have been wondering if it would be possible? no doubt i'm an idiot for asking,but i would be interested in anyone who has played such a character,and how you dealt with enemies e.t.c non lethally EDIT i play on 360

Well, no. You can flee from everything, which would get really weird and unrealistic eventually. But sometime, if you're playing the main quest especially, you'll come across some quests that you have to destroy or kill a certain person or thing. You can always work your way around it by letting a NPC do it for you if he's traveling with you and if you don't do any quests I suppose you don't have to kill anything.

But I think battle is way to frequent and necessary to be able to play it without fighting/killing and still have a good, long savegame.

Someone is actually doing a pacifist playthrough. There's a thread floating around here.

Of course, he has to rely on Frenzy and fleeing towards guards to survive.

It depends on the semantics and assumptions you want to make, and those are likely to be different for different players. For the way I play and assumptions I would make, the answer is yes, you can have a fine game without doing direct damage (like from arrows, blades, fireballs, etc).

Disappear to avoid what you want to avoid.

Don’t insist on doing every single quest (I wouldn’t with any character anyway), although with some skill and creativity, most can be done.

Summon a helper when you need one.

Convince foes to kill each other.

Consider enchantments or spells that return damage.

Realize that things will be tough early on. The tutorial could be a little rough. Use fast travel if necessary to get into the Arcane University, then study, practice and develop the spells and tools you need. Design the character to stop leveling at a reasonable point (between 20-30) so your conjured summons aren’t fighting huge pools of hitpoints.

As Acadian says, there are different interpretations of "pacifist." My own belief is that coercing anybody or anything to kill a Troll or Wolf for you is philosophically no different than killing the Troll or Wolf yourself. If a crime boss orders his enforcers to murder a rival crime boss, he is considered to have had a hand in that murder even if he didn't physically pull the trigger. When a soldier kills another soldier on the battlefield I, as a citizen of the country for which that soldier is fighting, am implicated; when the state executes a prisoner I am implicated in that execution. And likewise in the game, if I order a summoned Brown Bear to kill a Troll or Wolf on my behalf I feel I have had a direct hand in killing that Troll or Wolf and am just as guilty as the Brown Bear who actually did the job.

Having said that, I also want to say that I believe everybody should play the way they want to. It's just a video game and we're here to have fun. But if I am asked "Is it possible to play Oblivion as a pacifist?" my answer is, "No."

Pseron, I'm so glad you posted! Your interpretation is exactly the counter to my post that I had in mind when I caveated about semantics and assumptions. I think anyone reading my post and yours will see the full spectrum of possibilities and complications. Another complication is the quirky, inconsistent and imperfect way in which the game calculates such things as assaults and murders. I greatly respect your rather purist views here and, again, am very glad you added them to this thread!

It's possible to "play the game" without killing. It's not possible to play through all the quest lines without doing so.

I have a character names Paxelle, who is a no-kill mage. She has managed to finish all the mages guild recommendations, plus a couple of additional MQ quests (she has a mage's staff.) She is also the Hero of Kvatch (some hero; the Kvatch Guard did most of the work, and as for Oblivion Gates, all you have to do is a combination of sneaking and sprinting.) The hardest thing is getting items that you'd normally have to kill for, like keys -- as it happens, you can loot people who are paralyzed, without hurting them. Invisibility helps a lot.

But most quest lines have some point at which the player-character is obligated to either kill something or abandon the quest. That's just the way the game is designed. And even if one can find a way around that requirement, the complications get so silly and unrewarding that it's just not worth the trouble.

I still load Paxelle and play from time to time, but we have no illusions that she's going to complete a lot more quests.


I agree with you. In most instances, Paxelle's practice has been to take the matter to the police. That is, she runs to the guards when somebody attacks her, and lets them handle the matter. The contortions of "non-killing" that were necessary to get through the Skingrad Recommendation were so bogus that it eventually soured me on the concept, and it became a chore to get through that recommenation. It was one of those challenges that you take, realizing that you're not really role-playing, just to explore the limits of the possible.

Glargg, I am trying Paxelle’s approach with my healer, and she ran into big problems in that Skingrad quest. She had to get the job done herself with spells from Restoration. I think that will be the only one like that, though. Or she’ll just go back to her daily business inside city walls, no more quests.

My pacifist is different. As long as my hands were not the one who directly caused damage, or if the imaginary kill count in game hasn't been violated, I'm a pacifist.

I say it's possible, exploiting loopholes, but not all quests will be finished, like the Dark Brotherhood, which should be obvious.

Arena is actually possible, though most people wouldn't agree with my method, but it's m rules and I didn't violate it.

Illusion is a must.

REAL pacifist would intent :

-Dont even ATTACK anyone, not any beast, not anything
-Dont even defend against anything if it attacks you.. you always just run away.
-Dont do anything that does ANY harm to anyone, or anything (like placing an enchanting mage hat on them that will kill them)
-Dont intervene with the liberty of others (so NO mind-mending illusion either)
-Dont break any locks, not steal any items, thats aggresion too.

Trade, talk, walk that would be about what you would be allowed to do..
and I don;t see how the game can be played like that.

anyone: yes
anything: no

You're not an idiot for asking, don't be silly. I was toying with the idea of roleplaying a Jesus-like character a few months back; somebody (prob a Breton) who wears robes and sandals and literally carries no weapons. But, ya know....never got around to it. It's totally possible, though.

Some questlines would have to be avoided, though. You'd have to have your character ask: "What Would Jesus Do?" Lolz.

@black viper: how could you do Arena with no kills?





Yes.. illlusion is key. So is a bit of Mysticism (detect life, so you know what to expect). Alteration might come in handy so you can eventually walk on water and such.

So far people have mentioned Frenzy, Paralyze, and Invisibility, nobody has mentioned "calm" spells. That's the way to go early on.

Frenzy = causing somebody else to assault and/or kill, paralyze effects don't last very long, and both paralyze and invisibility only kick in after Journeyman. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure you can start calming early on in the game.

Fear is also a good non-assault spell, although if you're roleplaying somebody who's a total pacifist, it's kinda silly to have enemies run away from you all the time.

@Renee Gade III

Sanguine Rose/Skull of Corruption. They don't count as your kills.

Calm in OOO is damn expensive to make. I don't use it that much.

Command Creature/ Humanoid acts as a permanent Frenzy. A 1 second Level 25 Command spell will make your enemies attack each other to the death.

As noted, there's a difference between a technical "pacifist" and a philosophically pure one. The former is playable in the game, while the latter probably isn't, or at least I haven't figured out how to do it yet. I've got a truly pacifistic character - that is, one who not only won't kill anyone or anything, but won't even do anything that he has reason to believe will lead to its death (like conjuring, commanding or even running to the guards). He was on his way out of town when he ran into Aelwin Merowald and agreed (enthusiastically, even) to help the kindly old guy out by collecting some slaughterfish scales. He swam out to the first slaughterfish, then.... couldn't do anything. He couldn't kill it and had no way to get a scale otherwise. He finally swam back to shore (with the fish following) and just stood there for a while, watching the fish thrash around in the shallows and considering his options. And he eventually just turned around and walked back to the IC, which is where he still is now.

I've got a few characters with relatively low kill counts, just because they rely on illusion and conjuration, but I've never played one deliberately to keep its kill count at zero. Ironically enough though (and as demonstration of the shortcomings of technical, statistical "pacifism"), my character (other than the pure pacifist) with the lowest kill count is not a "pacifist" by any stretch of the imagination. He's actually a thoroughly vile and detestable murderer. It's just that he flatly refuses to kill anything with his own hands, and that simply because he considers it to be tawdry and uncouth. To his way of thinking, actually hitting things (whether with a physical weapon or magic) is the sort of thing that peasants do, and he's above all of that. He has absolutely no compunction about killing people, and actually goes out of his way to do it (beyond what he already does as a paid assassin) - he just refuses to dirty his own hands with it, so he relies almost exclusively on illusion and conjuration. Last I checked, at level 8, his kill count was 10. He actually often "kills" more people than that in a single day, but just because of his quirks, isn't credited for them.

That true pacifist could wait for any fish to die of old age.. or for any wildlife to kill a fish (without him interfearing ofcourse)
or the most simple solution : walk to any shop and buy the slaughterfish scales though the latter would indirectly force others to kill fish for you (in real life) in this game the scales of shopkeepers will magically restock, and require no killing.

It wouldn't solve the quest, though, since the scales needed are unique, and can only be taken from the Rumare Slaughterfish.

Regarding your strict definition of "pacifism": You're welcome to your opinion, of course, but there's no reason that a person playing a game as a non-killing character is bound by your definition. Given that there are magical effects such as Calm which will resolve a situation non-violently, it's simply not necessary to equate "pacifism" with avoidance of action.

Yeah, Calm is the ultimate pacifist situation maker for sure. Control can be too for certain creatures, assuming there's no other enemies around. I've had my characters put a Control spell on a wolf,for instance. You cast the spell, walk away a little bit, wait an hour, and sometimes the wolf will actually be walking away from you after the hour passes. It'll walk, and will not turn around and attack, especially if the player doesn't move.

No... at least not if you want to play the main quest, I would say.

Play the game: Yes. It's perfectly viable to pickpocket your way to wealth, buying a house, and just relaxing and roleplaying from there. I've done it once, and with mods that add in some nice pieces of literature, it can be a great way to relax.

Beat the game: No. Most quests are built around killing, I doubt there is any way to beat the game without killing unless you don't consider frenzy spells killing, or companions, or an unhealthy amount of calming spells.

I agree with your assessment, but I wonder what you'd say was the "healthy limit" on calming spells...?

TRUE pacifist would also mean no stealing,no hurting.
(anything that goes against the will, property(including health), or life of oneother being or person) is a big no.
trade.. is allowed, persuation (if not manepulation) is too.

However if one bend the rules very far (though it would be not a pure pacifist) : it is possible to lure a lot of monsters of a certain type towards you.. than move towards the monster or person you want to kill, and than go charmeleon...
also with very very strong healing on other, and shield on other spells, one can let npc's do most of the killing needed for quests..

so a char that actually never slay anything by his own hand, nor his own spells.. possible. but since you "encouraged" others to do the killing for you...
It's like not stealing yourself... but buy the items of somebody that steals... fine line indeed..

think doctor who;) he never killed anything;) but everything around him dies;) power of persuation;)

That's me lol.

So for others pacifist is a guy who strolls around the world, running away from beasts, straying away from fights, while for other pacifist is anyone with 0 kills.

TRUE pacifist : *no violence of any type against anything or anyone (no charming, no stealing, no poisening, no making others kill for you, nothing but talk and trade, period.
Halfway pacifist : *you may assist people killing others of their OWN incentive (for example, healing townguards that are attacking some monsters..) you may however NOT use charm or command humanoid on them to make them do so, as you may only AID, not influence.

anything further than that line.. aint a pacifist anymore to me;)

pacifism |?pas??fiz?m|
noun
the belief that any violence, including war, is unjustifiable under any circumstances, and that all disputes should be settled by peaceful means.
? the refusal to participate in war or military service because of such a belief.

Yes, that's a good definition. I don't see anything there about not stealing, or not charming people and animals, or not sneaking into dungeons and trying to find valuable loot.