Fissoa really is a salt the earth situation for my character though. Maybe others will tone him down, maybe they won't, but if it's up to him, Fissoa will be nothing but a wasteland at the end of this war.
That being said, scorch the earth as a defensive tactic may be modern (though I'm not even sure about that) but looting was VERY widespread in medieval times. It actually got so out of hand with people all over Europe suffering that the Church intervened and tried to set some rules for warfare.
Anyway, the new estate system already makes conquest a lot more attractive but it remains a choice.
