Yet another quest bug:

The Companion's quest "Hired Muscle" (one of the early quests in the Companion's quest line) had me going to Belethor's general store in Whiterun to rough him up (not to kill, otherwise you fail the quest). So I selected the dialogue option to rough him up (brawl) and the fight began.

I beat him down enough so he would surrender and I spoke to him again. There were no dialogue options other than to brawl again... so I did. And this time... he pulled out the Staff of Magus!! See, I'm a High Elf and I've done all the Winterhold mage quests. I really had no use for the Staff of Magus, therefore I sold it to Belethor for the extra scratch. And now the bugger was using it against me! But this time, he wouldn't surrender. He just keeps attacking until I kill him.

The thing is, I don't WANT to kill him, as he's my go-to guy in Whiterun to sell off misc goods that I don't need anymore. It seems like the quest just refuses to end until I kill him. There are no dialogue options indicating that he surrendered. Help!

*bump*

After beating him down...wait !

Don't talk to him while he's down...wait until he is standing and the script should fire.

I had to intimidate a Greymane ( or maybe the other group ) and after beating him up it took him forever to get back up and the appropriate script to fire.

First off, get that staff back. You'll need it for any radiant Archmage quests from the College.

As to the fight, when I did mine, I was concerned about the same thing. The fight went the same way, and it does seem you have to beat ALL of their hp down before they surrender for the quest purposes, not just until they take the knee. Save ahead of time to be safe, of course. I'm not sure if they'll surrender the first time, as I let my target recover, but the 2nd time I beat all of his hp down, and instead of dying, he then surrendered.

Thanks for the responses, y 'all. I managed to fix it buy buying back the Staff of Magus. After I did that, I 'brawled' with him, and he surrendered (as usual), but this time when I spoke to him again, there was an 'intimidate' option.

Whew!

Glad it got fixed...

He was probably not afraid of you because he had that staff...j/k.

Honestly, I think that was the case! LOL