and Naga.

Technically, if you want to delve deeper, Hitler is responsible for every single death in WWII, If he hadn't gone on his Third Reich campaign, then a lot of those people wouldn't have died.

BUT HE DOESN'T GET THE BODY COUNT. (not yelling, just emphasis)

George Bush doesn't get the body count of Scout snipers in Operation: Desert Storm, the sniper does.

We're not counting how many deaths they're responsible for. We're counting how many they took the life of. We're looking for a singular line of causality, He shot he killed. She clawed she killed. He released the air lock, he killed.


For body counts, you need to see in black and white.


If in another thread, you'd like to debate what deaths the Animorphs are responsible for, than do so, you can explain your shades of gray all you like. But here, we're talking body counts. Black and White, no gray allowed.

if you want to do that, it's cool. I'm just wondering how practical that knowledge actually is.

[Darth Revan]

Yeah, I thought the same thing when I first read the original post. But then people started to skew what Visser Phi was asking for.

Plus, the numbers, I feel, are incalculable because they had many missions that weren't on the books, I'm sure.

[dasada122]

Huh.  Good idea for the 2.0.

[goom]

so, thanks to parker's post to clear it up a bit, who wants to tackle this?

shall we each read the books and discuss, or do you want to get it done sooner and split it up?

[DinosaurNothlit]

shall we each read the books and discuss, or do you want to get it done sooner and split it up?

I vote we split it up.

I think we can rule out a few books from our count.  #2 didn't have any real battle, nor did #3.  #11 had a battle, but any deaths that occurred would have been un-done when Jake fixed the Sario rip.  Don't recall any opportunity for anyone to die in #14, #16, or #19.  I think all the books after that point, though, all contained major battles, because the books seemed to get more and more violent as the series progressed.

Okay, so, who wants which book?  I'll take #33, if nobody wants it, because that's my favorite book anyway.

And does someone want to make a list, so we can keep track of which books have no battles, and which ones are taken?

[anijen21]

Didn't they destroy a whole restock ship in #3?

I think we're going to just have to do them all. A few of the more peaceful ones managed to sneak in a random 2-page battle somewhere. In #14 there was that battle at the Gardens with some Hork-bajir on the tunnel of love, and I know 16 had some carnage, if not deaths, at fenestre's mansion.

[DinosaurNothlit]

Didn't they destroy a whole restock ship in #3?

I think we're going to just have to do them all. A few of the more peaceful ones managed to sneak in a random 2-page battle somewhere. In #14 there was that battle at the Gardens with some Hork-bajir on the tunnel of love, and I know 16 had some carnage, if not deaths, at fenestre's mansion.

Holy crud, I completely forgot about them destroying the ship in #3! 

Yeah, so I guess we'll have to go through every book, then.  So much for trying to make it a little easier.

[Darth Revan]

I think we should compile a list of participants, then start sectioning off packets of books. (i.e. 1-5, 6-10, etc.)

Should the count be specific, like:

Jake:
Human-Controller: 2
H-B-Controller: 8
Taxxon-Controller: 4
Bystanders: 1
Free H-B: 1
Andalite: 0

Or should it just be

Jake: 16




I don't think H-Bs should be counted for more than one, a soul is a soul, even if it is 8' tall and armed with blades.

[dasada122]

#11 had a battle, but any deaths that occurred would have been un-done when Jake fixed the Sario rip. 

Yes, but they still remember the act of taking a life, and that's the thing.

[Darth Revan]

No, only Jake remembers what happened.


There's a question, should alternative reality kills count? The person never actually died, but the act of killing did happen.

[DinosaurNothlit]

I think we should compile a list of participants, then start sectioning off packets of books. (i.e. 1-5, 6-10, etc.)

Should the count be specific, like:

Jake:
Human-Controller: 2
H-B-Controller: 8
Taxxon-Controller: 4
Bystanders: 1
Free H-B: 1
Andalite: 0

Or should it just be

Jake: 16




I don't think H-Bs should be counted for more than one, a soul is a soul, even if it is 8' tall and armed with blades.

Yeah, we probably will have to section off the books.  I guess we probably won't have 54 people participating in this, so we can't really have a person-per-book system.

Anyway, I think we should list out the kills by type.  It would be more fun, I think, and we'd get a lot more information that way.  It's much more interesting to know that Jake killed 15 humans and 28 Taxxons than just that he killed 43 creatures of some kind.  Also, like others have said, a controller counts as two.  One Yeerk, one whatever kind of controller it was.

No, only Jake remembers what happened.


There's a question, should alternative reality kills count? The person never actually died, but the act of killing did happen.

Lol, I have no idea whether that should count.  I was thinking not, since when all is said and done those people are still alive (unless they get killed later), but I guess you could make a case either way.  I guess it depends on what we really want this information to specify; how many lives the Animorphs (temporarily) took, or how many lives that (permanently) ended because of them.

And what about that Barryman guy in Megamorphs #3?  Technically, they didn't kill him . . .