How to provoke people?

[Jenesis]

I'm on the 'bad people' quest in Balmora, and I've already dished out over 1000gp to clear my bounty after killing just 2 of them. I've been told you can provoke people into attacking you without breaking the law. How does this work? I can't afford to spend any more on clearing my name - there just aren't enough shops in town to rob!

[Nalle]

Originally posted by turkaholic:

I'm on the 'bad people' quest in Balmora, and I've already dished out over 1000gp to clear my bounty after killing just 2 of them. I've been told you can provoke people into attacking you without breaking the law. How does this work? I can't afford to spend any more on clearing my name - there just aren't enough shops in town to rob!

You need speechcraft of about 30 for any hopes of this happening.

Go to persuasion, taunt. If they don't attak you, repeat. Once the disposition is down, bribe them (you'll get the money back), and keep taunting. Do this until they eventually attack, then kill them in self defence (no bounty), and loot the money you just used to bribe them. May require thousands of gold even on higher speechcraft levels, but you can get all the gold back.

[Shadow]

Easiest (but also lamest) way to do this is to learn the frenzy humanoid spell. Then go to a spellmaker and create a magnitude 100 frenzy humanoid for 1s on touch/target spell. You will need some skill in illusion to cast it, but it makes them attack you, allowing you to fight them without penalty.

[Nalle]

Originally posted by Shadow:

Easiest (but also lamest) way to do this is to learn the frenzy humanoid spell. Then go to a spellmaker and create a magnitude 100 frenzy humanoid for 1s on touch/target spell. You will need some skill in illusion to cast it, but it makes them attack you, allowing you to fight them without penalty.

Nope..?
Casting the Frenzy Humanoid at someone is also considered a crime, since you attach him/her with the spell.

[Shadow]

It is not considered a crime, as it only alters their fight stat. The spell forces their fight to 100 for 1s, making them hostile to everyone. Although the spell only lasts for 1s, they stay in combat with whoever they went hostile to until you cast calm on them.

[$n@ke Eye$]

I try to use potions of personality when attempting to provoke someone. You can generally stack 3 potions to give yourself over 100 personality, then just line up the two windows so that it is easier to just spam taunt.

Using personality potions in this way is also a great way to increase your speechcraft skill too. After consuming 3 personality potions, just line up the windows and spam admire on a random NPC.

[Jenesis]

Thanks for all your advice everyone! I spammed them with taunts and whooped their Dunmer asses. The Council Club is a lot more... er... quiet now.

[Nalle]

Originally posted by turkaholic:

Thanks for all your advice everyone! I spammed them with taunts and whooped their Dunmer asses. The Council Club is a lot more... er... quiet now.

You only killed Dunmer?

GUARDS, KILL THIS RACIST OUTLANDER!

[Werewolf]

Originally posted by turkaholic:

Thanks for all your advice everyone! I spammed them with taunts and whooped their Dunmer asses. The Council Club is a lot more... er... quiet now.

You N'wah!

Anyway, Frenzy Humanoid is a non-combat spell despite being offensive in nature. Thus you can get away with casting it on someone you really want to take out of the picture in a legal way. Many people consider this a cheesey spell but it gets results.

Taunting is another method as previously mentioned. It, however, can take a significant amount of bribery and time to pull off.

[󠀡󠀡󠀡󠀡󠀡󠀡]

I though Larrius Varro removes your bounty after you killed them all as a part of bad people quest.

[DerEider]

Originally posted by DubstepPotato187:

Originally posted by turkaholic:

I'm on the 'bad people' quest in Balmora, and I've already dished out over 1000gp to clear my bounty after killing just 2 of them. I've been told you can provoke people into attacking you without breaking the law. How does this work? I can't afford to spend any more on clearing my name - there just aren't enough shops in town to rob!

You need speechcraft of about 30 for any hopes of this happening.

Go to persuasion, taunt. If they don't attak you, repeat. Once the disposition is down, bribe them (you'll get the money back), and keep taunting. Do this until they eventually attack, then kill them in self defence (no bounty), and loot the money you just used to bribe them. May require thousands of gold even on higher speechcraft levels, but you can get all the gold back.

Agree with this approach. However, while "Taunting" I never had had to do any bribing, so I incurred no gold cost for this. Not sure what "Speechcraft" was, but I'm sure it was above 30. I was able to simply alternate from Persuade to Taunt until the hapless NPC broke off the conversation with "That's it. Goodbye". I then reinitiated conversation and repeated until the NPC response showed "NPC is in combat" and the faultless fight was on.

One may speed the process of alternating Persuade/Taunt selections by shifting & squeezing the conversation box so "Persuasion" lies just beneath the "Taunt" pop-up so one may simply do a double-click.

My "Player" was buying training for every skill important to promotions in his/her "Guilds" [Fighters, Mages, Imp. Cult, Blades & House Redoran] that she/he could afford and Speechcraft was in the group. Player was assisted in this endeavor by the ever-generous Indoril and Hlaalu Guards who were attacking [unprovoked] Player on sight [Player at one time wore sacred Indoril Armor]; No "Bounty" penalties + lots of loot Gold. HUGE income generation !!! Got about 1100 g for each set of Hlaalu gear and over 10,000 g for Indoril stuff [amount depends upon one's relative Disposition with the selected Smith [Enchanters or Traders with lots of Gold also make good fences]. Player also looted everything not tied down in the Balmora Camonna Tong Corner Club. Think there was a Quest or Training item in there [can't recall the details].

Originally posted by Coco Bryce:

I though Larrius Varro removes your bounty after you killed them all as a part of bad people quest.

THAT was an important factor in deciding to go ahead and take out the Balmora Camonna Tong club. Player decided to go ahead and waste everyone in their corner club, whether on Varro's hit list or not. Player even did an "innocent" entertainer [inadvertantly] inside the club plus the [non-List but not innocent] CTers on the roof-top patio [after verifying by their responses that they WERE CT].

Player then IMMEDIATELY beat feet out of town ["Divine Intervention" spell was used so Player transported directy to Varro's fort]. He/she ran directly to Varro, without talking to any other NPC [Talking to any Guard would result in incurring Bounty/imprisonment. Other NPCs would be fearful due to Player's now vast INfamous [negative] reputation].

Varro did clean up and clear the whole mess including the Bounties [no problems with Guards]. Player got a positive "Reputation" boost [no "Fear" from other NPCs]. Nice guy to have on your side! Maybe Imperial Trooper would be a good career line after that.