I have played no-kill characters in single player TES games, and had a lot of fun doing it. It creates a lot of tricky problems to solve.

I've considered doing the same in ESO, but so far decided not to. It just doesn't get me anywhere in story terms. There are no significant questlines in ESO that don't force you to kill something. The only possible exception is the Thieves Guild questline, and even that depends on how strictly you define killing.

The only way I would play a no-kill character in ESO would be as a thief of some sort. That may be possible without "stealing". Following the Bandaari rules of salvage gives plenty of latitude for acquisition. And maybe follow Jakarn's maxim that you can't steal what's already been stolen.

I would have to define "killing" for myself as well. Looking at the Slayer achievements I might restrict "killing" to include the Humanoid and Nature categories but not count anything else (except maybe vampires). Breaking dwemer automata, banishing daedra to the void, and destroying undead like skeletons, zombies and ghosts is not killing. Basically, you can't kill what isn't alive.

One insurmountable problem with ESO is that you can't reload from a saved game. So, if you accidently zap a critter instead of an automaton (and how easy is that!), the little creature's death is always going to be on your character's record. There's no going back. Same if an NPC you're accompanying kills something too, that may go on your character's stats.

You'd have to skip the tutorial quest for certain. That means you have to get another character to do your killing for you first, which may not be satisfactory.

If I was going to give this a try I would definitely go for a sneaky illusionist - khajiit Nightblade. That would give me quite a few non-lethal skills to use to avoid and escape combat. RP'ing as a Bandaari might just give me enough of a story to make it worthwhile.

Maybe, when I've played-out every other part of the game, I'll give it a try. The way things are going that might be quite soon.

Fur_like_snow wrote: »

This ain’t Pokémon.

Enslaving wild and/or endangered creatures, for use in an organized dogfighting ring? Darn right, this isn't Pokemon! That game is evil!

(and marketed to younger children, to boot! /gasp)

Reconsider thievery as none other than asset retrieval/recovery/restoration to the original owner who will be communicated to by the fence for collection.

Consider "killing" as complete spiritual disinformation and being none other than a shift from one dream into another and an opportunity for a genuine awakening. Yet the npc and muggistic humans rarely choose awakening and thus you see them(NPCs) back, as if they never left..in fact you probably allowed them a well deserved break as we do in sleep at night

The only killing that may be going on is the shared dreamscape PC's and NPCs are operating their dream bodies/ toons in --ie the eso game itself as it crashes over and over again...yet even then that can be very well interpreted as an awakening from a dark night of the soul

Not one death has ever occurred in PVP aside from the decision of that entity to not sign into the eso dreamscape again...and even then...they did not die.

Narvuntien wrote: »

I am pretty sure you could do the Elsewyer tutorial without killing anyone if you are stealthy.

That is assuming skeletons don't count as people, or ghosts or Daedra etc. although eventually you'll have to kill a dragon.

Now that I think about it Elseweyr actually has less killing than other parts of the game.

I just tried the Elsweyr tutorial to see. There's a bit where you have to kill a Euraxian officer to rescue a couple of adepts. No way round it.

It is possible
There was a person that ZOS featured in a live stream that reached vet 16 (max lvl at the time) who got there by not killing any creature or person. Took em a long time though. The key is to learn what quests you can and cant do. The hard part is getting to lvl 6 after. At lvl 6 you can use crafting dailies and some of other dailies. But really you just need lvl6 and a few skyshards for skill points. Cause you see the secret to lvling a character without combat is master writs. Though its gonna take some time for research and stuff. But the consumable writs you just need to know which traits to combine, the mats, and sometimes the recipes. It can all be done out of combat though it is expensive.

People are being a bit harsh on the OP.

I think what they might be getting as is murdering and thieving. I e playing lawfully. Which actually I did on my main first few years. No chests / nicking / town murders. Always took the more righteous pathway etc.

I did role a thief for TG DLC and he killed everyone to be honnest lol

But yeah to do zero farm would be hard to achieve much.

Raudgrani wrote: »

If you want to join Dark Brotherhood and Thieves Guild, that's a choice - one which you don't have to make.

But if you decide to steal you kind of have to murder too.

The only thing which resets NPC inventory for stealing is respawn.

You could empty NPCs in an area and just move on to another. But that would leave a lot of empty pockets for other players, which is a bit rude.

Another example of this game's insanity. Not murdering innocent civilians is an anti-social behaviour.

Playing the market game with the trade guilds, making money and establishing your own niche market. Crafting, but mainly fishing too. No killing or stealing involved .

I am assuming you mean Murdering or stealing, those are completely optional, stealing though you may still do on accident due to the way random stuff is placed in towns.

If you meant killing as in you don't want to kill anything at all, try puzzle games, get a deck of cards instead maybe.

You could just play a healer and make all your friends do the dirty work?

Linaleah wrote: »

cupboards also count as stealing.

Fair enough, but you're definitely gimping yourself by not pickpocketing.

Linaleah wrote: »

moreover, personaly when i pickpocket npc's in say skywatch, i don't kill anything or anyone. because logging out and switching characters - works to reset their loot as well.

You've logged out of one instance of the map where you've emptied all of those NPC pockets and into another where they're full.

NPC stealing inventories are shared by all players on that map and can't be reset just by logging out.

Container inventories can.

Linaleah wrote: »

time resets npc inventory. i'm not entirely sure how much time. half an hour maybe? 15 minutes? I tend to steal on multiple characters so by the time I switch to original - npc inventory is reset. and no, its not because npc's were killed by someone else.

Yes they reset with enough time - which takes a lot longer than just killing them and making them respawn in a few short minutes - but how could you honestly attempt to claim that you're 100% that no-one has killed those NPCs who have reset?

You've admitted that you're jumping around between characters. Even if on the same map there's a very good chance you wouldn't be on the same instance of that map.

Do you only steal in a single room?

Kill an NPC and it'll respawn in a few minutes. If you leave a room for more than a few minutes and you've emptied the pockets of NPCs there's a very good chance that some another thief will murder those NPCs to reset their inventory.

Just because you weren't there to see it doesn't mean it didn't happen.

Linaleah wrote: »

oh, I forgot fishing :P unless you don't want to kill any innocent fishes either - fishing is technically not murder

I'm vegan so yeah, I'd call that murder.

Murdered NPCs also don't actually stay dead. Assassinate one and they're walking around again in a few minutes in perfect health. That's undead / daedra territory.

Those fish? Probably not catching and eating literally the same fish over and over and over. They'd be suffering real and permanent deaths.

Nerouyn wrote: »

Linaleah wrote: »

cupboards also count as stealing.

Fair enough, but you're definitely gimping yourself by not pickpocketing.

Linaleah wrote: »

moreover, personaly when i pickpocket npc's in say skywatch, i don't kill anything or anyone. because logging out and switching characters - works to reset their loot as well.

You've logged out of one instance of the map where you've emptied all of those NPC pockets and into another where they're full.

NPC stealing inventories are shared by all players on that map and can't be reset just by logging out.

Container inventories can.

Linaleah wrote: »

time resets npc inventory. i'm not entirely sure how much time. half an hour maybe? 15 minutes? I tend to steal on multiple characters so by the time I switch to original - npc inventory is reset. and no, its not because npc's were killed by someone else.

Yes they reset with enough time - which takes a lot longer than just killing them and making them respawn in a few short minutes - but how could you honestly attempt to claim that you're 100% that no-one has killed those NPCs who have reset?

You've admitted that you're jumping around between characters. Even if on the same map there's a very good chance you wouldn't be on the same instance of that map.

Do you only steal in a single room?

Kill an NPC and it'll respawn in a few minutes. If you leave a room for more than a few minutes and you've emptied the pockets of NPCs there's a very good chance that some another thief will murder those NPCs to reset their inventory.

Just because you weren't there to see it doesn't mean it didn't happen.

Linaleah wrote: »

oh, I forgot fishing :P unless you don't want to kill any innocent fishes either - fishing is technically not murder

I'm vegan so yeah, I'd call that murder.

Murdered NPCs also don't actually stay dead. Assassinate one and they're walking around again in a few minutes in perfect health. That's undead / daedra territory.

Those fish? Probably not catching and eating literally the same fish over and over and over. They'd be suffering real and permanent deaths.

1. i'm not gimping myself at all, looting cupboards is easier and faster if all i'm after are fence goods with maybe an occasional recipes. pick-pocketing is only worth it IMO if you are after specific items that can ONLY be gotten via pick-pocketing and event then - there are faster ways to make gold to just buy those most of the time. unless you are enjoying pick-pocketing specifically - in which case fair enough. as I'm not the biggest fan of it, I prefer to steal without pick-pocketing whenever possible.
2. npc inventories are individual per player. they are NOT shared, they are like cupboards instanced to each player. which is why the strategy of "taking turns to pickpocket the same npc" actualy works, which is why if you pickpocket once and then someone else murders the npc you just pickpocketed, you get multiple items you can loot from them, as if you pickpocketed 3 times (and which is why its only polite to freaking LEAVE NPC's FOR OTHER PEOPLE TO PICKPOCKET INSTEAD OF SLAUGHTERING THEM AND MAKING EVERYONE ELSE WAIT /deep breath sorry, sore point and part of the reason I don't pickpocket much).
3. there are no dead bodies around - hence no killed npc's. those bodies can take a bit of time to despawn - far more time than it takes for npc to respawn which is why you can often come across the same npc standing in a knee high pile of their own bodies. moreover - unless the zone is super busy for whatever reason, there is rarely more then once instance active. while yes, there are dolmen trains in Auridon, they are nowhere near the insanity of alik'r
4. I figured being vegan might come into play, hence I mentioned that fishing could count as murder potentially. however, if you are going to claim that npc's respawn over and over, so it doesn't count as permanent, how can you claim that this doesn't apply to fish? since it also respawns over and over - you cannot claim that its not the same fish respawning. npc's that respawn are the same exact non daedra people. its the ludonarrative dissonance thing. so either they all count or they all don't