How about we consider some scenarios that are a smidge more realistic than pushing over men fat enough to stop trains?
There's been a nuclear war, or an asteroid strike, or some kind of global castastrophe of whichever flavor you prefer. You find yourself a few weeks later as the nominal leader of a small band of 25 survivors. You've scavenged as much food as you can find from the area and are planting some crops. You're doing some hunting and trapping too, but it isn't all that productive because everybody and his brother was hunting Bambi until the die-off was over.
So... you're plowing and will start planting soon, but it will be a few months before any crops are ripe enough to harvest. You inventory your food supplies... uh oh, not so good. You have enough food to provide the minimal rations needed to keep 15 people fit enough to work the fields and man the guardposts for the time that will pass until you begin to harvest... but you have 25 people. If you try to feed EVERYONE, the odds are that NO ONE will get enough food to stay healthy and do the back-breaking labor required to grow and harvest the crops and defend them... possibly everyone could die if you try to feed all.
What are you going to do?
Here are your more obvious options...
1. Kick ten people out of the group; put them on the road with a few items you can spare and wish them good luck, and try not to think about how they're likely to die horribly by starvation or disease or bandits or something.
a. if you choose this option, what are your selection criteria for who you put out? Those least able to work? (ie young children, old or sickly) Those with the least useful skills? etc?
c. You have your own 3yo child and your elderly and mostly disabled mother with you... do you use your authoritah to protect them, or are they subject to exile if they can't pull their weight?
2. Frack it, I'm feeding everybody, if we all die then we just do. We'll try to scavenge more food, or hunt more or something...
b. ...but what if after a few weeks it isn't working, and hardly anyone has the strength to tend the fields? Will you change your plan?
3. There may be other small groups out there trying to farm or something for survival... if you can locate them and find a group smaller than yours, you could raid them and take their food by force, and use it to feed your group. This is probably going to involve killing people who are essentially innocent and simply trying to survive just like you... but it if it you or them, who will you choose?
4. The 12 best workers (or most important skillsets, etc) get a full ration... everybody else gets 1/4 ration, and if they get sick and die well that's too bad, I tried.
a. How will you handle it if the people on quarter ration get so mad with hunger that they try to take more food, by force if they must?
Now question number 2... what if you WERENT the leader, and instead YOU got selected for exile or starvation-rations? Would you cooperate with the leader's decision on what was best for the group, or would you rebel and fight to take over? What if YOU were not put out, but instead your wife/husband/child/parent were selected for exile?
Now THERE's a nice dilemma... have fun... :mrgreen: