I jumped into a game today with my brother, hoping to enjoy a relaxing normal 5v5. The game started off pretty poorly – our mid was feeding, we lost two towers within 10 minutes, and the enemy Vayne had a very nice minion farm. I made a poor choice early and went for a tower dive on Mordekaiser as Nasus. I was halfway through the animation for Siphon Strike, an attack that surely would have ended the 6 HP Mordekaiser, when tower killed me. He quickly responded, “u bad?”

We proceeded to stomp the enemy team for the rest of the game. Somehow, despite the bad start, our team just started to move around the map together. Our Kayle got farmed. My brother started lighting up their carries with Veigar combos, and I was Siphon Striking for 700 damage before it was all said and done. Of course, I couldn’t let Mordekaiser’s trolling go unchalleneged, so when he died, I would respond, “u bad?”

Usually trolls will just argue, but he actually asked me to stop being a dick. I complied, though I reminded him that he started the “u bad,” and that he shouldn’t troll if he doesn’t want to be trolled back. Then he typed the most surprising thing I’ve seen in a while – “you have a point, I take it back.” It was a roundabout way to apologize, but much better than anything I’ve seen in the past. It’s amazing how showing a troll just how foolish and obnoxious they are can turn things around. I’m not advocating counter-trolling in every case, but in its more mild appearances, it sometimes helps to shed light on what is probably my least favorite convention of gaming/internet culture.