Think Lucerys' Death Was Bad? Joffrey Got It Way Worse In The End
In the world of Fire and Blood, being a lesser character doesn't necessarily mean a worse fate.
Lucerys Velarion really drew the short straw at the end of House of the Dragon Season 1, when through the combination of his parents' short-sightedness and bad luck his diplomatic mission ended with him getting eaten by a dragon.
But at least his death, however brutal, was probably instant, as he and his small dragon Arrax were torn to shreds in mere moments by gigantic Vhagar.
Insofar as George Martin 's Fire and Blood, on which House of the Dragon is based, can tell us, Lucerys was positively lucky, compared to many other characters, including his younger brother Joffrey. To be fair, unlike Lucerys, Joffrey brought his doom upon himself.
On the night when Rhaenyra's rule in King's Landing was collapsing, and crowds of smallfolk rebels, led by the mysterious preacher known as The Shepherd were clearly about to storm the Dragonpit, Prince Joffrey tried to be a hero, and save the dragons caught inside, including his own dragon, Tyraxes. Well, such impulses hardly ever go well for anyone in Martin's stories. And Joffrey's attempt was particularly ill-conceived.
At that point he, his mother and Rhaenyra's remaining supporters were separated from the Dragonpit by half the city, filled with rampaging mobs. After Rhaenyra brushed aside the thought that dragons can be slain by “vermin" (fearing that she did not have forces to spare), Joffrey attempted to fly to the rescue of dragons trapped in the Dragonpit on Syrax, Rhaenyra's dragon.
Even though he surely knew that dragons can only be bonded with one person at a time, so he won't be able to actually control Syrax.
The results were about what you expect. Syrax threw Joffrey off, only to fly to the Dragonpit anyway, and be slain in battle alongside with the other dragons.
Joffrey fell into Flea Bottom from the height of two hundred feet, broke his back, and impaled himself on his own sword. At that point dying before the crowd of rebels fell upon him and hacked his body to pieces was a mercy for the poor boy.
All that the handful of loyal knights, sent by Rhaenyra to bring back her son could do, at the cost of several lives, was to collect most of said pieces and make a hasty retreat, before getting swarmed.
All in all, as the chronicler from whose viewpoint Fire and Blood is written said: "Though we cannot doubt the prince's courage, his act was one of folly."
We would be able to judge his act for themselves somewhere around Season 3 of House of the Dragon.