[Icelander]

Bloodlust with a high Self-Control roll is a fairly plausible result of military training and combat experience. The character may be rigidly disciplined about adhering to rules of engagement and never using lethal force capriciously, but once something has been determined to be a legitimate target and/or a threat, the accepted method of dealing with it is rapid and decisive neutralisation.

Outside fantasy and super-science, less-than-lethal methods are simply less effective at ending threats with minimal risk for your side than engaging the target with your best weaponry. And few soldiers are trained to use half measures once they decide that something warrants lethal force. They engage and keep firing until there is no chance that there is any further threat. Termination with extreme prejudice becomes a trained reflex once something is classified as a 'threat' and a valid target under the RoE.

Even using melee weapons or unarmed techniques, the intent is rapid incapacitation and that generally entails inflicting potentially lethal damage. Techniques for dealing with an armed threat don't stop at a disarm or takedown, these are followed by ruthless strikes or stomp kicks to vital areas until the opponent is physically unable to pose any further threat. And the brutal follow-up attacks may be a part of the trained response to a threat, ingrained into the muscle memory that is a lot more reliable than intellectual analysis while under the effects of adrenaline.

I like using Bloodlust for basically decent, likable characters who don't like killing, but understand it is a somewhat unavoidable consequence of events escalating to the point of violence. They may consider the view that there is such a thing as non-lethal combat naive, and, as a consequence, are generally predisposed to prefer almost any other solution to the use of violence.

This can create interesting contrasts when chacacters with a different background assume from their actions in combat that they are cruel murderers, when the philosophical difference between the characters may be minimal and both may be heroic, moral people.

By contrast, Bloodlust is an unambigiously villainous trait when possessed by characters who are at all likely to start fights. A staple of murderous NPCs, but rare for any PCs I'd play.

I don't think I recall a case where a PC's Bloodlust got him in trouble. I remember an NPC Ally failing the SC roll in a street fight with some rapier-wielding bravos once, which got her and the PC with her arrested and tried for manslaughter. The victim was gently born and they were pretty clearly guilty, but a discreet bribe and a quick jail-break got them on a fast ship out of town.