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[kaian-a-coel]

It's not a question of "hatred and dirty tricks". It's a case of giving him a perfectly valid reason to come and get our lands.

And for Gilles, come on, 200+ children kill? What is he? A fairytale monster?

He was called before the inquisition after the whole priest-arrestation thing because he did it during a religious time or something, so it was "mildly heretic". Knowing (or rather thinking) he was before the inquisition for that, he acknowledged the tribunal. They had to have him do that, because he was too high ranked. He could have refused to acknowledge the tribunal and they would have been powerless.
And after that, they spilled out the 200+ childrape/killing and all the horrible, horrible things that make him look like a complete demon, and he's screwed. And they get all his belongings.


A: Wars DO happen when not-so-random (son-in-law, remember?) merchant are arrested by a vassal right in one's land.

B: he has at least ten to twenty times our forces, and our neighbour won't join us if we just kidnapped the count's son-in-law.

C: His death is evidence in itself: that someone was behind him.

[Mlamlah]

Which is why we go about this the legal way, we seek to charge and apprehend the merchant, as is our right. We raise a fuss, and make it apparent we have a legitimate claim, we also send letters to our friends alerting them of the situation. This witness, and the prisoners, give us a lot of power in this situation because we have a legitimate gripe, and if we go through legitimate means no one can stop us outright. If he attacks us for attempting a perfectly legal thing then *he* will be the one commiting treason, not us.

[Gervassen]

A: It's still a legal matter. And the historical punishment is a fine, not massacring our peasantry while we're not even there.

B: By general concensus, our forces are large. Then we have trained reserves of 200, then our neighbors who can mobilize every bit as fast as the Count could, then you consider how many other enemies the count has stepped on...

C: Those two agents that we have lead to one man: the wool merchant. All the evidence that we will ever get will always lead to... the wool merchant.

To be anachronistic for a second, but relevantly so, in the way of speaking timeless truths: It's like busting the mafia. The only way you get the capo is by turning his button-men. You never get actual dirt on him. The wool merchant is the only evidence implicating the Count that you'll ever find.

[GreatWyrmGold]

^Not my style, but that's a valid option.  However, what if they are convinced to change it?  Edits?

Bummer. Edited suggestions will be ignored.

That would be pretty cruel. Even edits to just correct a typo or something? Or ones which are critically suicidal once a forgotten point of info is recalled?

And while all these clever subterfugey ideas sound neat...what's wrong with just gathering the evidence and bringing it to higher authorities (the duke) before acting? It shows we can be counted on to not go off and attack someone on our own suspicions and may help us avoid breaking some sort of obscure law or policy. And, it doesn't give the count a legitimate reason to attack us. If we capture and even just imprison and interrogate the count's son-in-law, our position with the duke and king is a lot shakier than if we go to the duke with our evidence that, hey, this merchant is hiring trespassers and whatnot who attacked my men, we should punish him.

[Mlamlah]

I guess it makes sense to simply go over the counts head, but i would also be alright going to Sir Uriel Lope, as it's his jurisdiction.

[kaian-a-coel]

Going to the count for it, and not directly the duke, will have the same effect, if not better.
Because:

1) We accuse the merchant
a) The count refuse to listen us: he is more suspicious. Go to duke.
b) He accept.

2) Trial: Present all evidence.
a) If the count rule innocent, he become more suspicious. Gather more evidence and repeat.
b) The count rule Guilty: the attacks are expected to stop by everyone.

3) after the trial
a) Attacks stop. Enjoy peaceful life, keep an eye open.
b) Attacks don't stop. Repeat the whole process. The count ends up one man shorter and we have more evidence toward him (all men ending up in trial will be linked to him in some way)

[Gervassen]

It's not a question of "hatred and dirty tricks". It's a case of giving him a perfectly valid reason to come and get our lands.

No. The fief was given to us by the King, so the Count may be the largest local authority, but our land was not his desmesnal holding, recieved from him with an oath of fealty. Do you remember swear fealty to him? I'm not entirely sure that we are his direct vassal without an oath. He can't march on it.

And for Gilles, come on, 200+ children kill? What is he? A fairytale monster?

Use logic here. Gilles didn't get executed for arresting someone. He got executed because he made enemies by arresting someone. The Count is ALREADY our enemy. You can't change that by not arresting the wool merchant.

A: Wars DO happen when not-so-random (son-in-law, remember?) merchant are arrested by a vassal right in one's land.

No. They don't. If he wants to chase after us, fine. If he wants to attack us, also fine. But there is no legal basis for either.

B: he has at least ten to twenty times our forces, and our neighbour won't join us if we just kidnapped the count's son-in-law.

We've already seen his forces. We were part of them. I think we and our allies can handle that.

C: His death is evidence in itself: that someone was behind him.

Oh! Someone! That's narrows it down a little.   

[10ebbor10]

Capturing someone's son in law by force in the Count's city is a serious offence, and is probably enough to justify an armed conflict. It won't be difficult for the Count to fabricate a evidence that we intended to blackmail him, or something like that.

Oh, and by taking action against the cloth merchant we make it very clear that we're not the dumb idiot he thinks us to be. Otherwise he might have hired actually competent assisins.

Just as a note, we have 35 people; the Count had like what, 50-100 cavelery, I dunno, add to that a militia and city guard and I think he outnumbers our entire city population. Our friends won't join us if the Count has any legal claim behind it(see above) and probably won't be in time anyway.

Oh, and what makes you think the Cotton merchant will tell the truth once we hand him over. It's much more in his interest to support the Count (at the trial that is, he will tell what we want to hear during our investigation). Face it, we have little real evidence (peasants don't really count) so it'll end up word against word. Doubt we'll win that.

[GreatWyrmGold]

It's not a question of "hatred and dirty tricks". It's a case of giving him a perfectly valid reason to come and get our lands.

No. The fief was given to us by the King, so the Count may be the largest local authority, but our land was not his desmesnal holding, recieved from him with an oath of fealty. Do you remember swear fealty to him? I'm not entirely sure that we are his direct vassal without an oath. He can't march on it.

Still doesn't mean we can just arrest his subjects.

A: Wars DO happen when not-so-random (son-in-law, remember?) merchant are arrested by a vassal right in one's land.

No. They don't. If he wants to chase after us, fine. If he wants to attack us, also fine. But there is no legal basis for either.

If we detained his son-in-law and vassal without any kind of official justification, he would.

B: he has at least ten to twenty times our forces, and our neighbour won't join us if we just kidnapped the count's son-in-law.

We've already seen his forces. We were part of them. I think we and our allies can handle that.

Only if we keep them allies, which requires not looking like a sphincter.

And we have some evidence, mainly from the assassins, like how the first set was looking for a Sir Rock (no reason to lie about that) and these connections to the wool merchant, not to mention the clear motive...but yes, our case is a bit shaky for now.

[Gervassen]

--

[kaian-a-coel]

I still maintain that abducting the count's family member will net us a war and a game over.

[tryrar]

Guys, we can't just do nothing this time, this is starting to come to a head. We need to shut down the guy once for all one way or another. If arresting him is to fraught with political implications, then just quietly assassinate the guy like I suggested earlier

[Gervassen]

--

[Mlamlah]

If the Count attacks us, it is treason. We are a servant of the king, an unjustified attack on a kings vassal is an attack on the king himself. If we go to an authority, either the count, his marshal or the duke, we are doing things legitimately, as long as we do things legitimately we have the legal right to demand justice, any refusal to allow us to do so is very bad form, outright illegal if he handles that wrong.
I do not think we should kidnap the merchant, we should charge him, doing so forces our enemies into a situation they can't win in.
Also, the merchant may very well give up the count in exchange for leniency.
This merchant tried to *kill* us, and now is sending armed men into our lands, i would be surprised if he could worm himself out of that, counts son in law or no.

[10ebbor10]

If the Count attacks us, it is treason. We are a servant of the king, an unjustified attack on a kings vassal is an attack on the king himself. If we go to an authority, either the count, his marshal or the duke, we are doing things legitimately, as long as we do things legitimately we have the legal right to demand justice, any refusal to allow us to do so is very bad form, outright illegal if he handles that wrong.
I do not think we should kidnap the merchant, we should charge him, doing so forces our enemies into a situation they can't win in.
Also, the merchant may very well give up the count in exchange for leniency.
This merchant tried to *kill* us, and now is sending armed men into our lands, i would be surprised if he could worm himself out of that, counts son in law or no.

If the count attacks us succesfully, "finds" some documents somewhere that indicate rebellious things, and wins before anyone can intervene, nothing happens. The Duke won't risk a civil war over one lowly knight.

Remember that the links are pretty weak. We got some peasants saying that he did so, nothing else. Now, give a peasant a bag full of money ,and he says what you want. The merchant just has to deny all the claims, no more, no less.

The wool merchant will crack because he's the front man. He knows what he is, and what being caught means, and if he doesn't we can make him.

Why would he. We got no real proof. We got 2 peasants, but can you trust those. See, for the merchant there are 2 options:
-Talk: Sentence + wrath of Count and supporters
-Don't talk: No sentence + wrath of the knight you tried to kill
Also, we can't make him talk during the trial. We don't have the right to keep him in our custody*, so we'll need to surrender the prisoner to either the Duke or the count. Now, it's kinda hard to torture people during a formal trial.

*Read, don't have the political power to afford doing that without being called a blackmailing traitor

Because, really medieval Judgings are decided by Money, political power and military force. WHo's right and who's wrong has nothing to do with it.