User blog comment:Gundam Legilis/Extracurricular In Depth - The characters/@comment-11188061-20140901044855/@comment-11188061-20140901060456

That is way too broad. Anyone of the seniors can be considered strong or threatening. I repeat, it makes no sense to even keep a list if the numbers span up to hundreds of students. Even just fifty strong students will be a huge problem - she has a total of 3 men in Beacon, and she herself cannot make an appearance most of the time for fear of being exposed.

Point. When you make a plan, that plan generally needs to have a good amount of chance to succeed. Suppose that she wanted to eliminate strong opponents in general. How much time does Cinder have in Beacon that she can identify - and even now Mercury and Emerald are still at the identifying stage - and eliminate said opponents? As I've told you before, going by the way you say that list can span hundreds. All of the Professors count as strong opponents; does that mean she want to take them down as well? Eventually, sure, but with just a measly 3 men? If she can do something at that kind of scale, why not just bloody take down all of the students then? Why even bother singling them out?

No, Cinder's plan is specific, and I believe that scope boundary is the Vytal Tournament. This assumption is more realistic and way more doable. The reason (which I've already put up at the Speculation House, and of course that place is as forsaken as ever) is likely that Mercury and Emerald are entering the Tournament, and she wants them the best chance of winning, or at least entering to the Finals.