History Main / PathOfMostResistance

** A general rule in ''VideoGame/{{Sonic|TheHedgehog}}'' games is that the highest route is the most difficult, but has the best power-ups, and is often the fastest route except for glitches.

* In the [[RPGMechanicsVerse console RPG parody]] webcomic ''The DOOM Army'', an NPC tells the IdiotHero to take an extremely difficult route to his destination, while the NPC will take the other path to the same place, which is a shortcut with no danger whatsoever. When the hero objects and asks why he should go the hard way, the NPC says "That way has treasure boxes" and he immediately agrees.

* In the first gym of ''VideoGame/PokemonRedAndBlue'', you can choose to either go through the easy way and avoid the trainer that guards Brock, or you can go through the hard way and fight the trainers and thus, be rewarded more so in the end by leveling up your '{{Mon}}s.
** In that case, a similar argument can be made for Blaine's gym, in which you can answer a multiple-choice question to open the door to the next room -- getting it wrong will force you to fight the nearby trainer, but you could just fight the trainer in the first place for the EXP.
*** Or you could solve the puzzle and then talk to the trainers to battle them anyway.
*** This was brought back in the Lumiose City Gym in ''VideoGame/PokemonXAndY'', but you fight the trainer marked with the answers rather than just selecting the answer. You can't challenge the other two trainers if you guess correctly, though.

*** This is actually [[LampshadeHanging commented upon]] in the [[VideoGame/PokemonDiamondAndPearl fourth generation]]; in Roark's (oddly similar to Brock's) gym the trainers praise you for taking the hard way, while in Fantina's gym, (where the right door is marked by a simple math problem, and you have an in-game calculator) a trainer guesses that you probably chose the wrong door deliberately to fight them.
** This is a common element all throughout the Pokemon world. Most routes will have a number of trainers (or patches of grass) to avoid, and only a handful must be fought, but battling trainers and pokemon is good EXP. In addition, patches of grass might lead to useful items, while battling trainers might introduce a shorter route for backtracking later on in the game, and also give money.
*** Veteran players will, in fact, recommend fighting every trainer in the game. Done properly you should never have to worry about being under-leveled or short on cash.

* Happens in ''Franchise/FireEmblem''. Many players will, when presented with a level objective that isn't to route the enemy, decide to kill them all anyway. This means killing every enemy before engaging the boss, or capturing the base, or even treating survival chapters as time limits to how fast they need to kill every unit. This is harder, but it gives you greater experience, which will eventually make the rest of the game easier.

* ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'' has the final dungeon, where the party splits up at one point when you reach a fork in the road. You have to decide which party goes where, though after you do so there is nothing stopping you from backtracking and checking both paths out.

*** In ''Shin Megami Tensei: Strange Journey Redux'', the New Chaos route is even worse. This path ultimately leads to you fighting [[spoiler:''every potential major antagonist not named Jimenez''. You also get to skip the final fight with Alex, although that's a bit of a cold comfort considering the other four times she tried to kill you.]]

* There are a few times you can avert combat in ''VideoGame/DragonAgeOrigins'' with the right dialogue options and high enough Coercion. You can avoid fighting the BonusBoss [[spoiler: Ser Cauthrien]] this way twice. Avoiding the fight deprives you of both exp and the [[spoiler: Summer Sword, a powerful unique Greatsword with knockback]].

Compare and contrast EarnYourFun. Contrast BeefGate, where the path you're not supposed to take yet is intentionally ridden with too difficult enemies.

When a video game presents you with multiple paths or options, you should ''always'' take the most difficult looking one. Don't know where to go? Look for the door with the most SpikesOfDoom near it. Need a Franchise/{{Pokemon}} that can actually [[ScratchDamage hurt something]]? Start leveling your [[MagikarpPower Magikarp]]. Want the super powerful, [[PowerGlows glowing]] InfinityPlusOneSword? It'll be at the bottom of a three thousand floor BonusDungeon, guarded by the BonusBoss that takes [[MarathonBoss three hours to kill]]. In the video game world, doing it the hard way is the only way to get the best rewards.

** ''VideoGame/ShinMegamiTenseiIVApocalypse'': The Massacre route starts with a massive [[DifficultySpike spike in difficulty]] on top of potentially losing all your items which ends up making the route one of the hardest to complete. [[spoiler:This is actually the more extreme of the two major neutral routes you can take, with the relatively pacifistic Bonds route being significantly easier since you don't have to turn against and fight most of your allies.]]

-->-- '''Gordon Freeman''', ''Machinima/FreemansMind''

[[folder: Action Adventure]]

[[folder: Action Game]]

[[folder: Adventure Game]]

--> '''Cassima:''' Oh, Alexander, I'm so happy that you've finally rescued me.
--> '''Alexander:''' Yes, my love.
--> '''Cassima:''' It's just too bad that you never avenged my murdered parents, or found the stolen treasures of the Green Isles, or uncovered the secrets of the Isle of Mist...
--> '''Alexander:''' Ah, yes, well, um...
--> '''Cassima:''' ...or ended the feud among the island rulers, or captured Alhazred's genie, or mastered the lost magic of the realm, or defeated the ruler of the Underworld...

[[folder: Fighting Game]]

[[folder: First Person Shooter]]

[[folder: Hack and Slash]]

[[folder: Miscellaneous Games]]
* One of the ways UselessUsefulStealth can be, well, [[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin useless]], in games where the rewards from killing enemies (weapons, experience, money, etc) is useful or necessary. Sure it's a lot easier to slip past, as compared to facing enemy resistance head-on and {{Leeroy Jenkins}}ing your way through them like a madman, but then you're missing out on resources that will make the game easier. ''[[VideoGame/{{Boktai}} Boktai 2]]'' infamously rendered the stealth mechanic entirely worthless by introducing a level progression. Certain games alleviate this by introducing alternatives like a BackStab ability to OneHitKO enemies stealthily (and still get the rewards), or reward the player in different ways for sneaking through (Like ''VideoGame/ChronoTrigger'' where avoiding fights with the guards and knocking them out from behind meant you got no experience, but instead rewarded you with mid-tonics).

-->One way is fairly obvious and simple, but there are no prizes to be had going this route.\\

The third way is almost inconceivable, but you have placed an invisible 5000 point down there and an [[OneUp Extra Glider]] to boot.

[[folder: Platform Game]]

[[folder: Role Playing Game]]

[[folder: Simulation Game]]

** ''VideoGame/AceCombatJointAssault'' plays with this. One mission has you flying an unarmed 747 through a ravine, which splits up at one point. The longer, apparently safe route has proximity-triggered mines and flak guns. The shorter path, on the other hand, has you dealing with missiles. In a 747 in a ravine. This fact cannot be emphasised enough. Either way, you're still taking poison.

[[folder: Strategy Game]]

[[folder: Survival Horror]]

[[folder: Non Video Game Examples]]

* ''Webcomic/DumnestorsHeroes'' had [[http://www.moderntales.com//comics/dumnestor.php?view=archive&chapter=14738&name=dumnestor#strip3 'Blackeye' Susan taking the apparently-disused path]] to avoid [[MemeticMutation the grues]].
* Discussed and subverted in the comic strip ''ComicStrip/FoxTrot''. Jason (the video game fan) is having an impossible time getting past a certain boss, and Paige (who has very little interest in video games) discovers that if you [[SheatheYourSword don't attack]], you can just walk right past him with nothing to stop you. Jason finds this quite hard to believe, and when he does believe it, he remarks that doing things the easy way is extremely difficult.
* ''Machinima/FreemansMind'' lampshades this, repeatedly.

* ''Manga/HunterXHunter'' had an odd subversion of this trope in which the group had to choose between two paths, one of which would take hours to complete, the other of which would only take minutes. The catch was that in order to take the short path you needed to leave two of your teammates behind. Seeing as they only had 20 minutes or so left to finish the maze, it seemed like leaving people behind was the only option. However, they were all able to make it to the end by taking the true path of most resistance. They entered the long path and then, because the two paths were right next to each other, broke through the stone wall with the weapons the room had prepared (for in-fighting between the team or for this scenario), so they could go down the short path instead.
* In ''WebComic/TheOrderOfTheStick'', while the team are en route to the Dwarven town of Firmament to stop the plot of [[spoiler:the High Priest of Hel]], they come to the conclusion that they're on the right path upon consideration that the ambush of a group of Frost Giants on their airship was not a RandomEncounter but a calculated effort to obstruct them.

* In ''Fanfic/WaitingIsWorthIt'', Izuku is given the option to get into [=UA=] on Toshinori's recommendation, allowing him to skip the entrance exam altogether. Feeling like this would be unfair to all of the other applicants, he decides to forgo this and take the exam instead. Not only does he get in anyway, but this allows him to show off his raw power and save Uraraka.

** In VideoGame/ResidentEvil4 itself, there's a section where you can choose one of two paths; one has a bunch of mooks and a set of minibosses, while the other has a single El Gigante. Since all bosses in the game drop valuable items on death, skilled players will do both paths for the monetary gains. This is also a bit of a deconstruction- the ammo you spend doing things this way may not be worth the spare money, depending on your skill level.

* ''VideoGame/{{Shinobi}} 3'' has a level near the end in which [[OneOfTheseDoorsIsNotLikeTheOther taking the wrong door sends you back to the start of the level]]. As you can guess, all the safe looking ones just send you back, while the ones that actually take you closer to the end have all kinds of death traps, jumping puzzles, and ninjas in front of them.

** ''VideoGame/DeusExHumanRevolution'' continues the tradition with the "Ghost" experience bonus for completing objectives without alerting or touching enemies. It is often bigger than the amount of exp you get for hunting down all the enemies.

-->'''Gordon:''' Well, I'm going to assume that because [[AliensAndMonsters this]] is the most dangerous-looking thing I've seen in my life, I'm going the right way.

* ''Fanfic/PokemonResetBloodlines'' has this trope in place with several characters choosing to take paths that are harder than they need to be, though it is intentional and for a reason. Reset Ash Ketchum ending up with the qualifications to enter the league after beating the second gym is the most prominent example: while he can technically do nothing from that point on, he continued to challenge gyms specifically because he knows that he and his Pokemon aren't ready for it yet. He uses the path to ensure they'd be ready. The Astrid Oneshot explores two people who took the path: with the one who took it fully, an OC named Vermell, defeating Astrid specifically for the parts of the path she didn't do. The Cipher oneshot deconstructs the trope, with a character having specifically chosen this path without being ready for it like Ash, Vermell, and Astrid to an extent were. He ends up at a point where joining Team Cipher is the only way for him to survive.
* In ''Fanfic/WaitingIsWorthIt'', Izuku is given the option to get into [=UA=] on Toshinori's recommendation, allowing him to skip the entrance exam altogether. Feeling like this would be unfair to all of the other applicants, he decides to forgo this and take the exam instead. Not only does he get in anyway, but this allows him to show off his raw power and save Uraraka.

* ''Manga/HunterXHunter'' had an odd subversion of this trope in which the group had to choose between two paths one of which would take hours to complete the other of which would only take minutes. The catch was that in order to take the short path you needed to leave two of your teammates behind. Seeing as they only had 20 minutes or so left to finish the maze it seemed like leaving people behind was the only option. However, they were all able to make it to the end by taking the true path of most resistance. They entered the long path and then, because the two paths were right next to each other, broke through the stone wall with the weapons the room had prepared (for in-fighting between the team or for this scenario), so they could go down the short path instead.
* ''Fanfic/PokemonResetBloodlines'' has this trope in place with several characters choosing to take paths that are harder than they need to be , though it is intentional and for a reason. Reset Ash Ketchum ends up with the qualifications to enter the league after beating the second gym is the most prominent example: while he can technically do nothing from that point on he continued to challenge gyms specifically because he knows that he and his Pokemon aren't ready for it yet. He uses the path to ensure they'd be ready. The Astrid Oneshot explores two people who took the path: with the one who took it fully, a OC named Vermell, defeating Astrid specifically for the parts of the path she didn't do. The Cipher oneshot deconstructs the trope, with a character having specifically chosen this path without being ready for it like Ash, Vermell, and Astrid to an extent were. He ends up at a point where joining Team Cipher is the only way for him to survive.
* In ''Fanfic/WaitingIsWorthIt'', Izuku is given the option to get into [=UA=] on Toshinori's recommendation, allowing him to skip the entrance exam all together. Feeling like this would be unfair to all of the other applicants, he decides to forgo this and take the exam instead. Not only does he get in anyway, but this allows him to show off his raw power and save Uraraka.