Deus Ex: HR.. Non Lethal...Why?

[HP Craftwerk]

SORRY, SPOILER ALERT!!








Just finished my first play through

First off, I loved it. Second, the one big issue most people had with the game didn't bother me at all.. the boss fights, and I'll tell you why.

I killed Everyone, I wasn't Rambo about it, I stuck to shadows, struck at oppertune times and was a hacking god, but they all died. Hell, I even would take someone down non lethal style just to drag them into a closet and put a silenced 10mm round in their head.

So when the boss events started, I was like.. oh yea, face my aggressors, I want them to look me in the face when I see the light go out in their eyes.

My Jensen was a cold hearted killer, through and through, and I can't see him any other way. Think about it, the man had everything taken from him, Augmented against his will, and his lady was twisted like a pretzel and burned to a crisp (he's led to believe), thats cold shit, and everyone who had a hand in it, including all those peon guards, had to pay with their lives.

So I guess my question is, if you went non lethal, what were your motivations for having Jensen be a big softy? Just a few thoughts on a boring Thursday morning in the office =)

[Shane]

You little... a spoiler warning would have been nice.

[Mihkel]

So I guess my question is, if you went non lethal, what were your motivations for having Jensen be a big softy?

Non-lethal takedowns for more XP.

[Giaddon]

Quiet, faster, more XP.

I think the mechanical advantages for non-lethal play are one of the worst things about the game.

(And it's not because I want to kill everyone. To be clear.)

[HP Craftwerk]

I really didn't feel underpowered for going lethal, I got all the Upgrades I wanted by end of Shanghai really, the rest was fluff.. Hacking, radar and recoil reductions...

[lasikbear]

I always thought that while Adam Jensen is a big brooding brooder with a stupid beard, he's also an ex-cop working security, as are probably most of the security guards he deals with. They aren't inherently against him, they are just employed by a different company, and he easily could have been one of them. Also it seems cleaner to just knock them out.

There was the one part (pretty minor SPOILERS) when you are in the second area and the security people come in to find the hacker where I did kill everyone (end SPOILERS) but that seemed justified as the best way to neutralize the threat. Also going out of your way to hold Q extra long to kill people seemed pointless, especially when it seems he can just punch them really good and accomplish the same thing.

[Nalano]

Non-lethal takedowns for more XP.

And outside of mechanics, because you're not an assassin. You're a security expert, and to go the lethal route means killing several hundred innocent security flunkies for no reason than because they've accepted the "wrong" contract.

[Drake Sigar]

And outside of mechanics, because you're not an assassin. You're a security expert, and to go the lethal route means killing several hundred innocent security flunkies for no reason than because they've accepted the "wrong" contract.
Hey, as long as it makes me feel better.

[HP Craftwerk]

Meh, Accepting the wrong contract isn't an excuse, I refer to

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRGhXHM1448

Start around 1:40

[Nalano]

Hey, as long as it makes me feel better.

Gun laws are so not strict enough.


Meh, Accepting the wrong contract isn't an excuse

Two things:

1) We're talking the world of Deus Ex, where the folks in a rent-a-cop business are hired by a front company run by a subsidiary of a corporation whose motives are themselves kept in secret by a cabal with government contacts.

It's like shooting the doorman of your local UPS distributor because the CEO profited from lobbyists that were themselves hired by a think tank commissioned by ExxonMobil.

2) People need to eat. Funny thing about having a space station the size of a moon: Building it's probably a great enough expenditure to invigorate the entire world's economy, and blowing it up will probably kill more people than blowing up the planet it's circling. After all, the planet isn't hollow.

[Malawi Frontier Guard]

I thought a non-lethal playthrough would be the greater challenge, when in fact the opposite is the case.

[CMaster]

I don't see how the boss fights are "all right" because you didn't mind killing.

You have all your opportunity to "strike at opportune times" by the cutscene making you walk out into the middle of the room for a chat. The bosses just stand there and take a slugging, which really doesn't work in the cover-based shooter mechanics. There's almost no freedom of movement and very little opportunity to improvise. Even if you didn't despise them, it's hard to see how they weren't pretty much the worst part of the game, and downright infuriating.

[lasikbear]

Without revealing too many spoiler stuffs, why is lethal harder? Is it just the lack of bonus xp? I feel my silence pistol and crossbow are functionally the same as my tanq rifle, but I only use them in emergencies.

[Smashbox]

SPOYLERS, but if you've made it this far and haven't finished the game you probably don't care

There are two things that made me less likely to kill:

Some people just didn't deserve to die, narratively. Namely, affected augmented people at the end, and several parties who were more pawns (not to mention Detroit PD)

When you stealth kill, the guy shouts and alerts everyone. This is stupid. The gang of body harvesters and the indiscriminate murderers at Belltower did deserve to die, but I couldn't kill them and remain super-stealthy.

[coldvvvave]

I never understood some peoples obsession with killing everyone on the screen. Maybe because I knew a guy who disliked Half Life for not letting him shoot everyone before experiment gone wrong and I also knew he was a total retard. Another guy I knew killed everyone in Fallout 2 and also happened to be an idiot, not to mention his ingame alias in every MP game was "Hitler"( I am not making this up). maybe I just decided that I don't want to have anything common with this. Thats why I mostly nonlethaled through Deus Ex and Deus Ex HR. Not completely, I always used lethal force in desperate( your turn) situations. Thats closest I ever got to roleplaying myself in a game.

[HP Craftwerk]

The whole walking in setup and exchanging quips kinda got me pumped for the fight, I thought if it as the My name is...Adam Jensen, you killed my father, prepare to die...

Might be harder cause you are pretty fragile in fire fights, few lucky bullets and you're a goner

I play by what I think the character motives are, some games everyone dies, some games the people do not...

I should clarify, I didn't kill anyone in the very first mission, those thugs were just dummies, and at the time I wasn't aware or not if they were connected to the guys that did deserve some killin

and I didn't kill anyone in the Police Station

[CuriousOrange]

"It's like shooting the doorman of your local UPS distributor because the CEO profited from lobbyists that were themselves hired by a think tank commissioned by ExxonMobil."

Except the doorman won't blow your head off just for walking past him.

[Smashbox]

You could go both ways on the first mission... they are holding people hostage with a bomb and threatening their lives. In real life, they'd probably killed, if possible. Also, in an overheard conversation, you hear two of them arguing about whether they should have killed some of the (innocent) staff. As for the introduction, those people have invaded your company and are mowing people down with guns. Jenson is in charge of security. Of course you kill them.

Belltower are 'just' hired thugs, but they're dangerous and cruel enough that you (Adam Jenson) can justify their deaths. And some Tai Yong employees, especially after their indiscriminate slaughter at the Alice Garden Pods.

Innocent security staff, police, civilians, augmented victims, and even the real baddies prior to their heel turns -- that's hard to justify for Jenson.

[CuriousOrange]

No, you are a security officer, not a soldier. You disable them and get them arrested, not kill them. That fits his character, he was a police officer after all.

[Smashbox]

I realllllly wished for the ability to quietly slit throats in the game. It was frustrating to sneak ever-so-carefully-and-quietly up to someone and then watch Jenson pirouette around waving his arms like airplane rotors and spectacularly dismember someone.

"LOOK EVERYONE I'M DANGEROUS!"

[Mistabashi]

Yeah, it's funny what counts as a "silent takedown" in this game. Apparently breaking someone's arm in two places then smashing their head into the floor is a legitimate way of deal with enemies when trying to remain undetected.

[QuantaCat]

I thought a non-lethal playthrough would be the greater challenge, when in fact the opposite is the case.

Thats not true. A stealth-nonlethal approach isnt much of a challenge. But a nonlethal "take-em-all-out" approach would be quite challenging.

[Smashbox]

Thats not true. A stealth-nonlethal approach isnt much of a challenge. But a nonlethal "take-em-all-out" approach would be quite challenging.

Even Batman wouldn't attempt that.

[QuantaCat]

The only way to be certain noone dies.

[Ian]

Quiet, faster, more XP.

I think the mechanical advantages for non-lethal play are one of the worst things about the game.

(And it's not because I want to kill everyone. To be clear.)

I agree. I'm not exactly sure what the solution is, but having more XP for non-lethal doesn't help the game much.

Anyway, I played it non-lethal just because that's what I do. Although I killed a bit more later on when people I was encountering were clearly bastards. Usually by using strength to lug turrets around and let it do the dirty work. :D

[DigitalSignalX]

What makes me curious about the lethal vs. pacifist approach is that the game itself doesn't really care. The game cares so much about what choices you make in conversation, what physical path you choose to complete an objective, and in a couple cases, how long it takes you to get there, but it really doesn't give a damn if you slaughter everyone or not. People don't hate you, or love you, you don't miss out or gain any content. About the only difference I could tell was a couple of off-hand comments from random NPC's and a few lines changing in the CHOOSE YOUR BUTTON ending monologue.

[Malawi Frontier Guard]

Thats not true. A stealth-nonlethal approach isnt much of a challenge. But a nonlethal "take-em-all-out" approach would be quite challenging.

That was really badly worded. Yes, I did mean that "kill everyone" playthrough would be much more challenging than just stealthing around. Even on the easiest difficulty enemies kill you quite fast.

[deano2099]

The game cares so much about what choices you make in conversation, what physical path you choose to complete an objective, and in a couple cases, how long it takes you to get there

Does it? The only conversations that 'matter' are the 'battles' and if you fail them there's always another route. Likewise there are multiple paths but short of some different loot drops there's not much in them. Was there another timed mission other than the first?

I felt the same way about the lethal/non-lethal thing as the rest of the game: it made little difference. But then, anything Jensen did made little difference.

[pmh]

That was really badly worded. Yes, I did mean that "kill everyone" playthrough would be much more challenging than just stealthing around. Even on the easiest difficulty enemies kill you quite fast.

I tried both and killing everyone seemed easier. Both the 10mm and revolver are incredibly powerful and it's easy to shoot from cover with the laser sight upgrade.


Does it? The only conversations that 'matter' are the 'battles' and if you fail them there's always another route. Likewise there are multiple paths but short of some different loot drops there's not much in them. Was there another timed mission other than the first?

I felt the same way about the lethal/non-lethal thing as the rest of the game: it made little difference. But then, anything Jensen did made little difference.

I agree, and that was part of the point of the conversation battles. If you failed those, it might make your life a little more difficult, but you could still accomplish the objectives just fine. Furthermore, there are only 2 instances I'm aware of where how quickly you get somewhere has any effect, and both are incredibly minor as far as the story goes.

[Oak]

Going absolutely 100% non-lethal felt like a metagame and I wasn't interested in playing it. I vacillated. I didn't wantonly murder people, but eventually stopped caring about the wellbeing of the average-joe workaday security guards who massacred everyone at Alice Garden Pods and protected a huge human-trafficking operation.

[QuantaCat]

Going absolutely 100% non-lethal felt like a metagame and I wasn't interested in playing it. I vacillated. I didn't wantonly murder people, but eventually stopped caring about the wellbeing of the average-joe workaday security guards who massacred everyone at Alice Garden Pods and protected a huge human-trafficking operation.

Yes- That was my "breaking point" as well. Although I expected to go lethal force already at the FEMA plant, but it just wasnt practical, it was too noisy.

EDIT: I have to admit though, I was very tempted to set the sentry bots to "kill all enemies"

EDIT2: I wish this jensen was in Brink:
http://27.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lrbvvwkH8B1qccjyio1_500.jpg

[Ian]

I replayed the first mission as a mentalist, killing the shit out of everyone. The only people who cared about what I did were the SWAT NPCs. If you kill all the terrorists one of the SWAT guys says the only reason he's not arresting you for being "a fucking murderer" is because he's been ordered not to.

[Grizzly]

SPOYLERS, but if you've made it this far and haven't finished the game you probably don't care

There are two things that made me less likely to kill:

Some people just didn't deserve to die, narratively. Namely, affected augmented people at the end, and several parties who were more pawns (not to mention Detroit PD)

When you stealth kill, the guy shouts and alerts everyone. This is stupid. The gang of body harvesters and the indiscriminate murderers at Belltower did deserve to die, but I couldn't kill them and remain super-stealthy.

Many people that deserve to die live, and some that deserve to live die...

(I felt really terrible when I used the minigun on those affected augs, only to figure out later that I had some gas grenades on me...)


but eventually stopped caring about the wellbeing of the average-joe workaday security guards who massacred everyone at Alice Garden Pods and protected a huge human-trafficking operation.Yeah, for me too that was a breaking point. Untill then I had been the 'return fire only' infiltrator kind of guy, using non-lethal means mainly, although going lethal when fired upon. The Alice Garden Pods team however, I completely massacred. Asses.

I am now doing a 'SEAL' like playtrough, which is part stealth and very lethal. I did 'non lethal' zeke anders, but I then shot him in the prison just because I wanted to see how the game would handle that... (After his 'i have connections' speech).

[QuantaCat]

I replayed the first mission as a mentalist, killing the shit out of everyone. The only people who cared about what I did were the SWAT NPCs. If you kill all the terrorists one of the SWAT guys says the only reason he's not arresting you for being "a fucking murderer" is because he's been ordered not to.

Pritchard compares you to Ghandi if you go peaceful. Also malik congratulates you on your saviour-atude if you just tranq everyone..

[taione]

I've tried to be non-lethal, except when the enemies are actively trying to kill me or those I care about.
<SPOILERY>[SPOILERY] For instance when they down your VTOL and come gunning for you and Malik, or in the TV station where they set a trap and attempt to eliminate you. [SPOILERY] <SPOILERY>Then gloves come off and the spurs come out.

[nuh uh no way]

SPOILER











i was playingnon-lethal (for no real reason other than maybe the challenge of it) until that part with faridah. belltower went too far there. they pushed me. i wanted to save faridah so i killed them all. every last one of them. after that? back to business as usual. never fought or was noticed by a box guard, even. pretty happy about that! a couple acquaintances that played the game on their consoles were completely dumbfounded by how i managed to avoid the box guards entirely.

[QuantaCat]

i was playingnon-lethal (for no real reason other than maybe the challenge of it) until that part with faridah. belltower went too far there. they pushed me. i wanted to save faridah so i killed them all. every last one of them. after that? back to business as usual. never fought or was noticed by a box guard, even. pretty happy about that! a couple acquaintances that played the game on their consoles were completely dumbfounded by how i managed to avoid the box guards entirely.

I was completely dumfounded as I managed to get the Ghost XP reward for saving Mal: I managed to stay cloaked the entire time, going into cover just to recharge my batteries. (even if you fire your gun, it apparently doesnt count as being seen)