Troll

This page is in need of cleanup. Srsly. It's a fucking mess.

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This page is for the mythical creature. If you are looking for the page about the shiposters of the internet, please see Internet Troll.

Trolls originated in European mythology, with the iconic forms hailing from Scandinavian myths, though similar creatures like Oni or even Bigfoot exist in other cultures. Other than that, it's really hard to pin down what a "troll" officially is. According to TVTropes, this is because whenever one european culture didn't have a word for one of the monsters in another one's folklore, it was translated simply as "troll." Often they're big dumb brutes who turn to stone in sun light; one of the most well-known examples of these in fantasy literature would be the three trolls in Tolkien's The Hobbit. Norse myths go further and say these trolls are descended from or otherwise related to giants, or Jötnar. Other times, they are portrayed as smaller, social beings that can turn invisible and hoard gold and treasure, a bit like dwarves or gnomes. They're usually portrayed as fairly ugly, but not always; female trolls being surprisingly gorgeous, if inhuman isn't unheard of - for example, the Scandinavian Huldra is technically a female troll, but looks more like a nymph with a fox's or cow's tail, and/or a back that is either covered in bark or "hollow like a rotting tree", who just so happens to be as strong as ten men and very interested in securing a human husband.

In fantasy gaming, trolls are typically the next step up from or equivalent to ogres in the scale of "monstrous humanoids". Generally regarded as being giant-kin, due to the giant/troll/ogre overlap in European folklore, trolls are usually portrayed as being incredibly dim-witted but savage, strong and tough. They may also have one or two innate magical abilities to further differentiate them from ogres, with the most iconic of these being the ability to regenerate, thanks to the influence of Dungeons & Dragons.

D&D

"Come give granny a hug!"

The Dungeons & Dragons Troll (and, by extension, the Pathfinder Troll) is a lesser giant-offshoot race who are somewhere between ogres and hill giants in size, but not quite as stupid as either. However, they are still utterly savage due to an intense hunger, a side-effect of their powerful regenerative abilities. Nullified only by acid or fire, trollish regeneration has risen and fallen in terms of raw power over the edition - back in Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, for example, they literally could not die unless you burned the corpse with fire or chemicals, although certain "bodily destructive" spells like Disintegrate or Petrify could usually kill them as well, if your DM agreed.

Also, to those who look at the illustrations of each take on the common troll, it seems that every new edition, trolls get less wrinkly, less skinny, more buff, and their eyes become more noticeable.

D&D trolls were also highly mutable, with many different varieties arising as a result of dwelling place (the Scrags are amphibious trolls who need to be immersed in water to regenerate) or a result of hybridization with other giants (two-headed trolls descending from troll/ettin crossbreeding). Between the sheer variety of trolls, plus the addition of templates in 3.5, fighting them could be just as frustrating as fighting slimes as you tried to figure out what you were battling (for example, is it a Rock Troll, who only dies to Acid or Sonic Attacks? Or a Fire Troll, who only dies to Cold and Acid?) and how to kill it. In fact, with the right templates, a killer DM style gamesmaster could build a troll you could only kill if you strangled or drowned it.

Before you ask why D&D trolls regenerate, apparently it's because they were inspired by Poul Anderson’s Three Hearts and Three Lions, where regenerating trolls are an enemy defeated at one point.

D&D Trolls have their own god (or at least Demon Prince) named Vaprak, whom they share with Ogres. They are usually said to hate all non-evil giants.

And they suffer nilbogism, becoming the Llort. If you think Fiend Factory deserves a hearing after disgracing itself with the Fiend Folio, in which case you are a more forgiving person that most of us here.

In AD&D, trolls are stated to be matriarchal, living in small packs of 3-12 led by a dominant female, who gets her pick of the best males as her mates (producing a single pup about once every five years) and enforces her rule through beating the ever-living shit out of any uppity lesser females - and given trollish healing powers, these are bloody battles indeed, with the winner traditionally ripping the loser's head off to see if they'll survive the week or so it'll take for the head to grow back. The chieftess also doubles as the pack's shaman, functioning as a 7th level cleric who typically has access to the Spheres of Charm, Divination, Darkness and Weather. Her main role is leading the hunt for food.

D&D Troll Variants

Scrags are an amphibious troll breed.

Giant Trolls are the halfbreed bastard children of trolls and Hill Giants, imbuing them with the size and stature of the larger giant-kin. Whilst they lack the formidable fangs of a regular troll, the ability to use a tree (or the average human) as a club and beat fuckers to death with it tends to make up for this lack, as does their ability to grab boulders and hurl them at anyone they don't like. Hill giant chieftains often keep them as elite guards, and when not found in a hill giant clan, giant trolls still tend to roam in packs of 1d12, served by vassal packs of 2d6 regular trolls - who often end up as snacks for their bigger relatives if the hunting goes poorly! Giant Trolls can be killed with fire.

2-Headed Giant Trolls are what you get when a troll shags an Ettin. They're less formidable than their half-Hill Giant counterparts, but still a formidable threat, and often serve as leaders for regular troll packs.

Desert Trolls have adapted to life in the scorching desert, which has made them immune to normal fire - to kill them, you need to use acid, magical fire, or clean water, which now dissolves their flesh like acid (especially pure or holy water is doubly effective). These trolls are tougher and more tenacious than their more common counterparts, but they are also more solitary. They skulk at the edges of settled areas, waylaying travelers and polluting sources of pure water.

Ice Trolls are smaller but smarter than regular trolls, and inhabit icy areas, typically fighting for dominance with neighboring Snow Trolls. Like scrags, they can only regenerate if they are touching water. They are immune to cold (regular or magical) and to non-enchanted physical weapons, take double damage from fire, and have their regeneration nullified by fire and acid. Ice trolls live near settled regions, hoping to waylay and capture humans and demi-humans, even going so far as to use treasure from their victims to bait bandits and adventurers - when humanoid flesh is unavailable, they hunt for animals and steal livestock. They often capture humanoids alive and keep them well-fed until it's time for dinner. They have been known to hunt remorhaz and even pick off lone Frost Giants.

Snow Trolls are another frostfell-dwelling troll variant - not as organized as their Ice Troll rivals and lacking their resistance to unenchanted weaponry, but their regeneration is much more potent and they are much nastier. These trolls always hunt alone, or at most as a mother/young child pair. Each third year, dozens or even hundreds of snow trolls gather in the mid-winter darkness to mate in dark mountain valleys unknown to other creatures.

Spectral Trolls, also known as Troll Wraiths, are undead trolls cursed to take material form only in darkness, where they appear as regular trolls with jet black hair and skin. They are only vulnerable to silver and magical weapons, and can be turned as if they were spectres. A humanoid slain by a spectral troll becomes one itself in three days, unless a proper burial ceremony is performed by a priest of the victim’s religion. Spectral trolls vanish in direct sunlight. They do not take damage from sunlight, they merely fade from view and reappear at the same spot at nightfall. Even those captured, unconscious, or trapped in temporal stasis have escaped permanent imprisonment in this manner.

Spirit Trolls are either a mutated form of Spectral Troll or a hybrid of troll and Invisible Stalker, depending on who you ask. Naturally invisible and immune to unenchanted weapons and cold, they are vulnerable to fire. They attack with a Strength-sapping and a bite attack that allows the spirit troll to heal itself by draining the victim's life.

Legacy Trolls are mutated scrags from the Red Steel subsetting of Mystara.

Troll Mutates are trolls who have lived in close proximity to a portal or dimensional bleedover from the Far Realm, which has resulted in their regeneration going haywire and producing horrific mutations, which only multiple as the mutate takes further damage and its warped healing factor is pushed to its limit. The typical troll mutate has multiple eyes and a third arm, whilst the pack matriarch, who drives off or devours any rival females, tends to have two heads, mental wild talents, and a prehensile tentacle-tail. Mutated packs spend much of their time merely surviving, for they share their environment with roving bands of Far Realm-derived horrors, such as brood gibberlings, Gibbering Mouthers, and myconid work bands. (The myconids are not particularly dangerous to the trolls, but are eaten with gusto.) These trolls appeared in the Firestorm Peak adventure, so all lore for them only describes a single tribe.

D&D Troll PCs

In BECMI, Trolls were amongst the "humanoid" races given a PC writeup in the Orcs of Thar splatbook. They stand out for having the highest XP requirements in the game, but between their regeneration ability and the ridiculously high (for the edition) number of hit points they were scoring? It was kind of justified.

Troll Ability Modifiers: +2 Strength, -2 Dexterity, -2 Intelligent, -2 Wisdom, -2 Charisma

Troll Minimum Strength: 16

Note: Like all Humanoids from "The Orcs of Thar", a Troll has racial ability score caps of 18 in all scores bar Intelligence and Wisdom, which are capped at 16.

Note: Like all Humanoids from "The Orcs of Thar", a Troll determines its Charisma score for interacting with humans and demihumans by dividing its Charisma score by 3 (rounding down) and subtacting the result from - not the normal 9, but an 8, such is their terrifying appearance and reputation.

Troll Natural Armor Class: 9

Troll PCs retain their Regeneration (starts healing 3 rounds after first injured, heals 3 hit points per round, can't regenerate wounds inflicted by fire/acid, can't die unless destroyed with fire/acid), but this ability doesn't develop until they reach Normal Monster status (Level 0).

Can become a Shaman (4th level) or a Wokani (2nd level).

Troll's level	XP Required	Troll's hit dice
Whelp (-3)	-35,200	3d8+2
Youngster (-2)	-26,400	4d8+2
Teenager (-1)	-17,600	5d8+3
0	0	6d8+3
1	35,200	7d8+4
2	105,600	8d8+4
3	246,400	-
4	528,000	9d8+5
5	828,000	10d8+5
6	1,128,000	11d8+5
7	1,428,000	-
8	1,728,000	12d8+5
9	2,028,000	+2 Hit Points
Subsequent	300,000	+2 Hit Points

Gallery

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  Pathfinder

Hordes

Trolls in the Hordes are a very different ballgame from your typical depiction. They come in a wide variety of subspecies from the huge dire trolls that are closer to your standard monster trolls, and the comparatively smaller trollkin who make up the bulk of the Trollbloods faction. Trollkin are as intelligent and civilized as humans, though they are less advanced technology which leads to a lot of oppression from humans. On the whole they are closer to the heroic variety orcs than your standard trolls.

Shadowrun

In Shadowrun, trolls are essentially the game's equivalent to ogres, being a relative of the orc metahuman strain who grows even larger and more powerful, with pronounced bony growths, mostly in the form of long, curling, ram-like horns sprouting from the skull. 4th edition introduced racial metavariants, mostly centered in the appropriate geographical areas, who naturally were named Cyclops(Mediterranian- One eye, few horns and bony growths, but bigger muscles), Minotaurs(Also Mediterranian- bigger horns, wide, flared nostils, and more body hair), Giants(Germany, Scandinavia, and northeastern Europe- about 10' tall, No horns or dermal deposits, leathery skin), Fomori(British Isles- Smaller and no demal deposits, but better with and against magic. Also slightly prettier).

Warhammer

In Warhammer Fantasy, trolls are one of the races allied with the Orcs & Goblins army, being one of the few creatures even stupider and more brutal than the greenskins. These ogre-like Chaos-touched humanoids are mindless predators, who'll eat just about anything courtesy of hyper-corrosive stomach juices. This meant that not only could they regenerate and appear in mutant varieties for more killing power (rock trolls that were magic resistant due to turning partially into living stone as a result of eating too much rock, for example), but they could also wipe out whole regiments of heavily armoured foes by puking on them. For many years GeeDubs had managed to acquire (re: Throw some food towards and then beat them around the head) some Stone Trolls to provide menial labour in their Mail Order division. However after a dispute, they demanded to be renamed something less conspicuous to what they actually were. After all, it is hard to kill and eat interns if they can see the obvious signs of troll life in the warehouse. Renamed to 'Troggoth' in Age of Sigmar and grouped into Gloomspite Gitz. Varieties in Warhammer Fantasy included Common Trolls, River Trolls, Stone Trolls, Sea Trolls or "Shugons", Chaos Trolls, Bile Trolls of Nurgle, 3 Armed Mutant Trolls bred by Clan Moulder, Ice Trolls of Norsca, and Magma Trolls bred by the Chaos Dwarfs who must be an absolute bitch to kill with their fire resistance. In Age of Sigmar, returning and new Troggoths included Sourbreath Troggoths (Common Trolls), Fellwater Troggoths (River Trolls), Rockgut Troggoths (Stone Trolls), Deepwater Troggoths (Shugons/Sea Trolls), Dankhold Troggoths (Fungus-covered Cave Trolls), Sulphurbreath Troggoths (Magma Trolls), Sloggoths (a new breed of quadrupedal scavenger troll), Mirebrute Troggoths (a more brutish species of swamp troggoth), Bile Troggoths (Bile Trolls, duh), and the Angujakkak, a kaiju-sized hybrid of Deepwater Troggoth and Mega-Squids, who appear as giant, see-through skin having beasts of the sea, one of whom defends a Free City. Trolls also apparently exist on planet Fenris in Warhammer 40K in the form of Ice Trolls, who utilize trees as clubs and are semi-sentient, along with smaller relatives referred to as Ice Fiends, who are described as being similar to descriptions of Yeti.

Monster Hunter International

Monster Hunter International Trolls are much like the D&D Troll. They are big, green, ugly, strong and regenerate while being weak to fire. There's one critical difference though: They're also highly proficient at non-in-person communication methods. In the past they were primarily mail and phone scammers (eg Nigerian prince). Now they are hackers and, yes, internet trolls.

Monstergirls

With how diversely trolls look, this is a perfectly legitimate depiction of a female troll. (No we don't know where her nipples are either)

This article or section is about Monstergirls (or a monster that is frequently depicted as a Monstergirl), something that /tg/ widely considers to be the purest form of awesome. Expect PROMOTIONS! and /d/elight in equal measure, often with drawfaggotry or writefaggotry to match.

Troll monstergirls are a touch rare, mostly because, due to what defines a troll being so diverse, they are all-too-often easily confused with ogre monster-girls.

An artist called F.K. Andersson (now known as DerangedMeowMeow) portrays his female trolls as inspired by Shadowrun's trolls; tall, curvaceous musclegirls with lion-like tails, cute little tusks, and curling ram-like horns. They regularly seek out humans to interbreed with (as do their male counterparts, who are likewise portrayed as fairly handsome) because prolonged interbreeding with only trolls causes them to devolve into hideous, mindless monsters, forcing them to regularly "supplement" their blood with human blood. Still, the couples tend to be happy.

The Huldra is an actual mythical "troll" who is portrayed as being both very attractive and very interested in winning herself a human husband.

The Monster Girl Encyclopedia bases its trolls on Germanic myths, predominantly Swedish; their trolls are shy, gentle and affectionate humanoids with big ears, oversized hands & feet, and cute little cow-like tails. They suffer an inferiority complex about their appendages, as well as their strongly arousing feminine musk, and so decorate themselves with flowers to try and make themselves "look pretty". They possess a powerful natural affinity for earth elementalism, and some forward-thinking individuals have actually sought them out as brides, hoping that when the Demon Lord finally gets past the Chief God's "no men born of monsters!" curse, their sons will likewise be powerful wizards with prodigious affinity for the magics of earth and plants.