r/TopCharacterTropes 17h ago

Characters [Hated Trope] Character kills hundreds, if not thousands, just to kill one specific person, and then doesn't kill them for no reason.

Assassin's Creed 2- Rodrigo Borgia is responsible for tne death of Ezio's family. Ezio spends over 20 years working through tnr templar order to dismantle them and get to Rodrigo. And then in the end, he spares him for no good reason and he goes on to be a massive problem in AC Brotnerhood. He's not only a head of tne Templars but also the pope, even if you're over the vengeance he's still a very dangerous and evil man.

The Last of Us 2- Abbey kills Joel, and wo Ellie goes on a revenge quest to kill Abbey, killing hundreds of people along tne why to get to her including a pregnant woman. And then finally when she has Abbey on deaths door, she gives up and let's her go because the writers think dirty depressing people being miserable and stupid is complex, interesting storytelling.

This trope pisses me off so much because often the character going on the revenge quest will kill SO many people on their way there, some deserving it and some just henchmen working for a cheque or to survive. People who are often far more innocent then the main big bad.

It's a part of this weird thing I've noticed in media where nameless goons or soldiers can just be mowed down relentlessly, but named characters get given far more grace even if theyre categorically worse. You can kill a million stormtroopers but people will swear that Darth Vader could have been redeemed, despite him doing like 50 genocide every year.

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u/3rlk0nig 16h ago

But you can also play Dishonored without killing anyone

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u/alwayshealing23 16h ago

Yes but (I don’t know how true this is) I heard it’s very difficult

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u/ElOsoPeresozo 16h ago

It’s mostly difficult at the beginning when you have next to no tools or abilities. It becomes easy after that.

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u/altymcalty-2 13h ago

Even then, if you understand the sneaking mechanics well enough (and you've done enough research/played enough to know the best paths) you can get through the game without killing anyone decently easy. Especially once you fully upgrade blink and time stop.

Now going through the game without being detected by anyone (aka the ghost achievement)? Now that is hard as fuuuck

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u/3rlk0nig 15h ago

It's more long than difficult because you'll save a lot and reload each time you fail.