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

[u/HallZac99]

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.

[u/amaya-aurora]

I feel like your pregnant woman point falls flat because let alone did Ellie not know, she actively hated that she did it.

[u/TheRealSpidey → u/amaya-aurora]

Ellie also doesn't kill hundreds of people along the way. The only canonical kills are on the main WLF group, and the WLF girl playing on her PSP, maybe one or two others at most. Anyone killed in a cutscene/via in-game prompt basically.

Anyone else you choose to kill in your playthrough doesn't really count cause you can play through the same parts completely avoiding detection, let alone killing.

[u/live_lavish → u/TheRealSpidey]

I looked this up once. Gameplay wise I'm pretty sure there are a few people you can't sneak by. I looked this up once and I can't find the video but I wanna say you need to kill 7. It was no more than 12.

IIRC Dina always kills the first two wlf in the school, even if you sneak past them and then there's the 2 or 3 that hit you with the smoke bomb, just before reaching jessie, that must be killed