Pyrrhic Victory: Difference between revisions

Few victories come without cost, but the cost of a Pyrrhic Victory is ruinous to the victor. A Pyrrhic Victory will often involve a [[Heroic Sacrifice]] or people asking [[Was It Really Worth It?]]. If it happens at the end of a work, it will inevitably lead to a [[Bittersweet Ending]] or even a [[Downer Ending]] (and likely [[Inferred Holocaust]]). Often the implication of a [[Lonely At the Top]] situation, where someone gets everything he wanted, but lost everything and everyone that helped him get there. A clever enemy can use a [[Defensive Feint Trap]] to trick an opponent into "winning" such a victory.

'''Here there be spoilers,''' since this is often an [[Ending Tropes|Ending Trope]].

{{examples}}

== Anime and Manga ==

* ''[[Mazinger Z]]'': After a long and hard battle, Kouji defeated Dr. Hell with Mazinger Z. However, the Mycene immediately attacks without giving any time to rest and he is unable to do anything to stop them. Mazinger Z, Venus A, Boss Borot and the Photon Research Institute are easily destroyed (and several world cities, including Tokyo, in the movie). Kouji is saved by Tetsuya and his Great Mazinger, who claims that Mazinger Z isn't needed anymore.

** And in ''[[Great Mazinger]]'', the heroes finally defeat the Mykene army... but it was due to the [[Heroic Sacrifice]] of Prof. Kabuto -Kouji and Shiro's biological father and Tetsuya and Jun's adoptive father-. In spite of they had won, nobody felt victorius, and in fact Tetsuya felt awful and [[It's All My Fault|blamed himself for his father's death]]. And rightly so). Not to mention in one of the adaptations, {{spoiler|Tetsuya}} himself bite the dust.

* The ending of ''[[Death Note]]'' certainly feels like one of these. {{spoiler|Soichiro Yagami}}, one of the only truly good characters in the series (according to [[Word of God|the artist himself]],) is dead, {{spoiler|L is dead,}} {{spoiler|Mello is dead}} although that was [[Memetic Mutation|just as planned]], poor Matsuda's probably going to need some serious therapy, {{spoiler|there is no afterlife (at least in the manga),}} god knows how many NPCs are dead, and {{spoiler|a year later, the world's practically returned to normal. Kira barely changed anything.}} Ouch.

** The movie version is only ''marginally'' better. {{spoiler|L gains 23 days, but he still dies. Kira is stopped sooner, but the world still goes back to normal. There's still no afterlife (at least for Death Note users). This time, he survives, but ''Soichiro's'' the one that needs therapy now.}}

** When Ichigo wins a fight... by losing his internal fight against his [[Super-Powered Evil Side]]. {{spoiler|Also, his final victory against Aizen. Aizen can only be sealed away and imprisoned meaning there's always a chance he could return. Meanwhile, Ichigo sacrificed his powers and his ability to be a substitute shinigami. Thinking he has no right to complain about this, he tries to go on with a normal human life for 17 months, his grades slipping and not planning for his future because he's unable to face up to reality that having the power to protect is an integral part of who he is, without which he's reduced to simply existing instead of actually living. It takes another [[Arc Villain|substitute shinigami]] shaking up his life to make him face and accept the truth.}}

* In ''[[Digimon Tamers]]'' after defeating the D-Reaper, the effects of the weapon they used on it take effect on their Digimon, who revert back to their In-Training levels and end up having to go back to the Digital World, otherwise they will die. This unfortunately separates them from their partners.

* In ''[[Monster (manga)|Monster]]'', Tenma got his [[Idealism vs. Cynicism|moral victory]]... at a great cost.

* Whether you believe Tabris the 17th Angel allowed Shinji to kill him because he truly respected/cared for Shinji, or because [[Alternative Character Interpretation|he wanted to make Shinji suffer as he died]], it's indisputable that the destruction of the last Angel in ''[[Neon Genesis Evangelion]]'' ruined the last of Shinji's self-confidence and mental stability. {{spoiler|It gets worse in the Movie, when we realize the Angels are actually NOT the real threat as his Magnificient Bastard of a father AND SEELE an Ancient Conspiracy begin their plans for World Instrumentality. }}

** After winning the previous Gundam Fight, {{spoiler|Master Asia}} looks back and is horrified by the carnage and the damage he and the other participants have caused. He becomes bitter at humanity's willingness to go through such lengths {{spoiler|and [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|has thus chosen to be extreme in his own way]]}}.

** {{spoiler|Domon}} himself. He defeats the Devil Gundam and saves Rain and his father, but in the process he {{spoiler|loses his mother, brother (twice over), and mentor in true [[Tear Jerker]] fashion.}}

* At the end of ''[[One Piece]]'''s Paramount War arc, the Navy succeeds in their stated goal of killing {{spoiler|Ace and Whitebeard}}, proving the strength of their justice. Unfortunately, as a result, islands once under the old man's protection are now open game for ''far'' less ethical pirates, and because of the war itself, dozens of vicious convicts have escaped from Impel Down, the great undersea jail. {{spoiler|Whitebeard's}} [[Famous Last Words]] have triggered a second Great Age of Pirates, and his formidable earthquake powers are now in the hands of Blackbeard. To top it off, the Navy, due to the losses in the war, are unable to deal with either problem effectively.

* ''[[D.Gray-man]]'': At the end of the Noah's Ark Arc, after battling all these Noah, Allen Walker restores the Ark by playing a special song in a secret room within the Ark that the Noah don't know. Of course, Everyone who came along for the journey, got left behind, and supposedly died come back, but when they get back, poor Allen is charged for knowing how to control the Ark, since only certain Noah know how, and for being the container for the 14th. Not only does he have to control this monster inside his head, he has to be subjected to some not so good treatment from Leverrier. Now is that the way to treat your savior?

* Twenty years before the main story in ''[[Mahou Sensei Negima]]'', Ala Rubra stopped the war in the Magical World and saved the world. Unfortunately, this was only achievable through {{spoiler|the sealing of Asuna, which caused the floating capital to collapse and destroyed the cultural center of the world. The dynasty of the founders and kings of Ostia was also assumed to be wiped out when Arika was blamed for the disaster.}}

* ''[[Sin City]]'': All victories in this series are pyrrhic and then some.

* ''The [[Onslaught]]'' crossover invoked this trope by name in the last trade paperback that collected the series. {{spoiler|Virtually every major hero within the main Marvel universe is forced to sacrifice themselves in order to stop the main villain, Onslaught, by giving him a physical body. The mutants present at the fight, who were unable to sacrifice themselves in the above fashion, are forced to slaughter the heroes in order to destroy Onslaught once and for all, though much of the world ended up believing that they had simply killed off a huge crowd of beloved heroes.}}

* When Batman faces [[Back From the Dead|Jason Todd]], who forces him between letting Joker die or killing Jason, Batman [[Take a Third Option|makes Jason drop his weapon and sends him into shock]] by [[Improbable Aiming Skills|throwing a batarang at a pipe so it rebounds and cuts the side of Jason's neck]].

{{quote|'''[[Complete Monster|Joker]]''': You managed to find a way to win... and everybody still ''loses''!! }}

* [[Crisis on Infinite Earths]]: The heroes beat the Anti Monitor but in the process the entire multiverse is lost (and this is canon.) Arguably, the heroes can't be held responsible for the worlds lost before they got involved, but there were still six or seven worlds remaining when they began their counter offensive, two of them were destroyed and the other five were collapsed into one that was almost but not quite like one of the five with a few borrowed elements from the other four.

** At least there are now 52 universes but none of them are the ones that were destroyed (though some are like the ones lost.)

* The 1954 film ''[[Gojira (film)|Gojira]]'' certainly applies. Sure, the titular monster was killed...but at the cost of the [[Heroic Sacrifice|life of a human being who chose to die alongside the monster rather than expose the secret of the weapon chosen to kill them]] and {{spoiler|It's HEAVILY implied that Godzilla isn't the only one of his species...}}

* In ''[[Ginger Snaps]]'', Bridget manages to escape being eaten by the werewolf {{spoiler|by accidentally killing it. And it's her sister, the only person in the world she loved, and who she'd hoped to cure.}}

* ''[[Set It Off]]''. The protagonist escapes with a fortune stolen from a bank but her friends were killed, she had to leave the man she loved behind and she can never return to the United States.

* ''[[Blade Runner]]''. Director's cut ending. {{spoiler|Deckard runs away with Rachel, a Replicant, a very illegal act, despite her having less than four years to live.}}

** Robert's Rebellion in the backstory, especially if you're Robert. His entire motivation was to rescue his beloved, Lyanna Stark, from the Targaryens. She died before he could do so. He ended up with the throne but not the girl (and with a loveless marriage).

* R.A Salvatore's ''The Crystal Shard'' has the final battle presented as one of these for the good guys.

* In ''[[The Riftwar Cycle|A Darkness at Sethanon]]'', the invading army of the moredhel finally capures the city of Armengar, but with devastating losses--not only is the city an invader's nightmare, built with technologies and magic long lost to mankind, but those in charge of the defense ''blow it up'' just when the invading army has finally broken through, leaving the moredhel with a ruined city and great losses. Ten years later, the risk of a devastating defeat or a Pyrrhic Victory is what spurs one of the moredhel chieftains to oppose the efforts to launch another invasion, going as far as allying himself with the humans to accomplish it.

* In [[Dan Abnett]]'s [[Warhammer 40000]] novel ''The Brothers of The Snake'', a chapter of Space Marines retake a refinery from Chaos forces. They realize that the place was tainted by something it had pumped up from under the earth, and it could not be used any more -- which meant they could just have blasted it from orbit, without losing three Marines in the fight.

Jean: It is.

Locke: It can go fuck itself. }}

** Also, ''Grave Peril.'' Dresden got the girl back, but couldn't save her. And in the process, started a war.

** ''Changes'' {{spoiler|So Harry won the war, saved his daughter, but what he did to do it...}}

* In one of ''[[The History of the Galaxy]]'' novels, the first battlefield use of the LIGHT [[Antimatter|annihilator]] device by [[La Résistance]] results in the total destruction of not one but two [[The Empire|Earth Alliance]] armadas. However, the colonists lose nearly all ships in the process, leaving them with a total of ''eight'' warships, while Earth still has plenty of ships in other systems. They also lose the only existing annihilator they have (at the moment). Their only advantage is the fact that Earth has no idea the colonies are virtually defenseless. The new colonial admiral manages to enact a daring plan to steal two flagship-class cruisers from an Alliance shipyard... by stealing the shipyard with tugs.

** Oh, and the admiral's own son was killed in the explosion.

* In Dickens' ''[[Bleak House]]'', one of the major plot points of the book is the infamous legal case Jarndyce v. Jarndyce. Near the end of the book, the characters finally win the case, but the cost and time—several years, and the modern equivalent of hundreds of thousands of dollars—that had to be invested in trying to untangle its legal [[Mind Screw]] rendered it bankrupt by the time they finally finished. It ate up all its own assets, which would have been worth a fortune if it had been some halfway competent lawyers who drew up the mess in the first place.

** In the third season, {{spoiler|Londo collaborates with G'Kar to assassinate the villainous Lord Refa, which ultimately removes the only moderating influence on an even ''worse'' leader, the insane Emperor Cartagia.}}

** And then in the fourth season, {{spoiler|Londo and Vir kill off Cartagia and Morden and blow up all the Shadow ships stationed on Centauri Prime, finally freeing the planet from the Shadows' influence... only to cause the Drahk to take over the place in revenge in the final season, leading to Centauri Prime's isolation from the rest of the galaxy, the firebombing of its cities, and just general devastation of the whole planet. And not only does Londo have to watch all this unfold, but he also gets possessed by a [[Body Snatcher]] — and he has to live with all this for the rest of his life. Brr.....}}

* [[Doctor Who|"You've got to! Come on. It can't end like this. You and me, all the things we've done. Axons! Remember the Axons? And the Daleks. We're the only two left. There's no one else... REGENERATE!" "Look at that.. I win..!"]]

** To give that line some context, at the end of ''"Last of the Time Lords"'' {{spoiler|the Master gets shot by [[The Dog Bites Back|Lucy Saxon]] after the Doctor's ended his regime over the Earth. Rather than regenerate (and subsequently spend the rest of his life imprisoned on the Doctor's TARDIS) he chooses to die, leaving the Doctor alone as the only living Time Lord once again. It's a pyrrhic victory for them both.}}

** The original one in the setting was Khaine's victory over Khaelis Ra (the Nightbringer) in the War in Heaven. Khaine destroyed the Nightbringer's body, but his actual form just transferred to a new one, he nearly killed Khaine, and he implanted an intrinsic fear of death into all sentient life except for the Orks. Though Khaine got the Destroyer aspect out of it all, which lead to some of the best Eldar units in the game, which led to the most overpowered Biel-tan army of 3rd edition (30 Dark Reapers, anyone?), so it wasn't all bad.

** Slaneesh's victory over Khaine during the Fall of the Eldar not only didn't actually destroy Khaine, but also weakened Slaneesh enough that Cegorach could escape him and Nurgle could steal Isha away from him.

*** The Imperium's fight against the Tyranids provides a rather interesting example. A common strategy for the Imperium is to suck the Tyranids into a war of attrition on a planet until the place is on the verge of being overrun, at which point Imperium conducts an [[Earthshattering Kaboom|Exterminatus]]. What makes it interesting is that this can be made into a sort-of Pyrrhic Victory for ''both'' sides: sure the Imperium has damaged the Hive Fleet, but it also has lost a planet with all its resources and there are always, [[We Have Reserves|always, always more Tyranids out there]]. On the other hand, the 'Nids may still have plenty more creatures to throw at another planet and their 'prey' may be weaker, but it still lost a whole lot of biomass that it could have used.

** Eldrad's destruction of Abaddon's Planet Killer, breaking the back of the Thirteenth Black Crusade, was accomplished when the Farseer bound himself in eternal conflict with the daemonic spirits controlling the starship and hurled them both into the depths of the Warp.

* ''[[Ravenloft]]'', for both heroes and villains. The heroes won't be able to achieve particularly significant things, and it's quite likely they will die in the process of saving a handful; on the Darklords' side of the ledger...well...Count Strahd saved his homeland at the expense of his youth and became immortal at the expense of the life of the woman he loved, to name just one example.

* [[Risk]]- If you've played a few games, this has happened to you at least once.

** However, if you end up taking your sweet time at a certain point, you will end up losing {{spoiler|[[Bridge Bunnies|Chambers]] and Doctor Chakwas, as well as most of your crew}}.

** The situation on Rannoch in [[Mass Effect 3]] can quickly turn into this. {{spoiler|Shepard just took out a Reaper on foot, freeing the geth from their control. But this also made the geth vulnerable to the still-at-war quarian fleet. If you haven't [[Take a Third Option|earned the requirements for peace]] between the two sides, [[Sadistic Choice|you have to choose between them]]. And you will probably feel horrible no matter which side you choose.}}

{{quote|In two of the Endings {{spoiler|the Reapers are defeated at the cost of destroying the mass relay network, cutting off all galactic civilization, and the allied fleets are stranded in the Sol system with no way home. If the player rushed through the game and didn't gather enough war assets for the final fight then Earth is also destroyed.}}

In the other Ending {{spoiler|all of organic life ''somehow'' gets bonded with artificial life, essentially trading organic diversity for a forced homogenous existence with the Reapers.}} }}

* Under-rated PSP game ''Infection'' has this at the end. You've managed to save New York by wiping out all the zombies! Congratulations! Too bad you only saved a few hundred people, at ''least'' the entire continental United States is still zombified, and there's no word from the rest of the world. But still...New York! Ayyyy!

* The ending of ''[[Metal Gear Solid]] 3'' way more than qualifies as a Pyrrhic Victory for Big Boss.

** If you keep playing through the *real* ending and the downloadable Epilogue, Ahriman's "victory" smacks of [[Pyrrhic Villainy]]. By bringing Elika back, the Prince freed Ahriman to destroy the world, but it seems that Elika is also somehow vitally important to finally defeating him-- reviving her enabled his release but will probably result in his ultimate destruction (assuming sequels happen).

* The mission results screen for the penultimate mission of ''[[Ace Combat]] 04: Shattered Skies'' notes how victory over the Eruseans came at a very high cost of ISAF casualties, including many aces lost to Stonehenge.

* While the effect of the final battle wasn't immediate upon the protagonist of ''[[Persona 3]]'', many players assumed that he was {{spoiler|just sleeping when he closes his eyes in Aigis' lap on the final day of the game. It turns out he 'died' that day, and the sequel, ''Persona 3: FES'', shows us what effect the protagonist's 'death' has upon the rest of the party. The reveal that the protagonist actually sacrificed his life to become the barrier between Nyx and humanity becomes the main point of contention between the entire party, especially for Yukari, who spends most of the game wanting to see him again, to the point where she would be willing to reset time even if it meant dooming the rest of humanity}}.

* The [[Multiple Endings|bad ending]] of ''[[Persona 4]]'' where you choose to {{spoiler|kill Namatame. If you didn't kill him, he would have gotten away with it, right? But Nanako is dead, Dojima is left all alone, and your friends have to live with the fact that they killed a man who they weren't even sure was the true culprit. [[Downer Ending|Heavy fog continues]] to [[Endofthe World As We Know It|envelope the world]] as you say goodbye to your friends...}}

* ''[[Saya no Uta]]'' has this in all of its endings, to some degree.

* ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]: [[Birth By Sleep]]'' has all characters' endings like this. {{spoiler|Terra loses his body to Master Xehanort but his armor and weapons reform by Terra's force of will and defeat his own body, stopping the current plan. However, Xehanort survives to become the [[Big Bad]] for the rest of the series, while what's left of Terra is just an empty suit of armor kneeling in the remains of the Keyblade Graveyard and stewing in anger at Xehanort for 11 years. Ventus defeats Vanitas inside his own mind destroying the X-Blade and stopping the other part of the plan. However the damage to his heart is so severe that he's rendered comatose while his heart seeks safety within Sora's. Aqua finishes off Xehanort's plans for good, except both her friends are gone, she inadvertently sets off the events that would put the first game into motion, and she's stuck wandering the Realm of Darkness alone for years.}} However, unlike most Pyrrhic Victories, there is the hope of Sora saving them all.

* The ''[[Halo]]'' trilogy: At the end of the Human-Covenant War the humans successfuly prevent Earth from being completely destroyed and permanently end the threat of the Covenant. However most human colonies are lost as well as basically the entire fleet and armed forces, and given that 23 ''billion'' humans died, there's barely anything left of their former interstellar empire.

** Really, this is a habit with [[Bungie]]. The ''[[Marathon Trilogy|Marathon]]'' trilogy had only a handful of the Tau Ceti colony escape alive, plus the Pfhor angered enough by their defeat to pull a [[Superweapon Surprise]] as a final “screw you” (almost causing the destruction of the universe too through accidental stupidity;) ''[[Myth]]'' has {{spoiler|pretty much your ''entire army'' slaughtered to a man}} over the course of the game, culminating in a [[Taking You with Me]] when you destroy the [[Big Bad]]; and ''[[Oni]]'' ends with the revelation that {{spoiler|the entire planet is ecologically on its last legs}}.

** Despite their noble decision to form a truce with humanity and aiding in destroying the loyalist forces, the Sangheili are no better off afterwards- without the means to create the vessels that they used (as they were creations of the Prophets backward-engineering existing Forerunner technology), their campaign against the Brutes is long and bloody. Worse still, they lack any spiritual guidance that they once had prior to their race being integrated to the Covenant, to the point where one Sangheili leader in the comic "The Return" {{spoiler|revisits a planet he had glassed, simply to find anything that might rekindle their faith.}} Fortunately, {{spoiler|after saving a human, he finds out about the existance of a Monitor, a lead he intends to follow to achieve the ends that he seeks.}}

* ''[[Final Fantasy I]]'': The heroes confront Chaos, destroying him and shattering the time loop. But because that loop is shattered, no one--not even the ''heroes''--remembers there was ever a battle to begin with. The price of victory? Never knowing your greatest achievements ever were.

* In Chapter 6 of ''[[Super Paper Mario]]'', {{spoiler|you [[You Are Too Late|fail to recover the Pure Heart before The Void consumes the Sammer Kingdom]]. Afterwards, you return to where Sammer Kingdom ''used'' to be (now called the "[[White Void Room|World of Nothing]]," and fight a boss to recover the Pure Heart. But even though you get a nearly full "You Got A Pure Heart" victory animation, the Pure Heart has been turned to stone by the destruction of the world it rested in, rendering it useless. The only thing missing from the animation is all your Pixls lining up to do their dance, most likely because even ''[[Cloudcuckoolander|they]]'' know it's only a [[Pyrrhic Victory]].}}

* The canon ending to ''[[Blaze Union]]''. The incompetent government has been overthrown, Gulcasa is able to completely ignore the corrupt court by becoming the world's most empathetic and competent dictator, and the people's lives can finally return to normal. Over the course of achieving this, [[Broken Pedestal|the employer Gulcasa trusted]] and his [[Living Emotional Crutch]] died, his mother bullied him into killing her for the sake of reclaiming his true power, and his childhood friend and mentor tried to kill him out of fear that he might become a monster someday, leaving him a complete emotional wreck.<br /><br />[[Yggdra Union|Three years later]], just when his people's lives and his own mental state have stabilized, his attempt to [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|rescue the rest of the world]] goes as wrong as it possibly can, and he is forced to watch everyone he ever loved sacrifice themselves for him as his country is ravaged by invaders, ending in his own death. Thank God for that [[Yggdra Unison|gaiden]] where [[Earn Your Happy Ending|you can fix this]].

* In ''[[Dragon Age]]: Origins'', a Human Noble PC's sacrifice makes it a [[Pyrrhic Victory]] for the Couslands. It becomes one for the PC if Alistair sacrifices himself out of love.

== Web Original ==

* The titular character of ''[[Doctor Horribles Sing Along Blog]]'' gets, in his own words, everything he ever wanted: respect as a villain, entrance into the elite Evil League of Evil, and the defeat of his nemesis. However, it costs him {{spoiler|the life of the only woman he's ever loved before he's even been able to tell her how he feels.}}

** Not to mention {{spoiler|her last words}}. Can you imagine any satisfaction in his "victory" at all after something like that?