NPCs and Wizard Trolling

[Donutfiend84]

I have a player in one of my games, who is notoriously difficult for me to role play reactions for. He is playing a wizard, and is just passing level 12. The character is a walking ego, and often uses his fairly formidable power just to troll NPCs.

I use the word troll, because his goal isn't to play harmless pranks on friends, or seek actual harm or vengeance, but just because it is funny to him to mock, be petty, or generally be annoying to NPCs.

Thus far, it's been fine. A low level character who is all talk can be genuinely endearing. But as he's gained more and more power, it starts feeling more like a super powered child at best, or an high school bully at worst. (Since it's less and less likely the average NPC could make him stop)

His actions aren't hostile. I think he just likes making people look silly. (ex. The guard captain explaining why he can't open the town gates after dark and the wizard conjures a fly buzzing around his face trying to annoy him, or using mage hand to mess up someones hair while claiming mocking ignorance)

He's not hurting anything except the tone of the moment. I'm just not sure what to do with his character, nor am I really sure how people would respond to being magically messed with in benign ways. Magic is not common in this setting, but it's far from unknown.

What ways might various people/monsters/etc respond? I've not really run a game with a prankster illusionist so I'm pretty stumped on how different people handle this outside of "Ignore it" or "Murder the source." It's worth noting we stick to a reasonably serious setting. (Not overly so, but far from a comedic or cartoon-like world. Rule of funny is rarely in effect)

[PhoenixPhyre]

I have a player in one of my games, who is notoriously difficult for me to role play reactions for. He is playing a wizard, and is just passing level 12. The character is a walking ego, and often uses his fairly formidable power just to troll NPCs.

I use the word troll, because his goal isn't to play harmless pranks on friends, or seek actual harm or vengeance, but just because it is funny to him to mock, be petty, or generally be annoying to NPCs.

Thus far, it's been fine. A low level character who is all talk can be genuinely endearing. But as he's gained more and more power, it starts feeling more like a super powered child at best, or an high school bully at worst. (Since it's less and less likely the average NPC could make him stop)

His actions aren't hostile. I think he just likes making people look silly. (ex. The guard captain explaining why he can't open the town gates after dark and the wizard conjures a fly buzzing around his face trying to annoy him, or using mage hand to mess up someones hair while claiming mocking ignorance)

He's not hurting anything except the tone of the moment. I'm just not sure what to do with his character, nor am I really sure how people would respond to being magically messed with in benign ways. Magic is not common in this setting, but it's far from unknown.

What ways might various people/monsters/etc respond? I've not really run a game with a prankster illusionist so I'm pretty stumped on how different people handle this outside of "Ignore it" or "Murder the source." It's worth noting we stick to a reasonably serious setting. (Not overly so, but far from a comedic or cartoon-like world. Rule of funny is rarely in effect)

One partial solution (in-universe) is to make sure you're enforcing spell components. Verbal ones. If the guard's explaining and he audibly, in a normal tone casts a spell and his visible mage hand messes with someone, they're gonna notice and get pissed.

Alternatively, talk to the player OOC and let him know he's being disruptive.

[GorogIrongut]

People would be pissed. In a low magic setting, spell casting would be viewed similar to how we view someone pulling out a gun. We may not aim the gun at anyone. We may not even shoot it. But it would put everyone on edge and would lead to repercussions.

Repercussions I would include in my games:
1. You would find waiter revenge occurring. This player would become notorious and be served trouser food regularly. He wouldn't be able to eat without it having someone's 'spit' in it.
2. He could automatically have disadvantage on most social interactions, because word would have gotten around that he was a douche nozzle.
3. If he pushes it too far, I can well imagine someone thinking that turnabout is fair play. This would be an illusionist mage who's main goal in life would be to make this player doubt reality... or to spend every round of every day investigating things to see if they're an illusion. He wouldn't eat any food that didn't taste of something repugnant.
4.These would occur in levels of increasing severity and would decrease level by level depending on how many good deeds he performed to redeem his 'good name'.

[Easy_Lee]

Talking to the player seems like the best bet, but my inner troll desires to see him interact with an anti-magic templar. Suppose an NPC has detect magic cast, can clearly see what he's doing, and isn't amused. Suppose the character gets smote with the nearest chair or candlestick.

Incidentally, any world with magic is bound to have laws about this sort of thing

[Donutfiend84]

That all seems to make sense. I hadn't considered magic as comparable with waving a weapon around, but that makes perfect sense in a civilized area. He still does it to enemy mobs and villains, but at least it doesn't feel like PC bullying at that point. I appreciate the ideas.

[Aett_Thorn]

Just one good guard that has some some of magic-induced rage reaction might get him to stop. I mean, you pull out the old "imaginary fly" trick on this guard, and he all of a sudden goes into a berserker rage on the wizard before he knows what's happening, and it might get him to stop his antics.

[smcmike]

Good question.

I'd try my best to take his trolling seriously and provide realistic responses. This is different from purposefully trying to shut his schtick down. If he wants to play a bully, that's his prerogative, to some extent.

As to what the realistic response is, I would err on the side of a strong response. A guard who is messed with by magic may become angry, or scared, or some combination of the two. Sometimes this might be useful - if he is trying to intimidate the guard, you might give some bonus on the check for this sort of aggression. More often, it will just get in his way, and eventually it may be fatal. Ruffle the hair of the stable boy, and he might feed your horse beans for an odorous ride the next day. Ruffle the hair of a powerful NPC, even a potential ally, and he might just teach you a lesson.

[Cakeking]

If a guard captain was explaining something to the party, and their spellcaster said something, made a hand symbol and the captain's hair rustled, the party would be surrounded very quickly with guards and possibly arrested.

Magic is pretty spooky to non spellcasters if you think about it, and a guard captain at night? he's probably on edge when a group of people with super powers show up in the middle of the night.

Could they slaughter your whole town? ya...maybe, they might have no problem at all leaving the town a bloody wasteland with children urinating themselves in the piles of their families corpses....but would they? probably not. Let this guy screw something up BIG once, and they will put him in line.

If you are opposed to having them surrounded and arrested you can go light and simply have the guard tell them they aren't welcome in town, and if they need to go in they will have to sneak in...or charm the guards...or apologize, really any form of real roleplaying and problem solving.

In my game, the rogue got lippy with guard captain, he had a tail for the rest of his stay in that town. I told him out of game that he can't just talk to people however he wants and there wont be repercussions, he outed himself as a troublemaker and was treated like a troublemaker...if your wizard outs himself as a pest, i would have the guards treat him like a pest.

I keep a reputation for my party, like what the people who met they and dealt with them told others about them, and word spreads. by lvl 12, unless they are constantly moving and never revisiting places people KNOW who they are. If things go missing when your group rolls into towns, shops will start closing early, guards will tail them. If barfights are common, bar wont serve them. LvL 12 is around when the PC's are like superheroes(or supervillians) in terms of raw power. The things they do are great, a mummylord can be a curse on an entire region, and ur party could defeat it with effort. So if one of these demi-gods among mortals is pulling annoying and degrading pranks on figures worthy of respect using power most people have never seen...people gonna be nervous, if they hang around the area for long, maybe have a death cult form who thinks they are dangerous and seeks to kill them by sabotaging their supplies when they go out to kill mosters.

TL;DR PUNISH THE WHOLE PARTY FOR THE ONE SOUR APPLE!!

[Unoriginal]

At best, people would simply refuse to interact with the guy. Won't let him go in their homes/workplace/town, and won't accept to sell him things without massively increasing the price.

At worse they'll see a mage casting a spell as a threat.

Also, if there is a wizard guild or academy or the like in the region, he will get blacklisted pretty quick and maybe have someone be sent after him to investigate that kind of bullying.

[Tetrasodium]

I have a player in one of my games, who is notoriously difficult for me to role play reactions for. He is playing a wizard, and is just passing level 12. The character is a walking ego, and often uses his fairly formidable power just to troll NPCs.

I use the word troll, because his goal isn't to play harmless pranks on friends, or seek actual harm or vengeance, but just because it is funny to him to mock, be petty, or generally be annoying to NPCs.

Thus far, it's been fine. A low level character who is all talk can be genuinely endearing. But as he's gained more and more power, it starts feeling more like a super powered child at best, or an high school bully at worst. (Since it's less and less likely the average NPC could make him stop)

His actions aren't hostile. I think he just likes making people look silly. (ex. The guard captain explaining why he can't open the town gates after dark and the wizard conjures a fly buzzing around his face trying to annoy him, or using mage hand to mess up someones hair while claiming mocking ignorance)

He's not hurting anything except the tone of the moment. I'm just not sure what to do with his character, nor am I really sure how people would respond to being magically messed with in benign ways. Magic is not common in this setting, but it's far from unknown.

What ways might various people/monsters/etc respond? I've not really run a game with a prankster illusionist so I'm pretty stumped on how different people handle this outside of "Ignore it" or "Murder the source." It's worth noting we stick to a reasonably serious setting. (Not overly so, but far from a comedic or cartoon-like world. Rule of funny is rarely in effect)


Talk to him. If that fails, make one of his victims an ashbound druid (http://eberron.wikia.com/wiki/Ashbound) who's now hell bent on destroying his spellbook & then murdering him.

[Donutfiend84]

Let this guy screw something up BIG once, and they will put him in line.

This did happen once in fact:

While exploring an empty temple to a powerful entity of the elemental plane of water, they found themselves in a dangerous position. A secret passage turned into a one way trip to the lowest levels of the temple. To add more to the tension, it turns out on of the players knew more about this temple then they were telling, and was keeping secrets. While that player futilely tried to explain, they hear a single voice echoing through the chamber, chuckling, then laughing at the exchange. It seems to be originating from each still surface of water in the room.

The players all dive into defensive poses. The wizard announces he is going to laugh back in Ignan. (The language of fire based creatures) When the party turned on him for antagonizing the thing, he wound up spending the rest of the session trying to make the case that he wasn't being 'mocking', and his reaction was totally innocent.

He dialed it back a bit after that, but it shows he doesn't do these things because he is trying to ruin the game. He just thinks it will be funny, and gets defensive when they are met with open hostility, insisting it wasn't THAT bad/rude/annoying. He doesn't do it as much now.

I've noticed it's most often a stress reaction. During tense moments, I'm more likely to see a mood killing outburst. (Which is a bit annoying as the story teller, but hey, what can you do.) I think those moments might be a good time for an OOC conversation. "In a life or death situation, at the big bad's mercy, you are going to start singing him a song about tavern wenches? Just... because?" (An actual example. He wound up taking an Empyrean's bolt attack for the effort) That action is not necessarily bad, when done with purpose. I thought it was used pretty well at the end of the first guardians of the galaxy movie.

[Easy_Lee]

I've noticed it's most often a stress reaction. During tense moments, I'm more likely to see a mood killing outburst.

He sounds like Krillin from Dragon Ball Z Abridged. Maybe he just needs to read a humor book and work on his presentation skills. Toastmasters might be a good time investment.

[imanidiot]

If you are opposed to having them surrounded and arrested you can go light and simply have the guard tell them they aren't welcome in town, and if they need to go in they will have to sneak in...or charm the guards...or apologize, really any form of real roleplaying and problem solving.


TL;DR PUNISH THE WHOLE PARTY FOR THE ONE SOUR APPLE!!

I'd have the guards let the party into town, EXCEPT the wizard. He can sit outside the gates and make snarky comments until tje rest of the group is ready to leave.

[Safety Sword]

The God(s) of Trickery might take notice of high level tricksters and have a hand in keeping them busy and/or tastes of the medicine they are fond of dispensing?

[Potato_Priest]

The God(s) of Trickery might take notice of high level tricksters and have a hand in keeping them busy and/or tastes of the medicine they are fond of dispensing?

Or they might approve of his conduct and seek him as a follower. Perhaps his behavior is noticed and appreciated by a cleric of trickery, who invites him to a church service. Once there, it is apparent that almost everyone behaves like him. People mess up his hair, pee in his drinks, or just attempt to make him seem pathetic rather than a powerful mage. If he gets angry, it's all in good fun: just cutting the new guy down to size, after all.