Making Fey scary, mysterious, and wacky

[4th number]

I've got a hankerin' to run a fey-heavy campaign (probably in meatspace), and I'm looking for a good spin on the Fair Folk.

I really dug Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell (an excellent book), and the depiction of the world of the fairies-- alien, abnormal, and linked to the "real" world in unpredictable ways.

When the PCs realize they're dealing with a fairy (after the first time), they should be at least concerned. Any given fey is likely to be essentially a magical sociopath-- possibly hedonistic, possibly violent, possibly friendly for reasons of their own. A minor fey should be profoundly irritating, and hard to kill even if they decide they should.

Got any thoughts?

[ArcturusV]

Sounds like you're on the right track. I don't like how most people split the fey into Seelie/Unseelie, then describe the Seelie as "GOOD" and Unseelie as "EVIL".

Now... an interesting spin might be drawing from the Lorwyn setting. In there Fairies, among other things, are also responsible for dreams/nightmares. If their first contact with the Fey Folk is basically a minor fairy that has been giving them night terrors every night... that might scare them. In fact I'd run it in such a way that each "nightmare" scene is RPed out, give no indication that it IS "just a dream" though allow things to be twisted and weird in ways that Dream Logic promotes. If they die in a dream or otherwise suffer, they'll wake up but take something like temporary Wis/Int/Cha damage (Significant enough to matter, like 3-6). After a few such Nightmare sessions they find out the Fairy is responsible... and THAT puts the fear of them. Especially if that Fey can cast a Sleep spell on them...

[4th number]

That's pretty good. I might just replace the Feywild with a literal dreamworld. You go there in your dreams, but that's not the only way to get there.

[Khaelic]

Personally, I just finished reading "The Sword of Albion" by Mark Chadbourn, and their fey were depicted as evil creatures that were trying to subjugate the world of men. I found the entire atmosphere very intriguing and mysterious and I am endeavoring to create an adequate template to allow these types of creatures in my homebrew.

The methods that I found that Chadbourn used were that they abducted people, appeared on the fringes of society, and created an air of open hostility and unclear borders between safe territory and territory where they would terrorise the population. Indeed, there may not even be such a territory.

[oxybe]

just portray them as alien, but familiar.

many fae have human-like characteristics, like the basic body shape and an expressive face. this, and their small and oft-whimsical nature makes them seem inoffensive and cute if you only see them or interact with them in short bursts. they're "quirky".

but then you spend a few days with them and the notion of cute turns on itself into disturbing.

fey, while small and fragile, are still supernatural creatures. they're tougher then they look and what a faerie might see as a "prank" being played on a human could end up with breaking the guy's leg, or worse, killing him.

and hey, since they live for hundreds of years, borrowing a human babe from it's cradle to help with the upcoming ceremonies of the fae queen's wedding for the next few decades won't hurt anyone, as they're rather small compared to an adult, so they're the perfect size.

they have their own sets of codes and laws, never written anywhere but simply understood by all of their kind. a harmless or even kind gesture made by a human might be seen as a slight by a fey and could result in a man's life being ruined as his businesses go up in flames, his companions shun him, his lovers flee from his sight and is forced to be a hermit in the forest domain of his tormentors.

on the other side what fae value might be completely different from our own. they might like gold and sliver coins for it's shine but it's value to them is reduces as it has odd faces etched in them, but a glass bauble, stained so it glows many different colors when hit with light and hung on a string to be spun? that's instant status symbol, right there as it's not often found in the fae kingdom. it'll be something they can prattle on about for quite a while. they might view any openly displayed iron as an insult (weapons to mean hostility and armor a lack of trust).

some are extremely compulsive, others relentless, some are vicious and others seems nearly mindless. some are all at one and others might vary, depending on the day of the week. for us it might seem random and weird, but for the fay we're the odd ones.

[valadil]

The only fey I've been able to take seriously are the ones in Dresden Files. I don't think they show up till book 4 though.

[Friv]

I would say quietly create seven rules, each of which notes that something is "good" and something is "bad". Perhaps music is good but singing is wrong. A smile shows that you are inferior to the person you are smiling at, while a frown denotes superiority.

Don't explain any of the rules to the players, and make them all something a little odd that will create odd social cues. The fae grows increasingly angry if the players frown, but if they smile it starts treating them as servants and if they switch between smiles and frowns a lot it gets confused and upset. Make sure that the rules don't interact with each other in obvious ways, and that none of them are things that normal people believe, and then use them without telling anyone, and you should get some odd social encounters going.

[Gavinfoxx]

Dresden Files do a fantastic writeup of fey... second reading the books in that series with Fey in them...

[Grod_The_Giant]

I would say quietly create seven rules, each of which notes that something is "good" and something is "bad". Perhaps music is good but singing is wrong. A smile shows that you are inferior to the person you are smiling at, while a frown denotes superiority.

Don't explain any of the rules to the players, and make them all something a little odd that will create odd social cues. The fae grows increasingly angry if the players frown, but if they smile it starts treating them as servants and if they switch between smiles and frowns a lot it gets confused and upset. Make sure that the rules don't interact with each other in obvious ways, and that none of them are things that normal people believe, and then use them without telling anyone, and you should get some odd social encounters going.

Ooh, that's cool, I like that.

The Nightside series, by Simon R. Greene (along with all its shared-universe series, like the Drood books) is pretty consistent in depicting fey as inhuman psychopaths.

[phlidwsn]

Ooh, that's cool, I like that.

The Nightside series, by Simon R. Greene (along with all its shared-universe series, like the Drood books) is pretty consistent in depicting fey as inhuman psychopaths.

Shadows Fall has a whole section set in the court of the Fey of that universe.

[FreakyCheeseMan]

In my universe, Fey are actually time travelers who jumped forward past the destruction of their own society- but said destruction was so catastrophic that it messed them up, even time-jumping past it.

The damage made them kind of crazy, and the time travel already gives them a very weird perspective- they encounter events out of order, and don't really get the fact that, to humans, events are certain and permanent, rather than things they can go back and change later.

This might also give you an easy way to freak the players out- have them meet the same Fey twice, out of order. The first time, the Fey says something along the lines of "You! Not you again! The last time we met, an entire city burned down!", or some other horrible event.

Some time after that, the party learns about the Time-Travel thing - and the next time they meet that particular Fey, they know the catastrophe is coming soon.

Depending on how rail-roady your plot is, you could get away with a lot of this- Fey hunting the players for things they haven't done yet, Fey with ornaments they made out of the party's equipment after besting them in some future encounter, stuff like that.

[kieza]

All of my fey are dangerous and unpredictable--the only difference is in the method to their madness. Spring-Summer/Seelie fey will hurt you for emotional reasons: you wore a color they hate, frowned on their birthday, or declined to eat with them. Autumn-Winter/Unseelie fey will hurt you for calculating reasons: they like a ring that you're wearing, or they collect teeth, or just because some other fey will owe them a favor for killing you.

The thing is, all fey are mercurial by human standards. Seelie fey will kill you over the slightest insult, and Unseelie fey will kill you for the slightest net gain, and more importantly, they don't attach much importance to past interactions with you. No matter how friendly you've been with a Seelie, or how much gain you've brought an Unseelie, the moment something goes wrong, you're fair game to them.

On top of all that, all fey have an intrinsic nature that they're compelled to obey. A lot of things are universal, like the vulnerability to cold iron (which is a psychological, not physical, weakness) and inability to tell a direct falsehood. Others are specific: pixies can't eat anything but milk, bread or honey. Trolls really like bridges and hate goats. Redcaps need to keep their headgear freshly dyed in blood. The high Sidhe can't accept a gift without giving an equal one in return or owing the gift-giver a favor. And so on and so forth. It's not a choice that they make, they aren't even aware of any compulsion--they just can't conceive of being or acting any other way.

[tbok1992]

I know I keep mentioning this movie on the forums, but if you want to do something different with the asthetics of the Fae, take a look at the film Forbidden Zone. The inhabitants of the Sixth Dimention are very feylike, in that they are insane, fickle, and very much musical, but their asthetics take less from the Brian Froud/European Myth model that everybody else seems to use, and more from old Fleischer cartoons.

Plus, Danny Elfman's sequence as The Devil should be watched by anybody wanting to have their players make a bargain with the Fae.

[ExtravagantEvil]

The way I've been trying to structure my fey, and is an ongoing project of mine which has yet to see completion, and was up for a spell on the World Building forums, was the idea that Fey are absolutely different.
Beyond human understanding, and much more like eerily familiar Eldritch Abominations than beings comprehensible.

That was because they are very much akin to Dr.Manhattan, in the sense of them being essentially Sentient Magical Quantum events, able to control to varying degrees what makes up the bulk of their comprehension, and basing their mentalities on that. This is made with D&D 3.5 in mind, mind you.

Dryads, for instance, had lots of control over nature and, to a limited degree, people. Specifically, their ability to control and truly connect with things diminished as they grew more intelligent (plants>animals>people), and they live in a very provincial environment, and are very fixated on what is in that environment. Hence, they had this weird system where it can only, in it's eyes, comprehend simple creatures because it determines cognizance by what it can control. Very much a teenage girl stereotype extended beyond it's typical scope. However, it took the form of slow to grow and age trees.

Hence: It has an odd mixture of not enjoying sentience and disruptions to its control, for that is all it truly knew, and never can understand the complexities of people, while relatively tolerating the elderly more.



This demonstration goes to show my theory on developing fey as interesting antagonists. Make them not just wild and hedonistic. Painstakingly set out their logic, and make it at times, seemingly contradictory due to insignificant details. Look at the fey, it's mythos, or the mythos you give it, and the assumptions on fey existence, and draw them out to weird ends that make some degree of sense, but are not at all instinctive. Creating the same weird social cues, but at the same time, making it hard for PC's to judge how the fey responds without studying it extensively.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

The only fey I've been able to take seriously are the ones in Dresden Files. I don't think they show up till book 4 though.


Dresden Files do a fantastic writeup of fey... second reading the books in that series with Fey in them...
Oh yeah. I'm reading through the latest book (which is inundated with the Fey), and....yes. Otherworldly beings with their own concerns, far above mortals, and largely puzzled by their behavior. A lot of stuff about balance (thus the need for contracts).

Also, it goes to show that Summer's domain of life and sunshine isn't always happy and good. After all, "life" is the force behind disease...

[North_Ranger]

That no one has yet to mention Changeling: The Lost is mind-boggling. You want the fae to be scary as all hell? Take a look at this nWoD setting, where the player characters are all escaped victims of fae abductions, physically and mentally scarred, not quite human anymore due to exposure to the weird physics of Arcadia.

[4th number]

I know I keep mentioning this movie on the forums, but if you want to do something different with the asthetics of the Fae, take a look at the film Forbidden Zone. The inhabitants of the Sixth Dimention are very feylike, in that they are insane, fickle, and very much musical, but their asthetics take less from the Brian Froud/European Myth model that everybody else seems to use, and more from old Fleischer cartoons.

Plus, Danny Elfman's sequence as The Devil should be watched by anybody wanting to have their players make a bargain with the Fae.

I have seen this movie. The Zone's inhabitants being Fae-like hadn't occurred to me, but it really makes a lot of sense.

[GFawkes]

That no one has yet to mention Changeling: The Lost is mind-boggling. You want the fae to be scary as all hell? Take a look at this nWoD setting, where the player characters are all escaped victims of fae abductions, physically and mentally scarred, not quite human anymore due to exposure to the weird physics of Arcadia.

I saw this thread, and came here to say exactly this. It's very easy to make the fey be a horrific experience. Maybe have characters not think anything of what's going on while they're with a fey, but when they remember it later, they remember things that were just disturbing, like how the meat they had didn't taste like any previous meat they've had or how bone was used in place of metal/stone.

One example I can give is a character I made once for C:tL. While he escaped just fine, he had memories that refused to die about what happened to him. The biggest expression of this was when he appeared to get ready to attack the party, then lunged at some creature that wasn't there.

On that note, there's some great material that could be considered fey in the SCP Foundation, SCP-870 in particular.

[Flickerdart]

Pratchett's elves are a very good portrayal of scary fey, if you're familiar with Discworld. And if not, then you have some homework for the next few weeks.

[Mono Vertigo]

To expand on C:tL's Fae, their realm is basically a place where physics don't apply, and you literally have to make contracts and agreements with everything to just keep on existing somehow. If you don't, fire won't warm you, water won't quench your thirst, food won't nourish you. When you escape, you still think in contracts. To regain a sense of trust, you have to forge pacts and deals with others, else you just fear they will betray you at the first occasion. You'll always have to give one thing for another. You can no longer see the world in a logical and orderly way. Not even the laws you thought immutable can be taken for granted.
That's how Fae live. They can only live if they're conflict with one another, as a way to define themselves, but they also can't hurt each other without agreements. They kidnap humans for fun, often invoking obscure rules and disrespected laws. They operate on Kafkaesque logic: if they catch you, you deserved it, though you won't know why you deserved it, and they will catch you.
They're, basically, children who have not yet gone past the stage where they think they're the only real being in existence. And because they operate on completely different rules, they have the means of considering all non-Fae as their toys. If they can't get what they want, they'll just need to make the proper agreements with the relevant concepts.

[Seharvepernfan]

Well, I think you might be interested in this (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=258659).

[FreakyCheeseMan]

So, to expound a bit more on my Fey (Because I think they're weird and scary. Or at least I hope they are.)

In mine, Fey are the survivors of an apocalypse that predated human society - and as such, they're used to a much different standard of what the universe is. Things like "Death", "Individuality" and "Causality" are all foreign to them, as the society they came from conquered all of those long ago.

So, so far, think of them sort of like the residents of the Capitol during the hunger games- alien, frivolous and certain of their own superiority.

But, they're also time travelers, and do so rather freely- which gives them all kinds of skewed perspective. When someone dies - even someone they care about - it isn't *that* big a thing, cause they can always go back to a time when they were alive, and see them again. Also, time is (somewhat) mutable - so to a Fey, they may have seen events unfold in numerous ways, enough that reality just doesn't seem that important. City burned down? Oh well, maybe next it won't. The only things constant to an individual Fey are their own lives - which makes them very self-centered and unempathetic. If a Fey kills you, that's no big thing, cause that might change - but if you cause a Fey to chip a nail, that's something that will always have happened, so long as that version of them persists.

Fey in my universe have a city, Avalon, that they're all linked to by a complicated system of natural and artificial portals (Sort of like Sigil). Avalon itself was unbound in space and time, and traveled freely - until a few thousand years ago, when it was destroyed in a siege which they fey couldn't prevent. All Fey died at that siege- but, since they're time travelers, some of them haven't died *yet*. Their deaths are in their future, but the universe's past. Knowing how they died has given the race a kind of dangerous melancholy - both nihilism, in thinking that nothing matters since they and their city are doomed, but also a driving need for distractions. These distractions often come in the form of games, which mortals get caught up in.

[Gwyn chan 'r Gwyll]

My setting, they're a cosmological force, one of the worlds that are considered Otherworlds.

Each Otherworld has positive and negative traits, though some more obvious than others. The Angelic Realm is virtuous, yet also restricting and authoritarian. The Demonic Realm is the land of freedom, yet is also the land of ambition and cruel self-interest and oppression in the name of personal betterment. The Fey Realm? It's the land of beauty, but also the land of incomprehensibility. I decided that all the Otherworlds are infinite, and that all of the elemental planes of DnD were part of the Fey World.

In the history of my setting, the first empire that spanned the globe fell under the influence of a cabal of necromancers, who decided that the empire should invade the otherworlds. These nobles in the cabal convinced most of the other nobles and the emperor to create an army of undead to face the Hosts of the Others: the Wighthosts, to face the Angelhosts, the Demonhosts, and the Feyhosts. However, a group of the necromancers had turned themselves into liches, taken control of the armies, and then the empire turned into disastrous civil war, each against the other, entire armies of undead switching sides to the more powerful will. Eventually, one called the Blind King finally threw down the Capital and was about to cross the planar bridge, when the King of the Fey intervened.

It's the only time the Fey ever entered the world in force. And the collected army of decades of corpses from war, and some of the most powerful wizards ever to exist in the world. (though some say that the Blind King used the planar bridge to create his own Otherworld, a land of death and destruction, but at the moment it's just a rumour)

The Fey are considered the most powerful force. The King of the Fey is the only time they ever united under one banner, in direct opposition from the Angels and Demons, who are both almost always united (with brief periods of unrest as the next Archdemon tries to wrest power). I'm mostly inspired by the World of Darkness fey. In my mind, the Fey are this group of ridiculously powerful, and willful and impossible to comprehend. Mortal communication doesn't apply to them in the same way, especially non-verbal communication. A raised eyebrow might move one to tears, or move another to blows. Incredibly individualistic and unpredictable. Basically, they run under rules that are not POSSIBLY comprehensible by humans. So because I don't want any players to POSSIBLY understand how they act, I won't know the rules either. Because if I can comprehend it, then so can they.

Edit: Oh, also I would think that Lovecraftian type horror is something similar to the feeling I want to get of the Fey, specifically the sense that the mortal world is so beneath them, the idea of incomprehensibility. Not so much the "we want to devour the world" though.

[Ravens_cry]

The scary thing about fey is that even the ones trying to be helpful are very alien and may not help you in a way that is actually helpful. Be very cautious, choose your words carefully, and be very ,very careful not to insult anyone. The humblest creature might be a might elf king.
Careless travellers who have joined a fairy ring dancing have been known to dance for decades unaware, and that is the nicer things that can happen.
If you make a promise, always keep your word. You can never, ever assume you are out of earshot of listening ear, and even the kindest faeries vengeance is terrible. Fay are masters of glamour, so be double beware of their gifts, though always appear grateful.

[Flickerdart]

The humblest creature might be a might elf king.
Humble fey? Now I've heard everything.

[Novawurmson]

Working on scary fey for a campaign of my own. The thing I'm focusing on (inspired by some WotC articles (https://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/arch/fey)) is that fey don't see humanoids as sentient creatures on the same level as them. Fey would kill a human the way a human would pick a flower. Fey like humans in the way a human likes a spider they see on their windowsill. They have no compunction about, say, stripping the flesh off of two different humanoids and reattaching them to the other bodies, because that's hilarious. And nobody's getting hurt! Well, nobody that matters.

[Marillion]

7th Sea's take on the Goodly Folk, particularly the Seelie, is that they are entirely unhuman beings...playing at being human. They give themselves titles because they rather like the sound of them, and because humans have them so why shouldn't the fey? Thus are born The Lord of Eastern Winds, Duke of Sunsets, or Lady of The Lake. Ritual is extremely important to them; if everything isn't just *so* they will become enraged at the offending element for daring to ruin the scene. They emulate the extremes of human emotions, so while a Fey may be a wildly devoted lover (for the time that you catch their fancy), god help you if you decide to break up with them. They act out roles that seem romantic or interesting to them; one Sidhe is a major NPC who has taken on the role of chivalrous knight, and his deeds are celebrated throughout the land of Avalon for his astounding deeds. Being mostly immortal, they will often stage pitched, fierce battles wherein they commit acts of savagery against each other so heinous as to make the most hardened warrior blush, playing dead if they are struck, and then simply stand up and walk away afterwards, wondering why their human "friends" aren't doing the same. Beware their gifts; A Fey cannot receive a gift without reciprocating something of at least equal value, and expect mortals to do the same. And every last one of them have powers beyond the ken of all but the most exceptional humans.

The Unseelie are just as inhuman, but less subtle about it, and more likely to just plain kill you. And every last one of them have powers beyond the ken of all but the most exceptional humans.

There's a reason why the supplement devoted to the Sidhe is called the Book of Nightmares.

Another good take I enjoyed is the Fey character in The Name of the Wind and The Wise Man's Fear by Patrick Rothfuss. He is at turns whimsical and terrifying, beholden to rules we can only guess at. Some appropriate quotes that capture him perfectly:


"You see, there's a fundamental connection between seeming and being. Every Fae child knows this, but you mortals never seem to see. We understand how dangerous a mask can be. We all become what we pretend to be....You meet a girl: shy, unassuming. If you tell her she's beautiful, she'll think you're sweet, but she won't believe you. She knows that beauty lies in your beholding....And sometimes that's enough."
"But there's a better way. You show her she is beautiful. You make mirrors of your eyes, prayers of your hands against her body. It is hard, very hard, but when she truly believes you.....Suddenly the story she tells herself in her own head changes. She transforms. She isn't seen as beautiful. She is beautiful, seen."

"So you're saying I work for you?"
"I'm saying you belong to me. Down to the marrow of your bones. I drew you here to serve my purpose. You have eaten at my table, and I have saved your life. Three ways I own you. That makes you wholly mine. An instrument of my desire. You will do as I say."

"Hear my words, manling. Do not mistake me for my mask. You see light dappling on the water and forget the deep, cold dark beneath." The tendons in Bast's hand creaked as he tightened his grip on the circle of iron. "Listen. You cannot hurt me. You cannot run or hide. In this I will not be defied."

"I swear by all the salt in me: if you run counter to my desire, the remainder of your brief mortal span will be an orchestra of misery. I swear by stone and oak and elm: I'll make a game of you. I'll follow you unseen and smother any spark of joy you find..."

Bast's eyes were now the pale blue-white of lightning, his voice tight and fierce. "And I swear by the night sky and the ever-moving moon: If you lead my master to despair, I will slit you open and splash around like a child in a muddy puddle.

Bast leaned closer until their faces were mere inches apart, his eyes gone white as opal, white as a full-bellied moon. “You are an educated man. You know there are no such things as demons." Bast smiled a terrible smile. "There is only my kind." Bast leaned closer still, Chronicler smelled flowers on his breath. "You are not wise enough to fear me as I should be feared. You do not know the first note of the music that moves me."

"Listen, there's no reason we can't be friends.

[Zahhak]

On the note of a Dreamscape, I think there's some official literature on it in Manual of the Planes and Heroes of Horror. H.P. Lovecraft wrote quite a bit that takes place in dreams of unknowable horrors, if that's your thing. A list of those stories can be found here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreamlands). There's also A Nightmare on Elm Street for that. Waking Life deals with dreams, but is kind of high-brow. Inception is a biggie, as a lot of research was done by the writer to make it as realistic as possible (in the sense of how dream mechanics work). Vertigo's The Sandman deals a lot with dreams and dreamscapes.

I'm going to say that if you decide to deal with nightmares, I would definitely atleast read about Lovecraft, even if you don't read the man himself (his writing style is irritating to a lot of people). I suggest him because his various gods and monsters are perfect abberations to place in a nightmare. On that note, I'm going to list some episodes of Doctor Who that I think are relevant:
The Empty Child/The Doctor Dances
The Idiot's Lantern
42
Blink*
Silence in the Library/Forest of the Dead
Midnight
Night Terrors
God Complex

* The Weeping Angels return in The Time of Angels/Flesh and Stone which is less relevant, but good, and again in The Angels Take Manhattan, that I feel severely breaks the original flow

Alot of the other stories are good, especially the 6th season overall (gotta love The Silence)

There are some anime which I think might be somewhat useful for the Dreamscape or Fae theme, like Bleach, Soul Eater, and Yu Yu Hakusho.

I'm sure I have a lot more possible suggestions, but its 2am and I am really freaking tired. Sleepy time now.

Also, this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eToXpKxN_xQ) is obligatory posting in any thread that involves dreams.

[Ravens_cry]

Humble fey? Now I've heard everything.
You obviously have never heard stories of three brothers looking for something, two of whom refuse to share with an old beggar and wind up losing out because of it.

[kieza]

Another way of playing up the otherness of the fey is with the strangeness of the actual realm of Faerie.

My version has nonlinear, infinitely recursive geography. You can find mountain ranges that look like small hills from the outside but turn out to be Himalayas when you actually try to cross them. And in said mountain ranges you might find a forested valley bigger than the mountains looked from the outside, containing a river wider than the entire valley itself once you start swimming. And most bizarre, following that river may land you outside the entire range of mountains without even leaving the valley.

The entire realm of Faerie is like this; it's an actual globe-shaped world with apparently finite area, but it's...nested...like those russian dolls, and it's hard to find, let alone access, a lot of it.

[Doxkid]

It would help to establish the linearity by which humans perceive the world makes no sense to them.

Human-
Event A causes Event B which causes Event C.

Fey-
I once met an Event C. Dreadful fellow; his crumpets looked sideways in nineteen. Lucky I had my hatchet or Event A has three lines while I whisper in purple.

B? You shall not speak of my mother as such!

-----
The two ways I rune them are:
--
Overexposure to causal processes makes them, by their standards, a little insane. Having to do something so something else happens, not because you felt like tasting four o' clock, is a combination between living out Groundhog's Day and playing a game that railroads you with "But thy must!...but thy must!" events.

--

Alternately, everything they ever have and ever will experience shares a place in their mind all at once. They KNOW you're going to stab them for it, but they steal your hat and smack your horse anyway.

Because you're going to stab them for doing it they are a jerk to you, and thus steal your hat and smack your horse. Which is why you stab them, proving them right. Which is why they are a jerk to you, causing them to steal your hat and smack your horse. In turn...

In the same way you remember your past, they 'remember' the past, present and future. That influences them to make decisions and perform actions that make no sense.

What little they don't have control over that can influence/alter their future (and they get to watch the future alter before and after you change it) is like some kind of miracle to them.