YMMV / Hero Class Civil Warfare

• Accidental Aesop:
  • Don't blindly follow or reject leaders simply for the labels applied to them; seriously consider their attributes and skills beforehand. Critically considering the actual leaders would have spared much of the class a lot of trouble and upset, which Extortion realized only too late.
    • Those who decided to follow Bakugou did so mostly because he was the assigned leader of the flatteringly labeled and historically more successful Hero Team. From what we see, not many gave due consideration to the type of person Bakugou actually was, and so were treated to a demoralizing ten days (a week of prep and three days of game) of support failure as Bakugou let his own personal flaws limit his team and the difficulty of their leader disincentivized them from taking initiative in a way that could contradict him.
    • Those who chose to follow Izuku and join the less popular and glamorous Villain Team thrived under guidance and support from a leader able to put his issues aside for the sake of his team and help those who chose to follow him grow and develop as people.
  • When choosing between making things worse for someone you dislike and making things better for people you care about, choose the latter; it's ultimately more rewarding.
    • Bakugou prioritized physically beating Izuku, and focusing on this and not on being a good leader meant he lost control of his team and performed horribly in the tactical war Izuku waged against him.
    • Todoroki chose to spite his father over supporting Izuku when Izuku clearly needed it, and the team he chose out of spite became the most thoroughly defeated Hero team in the history of the exercise.
    • Izuku decided to focus not on striking against any particular individual but on helping his classmates grow and succeed, and so his team returned his support wholeheartedly, earning him not only victory in the exercise but many Fire-Forged Friends.
• Angst? What Angst?: At the end of Intersection, quite some time is spent with the Villain team and the discussion over the toll the whole game has ended up leaving on their minds; on the other hand, next to nothing is said about the Hero team, none of them apparently bearing ill will or any other bad feeling, despite some having been subjected to easily traumatizing experiences from the Villain team. May also be due to the fact the Heroes are bound to forget the whole experience anyway.
• Broken Base: Not to a large degree but there is a bit of it in regards to the handling of Izuku. While most people are fine with how he's been handled, there are a few who believe that he's had it a bit too easy considering he's meant to be the underdog. Bakugou being the opposing team leader is one point that that reinforces this especially when it's shown that he is utterly incompetent as a tactician in contrast to Midoriya who was strategizing since he was announced as leader. An argument can be made that half of Midoriya's control is because the other team is just so bad at the game instead of the villains being good at it. Midoriya also has the backing of Aizawa, Nedzu, several students from other classes and conveniently had a Double Agent fall into his lap that just so happened to skirt the rules because she didn't read the rules to see if she could actually get away with switching teams.
• Just Here for Godzilla: Overlapping with Catharsis Factor, a good portion of the story's fanbase is reading the story just to see Midoriya finally hold the advantage over Bakugou and beat him at every turn in no uncertain terms. It helps that the story finally shows that there are things Bakugou just isn't as good at as opposed to in canon, where his grades are better than Midoriya's and has shown to be a better combatant.
• Nintendo Hard: With preset Difficulty Levels. The entire exercise is this.
  • The Hero Team have to monitor an entire city, battle superpowered villains to incapacitation or "death," and capture the Kingpin "alive." Though it technically isn't necessary, the goals imply they also need to discover as many of the 15 objectives of the Villain Team as possible, because if the Villains complete even five of their objectives without the Kingpin being caught, they win at the end of three days. If they're lucky, the Villains are stupid and get caught before the Heroes have to do the hard part. This Hero Team is not lucky.
  • Sounds like the Villain Team has the advantage right? Turns out the villain route is infamously Harder Than Hard, necessitating the team in this role utilize a far wider skillset than is taught in the school curriculum (such as hacking and forgery), obtain all of their own resources and support gear for game use, and find and set up their own base(s) (in contrast to the Hero Team, which has their base, communication and info networks, tech support, and other resources presupplied). They're also working with only a bare minimum of information on their own objectives themselves and always with less manpower and a game setup and final objective specifically designed to psychologically sabotage the team.
• Rooting for the Empire: A lot of the story's popularity comes from Midoriya truly being able to cut loose and be a villain without having to deal with the morality that comes up with a lot of other Villain!Deku fics. It helps that the story shows why Midoriya would be an excellent villain and also shows why Bakugou wouldn't be a great hero whose treatment caused one of his own teammates to betray him.
  • This ultimately sparks a series of fics where UA has the Heroes vs Villains exercise with Midoriya being chosen as the Villain leader or, in a few cases, part of the villain team, a couple going darker than HCCW.