What's the most merciful thing your video game character ever did?

[Roxas1359]

Thing is, I actually don't like being mean in video games. In Fallout games and Elder Scrolls games I always take the good path, if I accidentally do something bad I feel terrible.
Well to answer the OP's question, the most merciful things I've done in a game are:
Financing all the Kingdom in Fable 3 myself and making all houses rent free and repairing them too.
In Fallout 3 I always free the slaves.
In New Vegas I helped all characters get good endings.
I don't kill random NPCs in games...that itself should be a good deed no?

 

[SidingWithTheEnemy]

The one who's possessed, Arl Eamon's? I've killed him a bunch of times as his mother BEGS me to stop. So I guess that wouldn't get me much credit in this thread...

So...uh...most merciful thing...Well, there were all of those helpless NPCs in Fable, 2 and, 3 that I haven't murdered I guess. Some of them being my wives/ husbands. Better than nothing I guess.

I could never ever kill the Arl Eamon's son. Not because of mercy but because you got the chance to kill his most stupid mother of all. The most stupid mother ever. She is responsible of the fate of her poor son and she is the character I hated most in the entire game. Even Duncan was less despicable. I would have tentacle raped her to death, just because she deserves it but sadly that wasn't an option.

In New Vegas,I'm usually the sort of guy that takes anything of use that isn't nailed down,and kills for the thrill of it... Every single crucified person I come across I kill with a single headshot. It's better than letting them die the slow way.

I'm not really sure this could be called merciful, but well...

I'm always merciful in games that give me choices. I've played KOTOR several times, but never tried evil because I felt so bad that I had to restart...[...]

That sounds quite cute. Honestly some horrible things I've inflicted upon the world I had to undo by the reload function as well. So I know exactly what you mean. But it happens only occasionally to me.

Good question, you just made me realize what a heartless bastard I am. Even in "good" play throughs I never show any kind of mercy if it isn't tied into the plot or a sidequest.

The only times I have ever been merciful was if it was part of a quest and I was going to rewarded. (Examples: gifts for being good in Bioshock or "Paragon points" in Mass Effect)

I take this as a compliment. You are at least an enlightened heartless bastard who knows he is merciless. I think that's an improvement! Here have a ficitive self-awareness badge and the correspondantly unlocked achievement.
Oh and mercy and reward doesn't mix very well, does it? Not entirely sure about this altruistic concept. But if you aim at a reward you are acting shelfishly not merciful.

 

[Dirty Hipsters]

In Fallout 3 I gave water to the dying wanderer outside of Megaton City. That's about it.

 

[skywolfblue]

I can't think of a whole lot of instances where there were chances to be "merciful" outside of intended choices.

I've saved families and their farms, brought people who were sick to the hospital, saved the little sisters, etc etc... But it almost always has to be scripted to some minor extent.

I do find that a little odd, that it's easier to have AI that you can kill then AI that you can help. Though I guess it makes sense when you consider you have to include social dynamics for acts of mercy to work well.

 

[ultrachicken]

In Fable 2, I spent the entire game racking up corruption points by buying all the houses and stores and setting the rent and prices at max value. After I had a massive hoard of money, I actually patrolled the world and visited every property (I owned them all), and reduced everything to zero. I felt like more of a hero at that point than after the main story.

Hell, in pretty much any black and white morals RPG ever I play as the good guy, which comes with a lot of mercy moments.

Also, I play Deus Ex as a technical pacifist.

 

[thiosk]

Captain Jacob Johnston of the Ticonderoga SWACS1 scanner vessel had lost his main active scanners. New tech. Untested. No matter. We can still obtain sensor locks out to 12 m km ... the enemy is centered on a single world at the center of their star system. We will make due. On jump, a fleet of primatives was sitting, trying their hand at gate defense. Uhuru welcome delegation. They hailed us. We fire the engines and move about 6 megaclicks towards the star-- well out of range of their particle beams. Thats when the Offenders opened up. A hail of the new HonkeyTonk size-6 missiles sail towards the enemy fleet- backed by IdiotSlug size-4 missiles launched by the Defenders. They took a beating, and were streaming atmosphere before even turning their heading to face us. Their point defense could barely strike a single missile in each salvo.

It wasn't long before they were gone; their pathetic nuclear pulse drives hardly broke 2000 km/s. Fish in a barrel. Picked up the lifepods and started the interrogations. Didn't glean anything interesting. Put em out the airlocks.

There were more. We sailed towards the star when 12 mclicks out we spot 15 "fast" attack craft, streaming in at about 9000 km/s. Our primary fire controls were illsuited for targeting such small vessels at range. But no matter: the antimissile platforms had little trouble saturating each with two salvos of 4 small missiles... a few more to pick off the survivors.

From here, clear sailing to the Uhuru homeworld. A few orbital installations were destroyed unopposed, as were their shipyards and some commercial vessels. To make their impending doom clear... we targeted their ground forces from orbit, obliterating several units and filling the skies with a light dusting of smoke and fallout.

Three brigades, led by the the 1st Badonkadonk Brigade, landed and wrested control from the inferior Uhuru government.

13 years since the Human Imperium began to spread among the stars, and already, our first act of benevolence! We merely enslaved the Uhurans, and didn't glass the planet from orbit. It took a few years, but the 400 million surviving Uhurans soon learned to love me.

Aurora [http://aurora2.pentarch.org/] is awesome.

 

[JesterRaiin]

...spent countless hours replaying same quest over and over again trying different approaches and dialogue options just to keep some NPC alive. Happened plenty of times in numerous games.
...and i hate it when some characters are scripted to die no matter what. :|

 

[Burs]

Some Morrowind NPC in Maar gan (i think) said they were hungry, I filled their house with bread and kwama eggs (an entire inventory's worth) ^.^

 

[BishopofAges]

Well I wonder if this counts: After playing Bioshock 1 all the way through on good and seeing the super good ending, I am physically incapable of harvesting, the screams tear at my alignment like so much nails through chalkboards.

Otherwise the most merciful thing I have ever done was in WoW right after achievements came out but before the expansion. I sat in Ironforge, fished and never slew a single soul. (as an orcish member of the horde wearing PvP armor of "I totally killed all your buddies" and a title to prove it.) I was killed a good many times before they realized I was literally there just to fish.

 

[Ziggy]

assassin's creed brotherhood
beating the snot out of the guards instead of killing them

 

[NotSoLoneWanderer]

I saved the kid on a huge evil playthrough in a game once... Dragon Age on that one I think. I can never get the guts to kill him.

Which one? I remember giving the kid from Lothering a whole silver coin after I murdered that merchant for a gold coin (a whole f*cking sovereign) in front of the kid.

In The Suffering I ran into a guy locked in a padded cell with his arms and legs cut off. He was just flopping around in there like a fresh tuna so I shot him in the head.

While I see your point, that's doesn't seem so merciful. At least give him a cigarette or a final wanker or something.

[...] Having righted my previous wrong I continued on my way. Back to Vegas.[...]

Yeah this is what I meant! That's nice! I didn't thought of Clint East Wood, though. My mental image was more like Tuco Benedicto Pacífico Juan María Ramírez, also known as The Ugly. The Bandit that is a true badass but nice but a complete assh*le as well.

[...]

Well, sorry but I think saving the universe doesn't count. Oh and in Fable 3 the Angle Wings where just nonsense. I killed 60% of the population by neglecting the threat entirely and hoarding all the money myself. I could have spent two times the Army needed to protect my subjects but I spent not one single gold coin for those morons. Guess what? I got the Angle Wings as well, because the remaing population of Albion loved me.

....fine! So i was playing fallout 3 and traveling to the republic of dave from the southern most point on the map when I saw a woman run up to me with a bomb around her neck, I tried to save her and I couldn't (the skillcheck is random) so I reloaded the game and started once again from the bottom of the map because I didn't auto save and I repeated this one more time till I saved her.

 

[The Wykydtron]

I always form close bonds with my party members in basically any game. In my Hardcore run of Fallout NV i have to leave my party somewhere safe lest they get blindsided and killed by a Feral Ghoul...


I suppose that's more compassionate than merciful though...

 

[Gamblerjoe]

I usually play the good guy in games with moral choice systems. Its hard to think of the absolute most merciful moment. The best one I can think of off the top of my head was in Mass Effect when I talked Corporal Toombs out of killing the scientist that tortured him.

On a side note, how are the capatchas always so eerily similar to what Im posting about? getheg scenes? I didnt realize the geth laid eggs.

 

[mikey7339]

When I didn't decide to nuke a town.

Which I already did 3 times before in previous playthroughs.

I could never bring myself to destroy Megaton. Got to see one of my friends do it and it was pretty cool.

For some reason in games with a moral system, I can never be evil. I tried once in Mass Effect 2 and restarted after a couple hours because I felt like a complete douchebag.

 

[SidingWithTheEnemy]

This thread is turning out more interesting that I have hoped for.

I googled two possible definitions of mercy, but feel free to add your own. I'm curious about your thoughts.

# Compassion or forgiveness shown toward someone whom it is within one's power to punish or harm
[...]
# (esp. of a journey or mission) Performed out of a desire to relieve suffering; motivated by compassion

I have difficulties to accept that you can be rewarded for mercy. Well, especially if you know there is a reward involved, like an XP Bonus, Gold or some Karma Points. I think it shifts slightly from mercy to greed. Still there is no mention of this in the definition.

While playing a good character it's generally easier to be merciful, but its expected. As an evil character your expected not to be. This I found interesting. I have a habit of not doing what I'm expected to do - yet being merciful isn't something I can do regularly.

[hr]
Many mentioned Mass Effect.
I normally play an opportunistic quite more renegade than paragorn Shepard (I did save the council for example just to be able to taunt them later.)
Now one thing I couldn't bear to do was to exterminate the Rachni Queen on Noveria. I don't like genocide that much.
She didn't do me any harm and she probably was the last of her kind.
I won't commit some form of genocide just because someone is considered evil. The council wronged me more than the Rachni Queen so I let her go and reveled in the following dialogue choices when talking to the council. While I couldn't just kill her, after I spoke with the council I had hopes that she will turn against the Turians or the Geth.
So what do you think?

 

[Racecarlock]

Every citizen in saints row 2 that walked by me, repeated one of their gang leadership adivce, "I met kazuo", "What do you think about polyamorous", and "Wash your clothes" lines that I didn't kill. That's pretty merciful for something so fucking annoying.

 

[DarkAngryWolf]

The most merciful thing my character did was fight of an ice-powered chick and a large demon called "The Beast" and saved the entire world from being kill by a virus that would wipe everyone out. I am, of course, talking about spoiler Infamous 2's good ending.

 

[Zhukov]

Everything.

No really, I don't think I've ever done a non-merciful thing in a game.

I feel kind of weird now.

...

Oh right, specific example: Uh... letting Griffin live near the end of Oni. Yay obscurity.

 

[Zoe Castillo]

00

 

[Quaxar]

If there is the chance to finish off somebody or walk away I will most of the time just turn around and go. I also always try to save the random encounters in RDR (except for the cannibal freaks, they have to die horribly).
And in JC2 I avoid killing innocents at all costs. Which is a shame because soetimes rockets would be so much easier.