I quite like how Sniper elite handles this. As you are tagging enemies, small snippets about them pop up. So the Nazi you have in your scopes might love jazz music even though it’s illegal, or might draw caricatures of his fellow soldiers that give them some light hearted relief or might have tried out for the ss and failed the medical and takes his anger out on the locals.
It genuinely changes how I play the game. If they seem like they are just someone caught in the Nazi machine I tend to spare them if I can but I make pretty sure to end the true believers.
Judgement is a spectrum:
Which installment?
certainly 5, I think in 4 and maybe before
Oh, that explains why I never see it lol. I only have up until 3.
If you have game pass 5 is on there at the minute
That’s a real fucking tease if I can’t also kill and loot his kid.
Can’t have a kid grow up without a parent. It’s the only humane solution.
Oh no, the kid had a letter from his dog…
Closed captions: [John Wick]: subtle whisper I wouldn’t…
How bad is it that my first though was: “I wonder how much xp the kid is worth?”
BG3 did this in a few places. It might have even been a sign that you could’ve interacted with this person had you gone about things a different way.
Foreshadowing on where to get more loot.
One of my favorite small Skyrim mods distributed a wedding ring to random nameless NPCs, most of whom were bandits. Not quite the same, but it still added a little depth to encounters and would usually make me say “oh dammit” when I found one. I wish I could find the damn thing.
That’s the one! Thank you so much! That’s going back into my load order - and I really like the other one you linked. Well, not like, but you understand. Totally going to give that a shot as well.
This one is also excellent too: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/63733
When you’re sneaking around a ruin and draw your poisoned bow on a bandit’s head only to hear her talk about she hates this life but has to feed her two hungry daughters, it hits differently
A classic, for sure. That’s already in my load order along with a bunch more of his (NPCs react to Invisibility/Necromancy are also good) - JaySerpa does excellent work.
JaySerpa is a legend.
If the bandit had a wedding ring in their inventory, that’s no indication that they are the original owner. You have good odds of avenging the death of whoever they took it off of.
True. I remember one time, though, I’d cleared out Silent Moons Camp and was looting the bodies - I found four or five rings. They couldn’t have ALL stolen them, right? I guess part of the fun is making up your own story. But it made me FEEL something after years of clearing bandit camps (I felt like a monster, but still)
This would be a good use for LLMs. Humanizing random NPCs to encourage players to take non-violent routes.
Some games are trying to embrace the people of the land concept and I fuckin love it.
Me: “I wonder if I can find this dude’s kid in game and reunite them… 🤔”
I would put this in a game as an untracked quest except if you really dig around it was actually someone that killed the parent and started living as him so if you revert save and keep him alive eventually the kid will show up and some manner of altercation will happen depending on how you completed relevant tracked quests
I would just subtly add pressure to turn the main character into a necromancer, resurrecting the good people they killed and trying to make good on their wrongs, whilst slowly succumbing to the dark magic that will ultimately consume them and turn them into the worst bloodmage villain that teletubbyland has ever seen
There’s a bit of this in The Witcher 3. Usually in quests though, but maybe there should be a way to loot them before you kill them?
You mean pickpocketing?
Yeah, something like that, but that’s not a feature as far as I’m aware.
I’m only good at putting live explosives in other peoples’ pockets though.
Do you kill the cat school witcher who dlaughtered a village lr do you let him live?
In fact, I usually try to avoid getting into fights or uneccessary violence, the only exceptions being killing Whoreson Junior, and getting into a fight in that inn in Skellige over the ‘law of hospitality’, which didn’t end well.
I usually kill him. Geralt tries to comfort him by mentioning his Butcher moniker, but they’re not at all the same circumstances. What he does is inexcusable, regardless of the girl he spares.
I never kill him. The villagers betrayed him. Yeah sure he overreacted but what else could he have done?
Killed the guys who betrayed him, and dared the village to do something about it. Axxiid them walk off a cliff, burn down their barn. I’m sure there’s plenty of alternative options for a Witcher without slaughtering everyone.
What, the one who’s name starts with K, in the ‘Following the thread’ quest? I let him live for the sake of his family, same as I reversed the Nithing in the quest of the same name, as the son doesn’t deserve to die for the sins of the father
No I dont think that is the one. Its the guy who killed a whole village except for one child because they tried to kill him after he got rid of the monster attacking them.
Ah, maybe I just haven’t done that quest yet. I just finished the ‘check if Ciri is in various locations’ quest.
Edit: spelling
It’s a good one. It shows up as just another village contract in Velen, and takes a turn.
I’m only up to the level 18 quests at the moment.
Grim Dawn’s Asterkarn diary is the best subversion of this trope.
Only for a courier to deliver you a letter with your inheritance.
Should’ve gotten good.
Git gud scrubs
