Agreed, here. It's sadly impossible to play this game as a pacifist, which, to me, is one of the marks of a great game: where every single fight is a moral choice, rather than a requirement.
Far better a measurement of a great game than "Seconds to Crate" is "Encounters to Required Kill". For ED, this is pretty darn high, probably about 40 or so: you don't need to kill any goblins in the training level, and you can talk to everyone in the village. However, several "main questline" quests require a fight, and in order to become powerful enough to do any damage in those fights, you need to have done lots more fighting.
Maybe "a great game" give the choice like you said but... I don't think the story give that choice. You've been trained when you was a little boy (ten years old) for fight and kill (dragons but not only)... You're a soldier and became a dragon knight... And want to be pacifist? I never see pacifist-soldiers or pacifist-knight so for me it's a non-sense. In truth, other than simulations, I never seen games without a need of fight(s)... Maybe I'm wrong...
